She was five feet, two inches tall, weighing just over 100 pounds. Yet the little woman in the white jacket and high heels was staring down a colonel, a major, and a Jaffa, and all three of them were very close to shuffling their feet in guilty embarrassment.
"There had better be a good explanation for this," she said coolly.
"It's not really their fault, Janet," came a plaintive, somewhat nasal voice from the other side of the curtain, where one of the nurses was busy applying some strapping. Then, "Ow!"
"Shut up, Doctor Jackson," Janet ordered without shifting her glare from her three victims. "These training exercises were specifically designed to minimize casualties, Colonel. Under the circumstances, I would like to know how Daniel ended up in my infirmary with a broken nose, three cracked ribs, and a sprained ankle."
"Well." Jack, still dressed in a tacky scarlet robe with gold filigree, cleared his throat. "Well," he said again, then stopped.
Janet waited, foot starting to tap, but Jack seemed to have run out of words.
"It was supposed to be a foothold situation," Sam offered. "Daniel was one of the hostages, like me."
"Hostages," Janet repeated, the word dripping with skepticism. "I take it that no one told the trainees that hostages aren't supposed to be shot?"
"Part of the scenario included the hostages themselves proving to be a threat," Teal'c clarified hastily. The clanking of his armor as he shifted minutely betrayed his discomfort at the doctor's displeasure. "The trainees were told that the hostages must be neutralized as well as the enemy."
"Neutralized." Janet's eyebrows rose. "By shooting them?"
Jack waved a hand, still encased in a fake ribbon device. "Look, the trainees need to be flexible about what they're told, even if it seems far-fetched."
"Far-fetched is par for the course around here," Janet agreed, her voice just a little too mild.
Another muffled "Ow!" from behind the curtain made the threesome cringe as Janet's eyes narrowed that much further.
"We told the trainees that the Goa'uld had a new kind of ribbon device that allowed them to read their prisoners' conscious minds," Sam blurted in a rush. "So they thought that the Goa'uld, er, the colonel would be able to get crucial information from Daniel and me if we weren't taken out of the equation as quickly as possible. And since the Goa'uld was behind an energy shield, and couldn't be attacked..."
"You're teaching young recruits to kill people instead of rescuing them?"
"Not kill, Doc! Just -- incapacitate." Jack tried his most winning smile. "They were supposed to knock Daniel and Carter out so that the Big Bad couldn't eat their brains."
"I thought you were a Goa'uld, Colonel. Not a zombie."
"Zombies, Goa'ulds -- what's the difference?"
Janet took a deep breath, but Teal'c quickly spoke before she could fully explode. "The trainees encountered us at the top of a flight of stairs, Doctor Frasier. I fear that their enthusiasm to succeed allowed them to disregard the risk of a firefight in such a location."
"They shot Daniel and he fell down the stairs?" Janet blinked, then frowned. "That would account for some of his injuries, yes. But does not explain why everyone seems to feel that you three are responsible!"
"Ah. Well." Jack coughed. "We, uh, realized that Daniel was going to fall, you see, and we tried to stop it."
"And that's a problem because...?"
"Because we all tried to stop it at once, Janet," Sam admitted, sighing.
"They could've just not shot me," complained Daniel from his infirmary bed.
"As far as we can reconstruct, Doctor," Teal'c said gravely, "I was reaching for Daniel Jackson's shoulder just as Major Carter tried to grasp his jacket. Her hand inadvertently redirected my aim towards Daniel Jackson's face."
"And I might've knocked into Daniel's foot when I moved to grab hold of him," Jack mumbled. "In the confusion, I mean."
"But it wouldn't have been so bad if we'd --"
"It was most unfortunate that --"
"It's not like we wanted to --"
"Quiet! All of you!" The sheer volume of Janet's voice shocked them all into silence, broken only by a very small "Ow!" from the direction of the bed behind the curtain.
"Let me get this straight," Janet said at last, piecing the story together. "Colonel O'Neill and Teal'c were holding Major Carter and Doctor Jackson prisoner. You were ambushed at the top of a flight of stairs and Doctor Jackson was shot by one of the recruits. And in your efforts to stop him from falling down the stairs, Teal'c broke his nose, the colonel kicked him in the ankle, and Major Carter actually shoved him off the landing?"
"Uh... yes."
"Indeed."
"That about sums it up, Doc."
"Getting shot by an intar isn't all that fun, either," Daniel grumbled.
Janet slowly rubbed her hand across her face. "Well," she finally sighed, "I hope you've all learned to be more careful in the future."
"And no more getting shot!" Daniel called.
The colonel, sensing Janet's reluctant acceptance of the situation, quickly slipped past her and poked his head through the curtain. "How about just getting taken prisoner next time?"
"How about something that doesn't involve stairs?" Daniel snorted, then winced.
"How about both?" Sam suggested, following the colonel to Daniel's bedside. "I'm really sorry about this, Daniel."
"As am I, Daniel Jackson," Teal'c agreed, joining the rest of his team.
"I owe you a punch in the nose," Daniel warned him, squinting through the two black eyes that were rapidly forming. "But I forgive you." He tried to smile, and winced again. "I think I do, anyway," he added.
"Oh, like you've never --"
As SG-1 amiably bickered and argued, Janet faded into the background and slipped quietly into her private office. She carefully closed and locked the door, sat at her desk, and laughed until she had to wipe tears from her eyes. The Keystone Kops, bravely defending the planet! She couldn't wait to tell this one to Cassie -- and in wicked, loving detail.
Heliopolis Main Archive
A Stargate: SG-1 Fanfiction Site
Ten for the Team
by Fig NewtonKapitel Bemerkung:
In Proving Ground, Daniel says, "I like this scenario way better than the last one," and "You did tell them to take me prisoner this time and not shoot me, right?" This is a slightly cracky explanation for why Daniel gets the comfy general's chair.Site Navigation
Support Heliopolis