Team Building
Sometimes being a general sucks, big time.
I just had to discipline a friend.
Lou Ferretti, Major.
I knew that what he had done had been exactly what I would have done in the same situation. But I also knew that General Hammond would have dealt with it in the same way. Obeying orders is one of the foundations upon which a successful military force is built. The fact that you don’t agree with an order does not give you the right to ignore it. Or in Lou’s case – disobey it. Sure, there had been mitigating circumstances; Lou wasn’t to know that we had a rescue team ready to move out as soon as he had come through the gate, but he didn’t give me time to explain. When I had ordered him to leave his team and come home, he’d been blunt and to the point. It wouldn’t have worried me if it hadn’t been for the listeners in the Control Room. Lou and I go back a long time and we had exchanged words many times. Like I said – it wouldn’t have worried me.
Unfortunately the audience had left me with no alternative and Lou had been docked several weeks pay and had to perform clerical duties on world for the next two months. He was not a happy camper.
Like I said – sometimes being a general sucks.
Now I was hiding out.
I was eating lunch at my desk when the tentative knock sounded on my door.
“Jack?” Daniel poked his head around the door as he opened it.
“Hey, Daniel.” I put my sandwich down and wiped my fingers on a tissue. Since when had Daniel knocked on my door? Didn’t he just open it and walk in? Then I thought about it. I couldn’t remember the last time that Daniel had visited me here. I saw him in the mess hall and sometimes I went to his office, but he hadn’t been in my office for a while.
Actually, thinking about it, I hadn’t even been to his office for weeks. I had been too busy. And when was the last time that I’d just hung out with Carter and Teal’c?
“I’m not disturbing you?”
Damn – this was not good at all.
I glanced down at the reports and forms spread across the surface of my desk and made a decision.
“No, Daniel. In fact I just finished what I needed to do. Want to go get a coffee? Why don’t I buzz Carter & T and see if they want to join us?”
He smiled and his whole face lit up.
o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o
Daniel’s smile was echoed by Carter when she waved to us from a table on the far side of the room.
“I’m glad that you suggested this, sir. I needed to take a break.” She was already nursing a cup of tea, her hands cupped around it as if they were cold.
“Indeed, O’Neill. I too am grateful for the opportunity to take refreshments.” Teal’c came up behind us, pulled out a chair and seated himself between Daniel and myself.
“Well, I had nothing better to do.” My smile faded when I saw their reaction to my joking words.
Oh crap! They thought that I meant it.
When had things gotten this bad?
It had happened gradually. First I had shut myself off after my second pleasant visit as a guest of Ba’al’s, then there had been the episode with Juliet. I really had thought that we were back to normal after that, but I had been kidding myself. I had ignored that little warning feeling that I had had when I realised that I spent more time with Thor than I did with my team. I hadn’t had time to do anything about it.
That’s what it came down to.
Who was I trying to kid?
It wasn’t that I hadn’t had time. It was that I hadn’t taken the time. I had taken my friends for granted.
“What have you been up to, kids?” Carter and Daniel began to babble happily about their latest projects, each trying to talk over the top of the other. I caught Teal’c’s eye. His raised eyebrow and quizzical look told me all that I needed to know. Their response to my simple question was enough to show me that I had to do something about this situation, and quickly.
o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o
“Aww, come on, sir! You know I’m owed a vacation.” I perched myself on the corner of Hammond’s desk and tried to look as pitiful as possible. I really don’t know why I bother; George was never fooled and never will be. He knows me far too well. But it was the truth – I was owed a vacation. My last one was rudely interrupted only hours after it started. I could feel a righteous indignation welling up.
I deserved this vacation and I was going to get it.
I think that George could see the light of combat in my eyes because he held up a warning hand.
“Just a minute there, Jack. I didn’t say that you couldn’t take a break. There is no denying that you are entitled to one. I just can’t justify letting the whole of SG-1 take leave at the same time.”
“But we have been going off world together for years and there was never any problem. What’s the difference? Just pretend that we are on a mission, except we won’t be in any danger, except for the wild trees of course. And Teal’c might want to drive.”
George shook his head. I could see his lips twitching and knew that he was fighting not to laugh. “This is different and you know it. There would be four key members of the SGC off base at the same time. Each of you has added responsibilities now. For example Major Carter is in the middle of crucial experiments on the DHD programming.”
I decided that I would have to show my hand. I explained how I had been neglecting my team lately and that our friendship was suffering because of it. I think that he was extremely surprised that I was admitting so much to him, but I had come to the realisation that I would have to be honest – not just with him, but with the others as well. Most of my problems lately stemmed from my lack of trust. When I had been standing on the bridge of Thor’s ship and felt more at home there than at the SGC it should have been a wake up call.
I was pleased to say that General Hammond agreed to my request and gave the whole of SG-1 five days leave.
o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o
It hadn’t taken much persuading to prise Carter away from her, oh so important experiments, or Daniel from his rocks.
I suppose that everyone assumed that I would drag my team kicking and screaming to my cabin.
Well, they’d be wrong.
We didn’t have a lot of time and I didn’t want to spend it travelling. So we went to a small hotel in the mountains and settled in to just relax. All three of them seemed quite happy to go with the flow and let me book the accommodation. I picked a hotel that I had visited many years ago with Sara – not too big, with a nice personal feel to it. I remembered that it had some fairly challenging walks in the hills around it and, more importantly, a poolroom.
We checked in and, after unpacking, met downstairs in the bar. Maybe it wasn’t the best plan. We ended up sitting there until dinnertime. So much for the healthy, invigorating walks that I had envisioned. For a change we shared a couple of bottles of red wine instead of my normal beer. All in all a very pleasant evening.
But we really didn’t talk.
I suppose that it was too much to hope for – that Jack O’Neill would bare his soul and come clean to his friends that he missed them.
It was much easier to eat a good dinner and play pool until the early hours, then fall into bed with no thought of snakeheads, little grey guys or other assorted aliens.
o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o
I tore myself from the nightmare and flung myself out of the bed to lie shivering on the floor.
What the hell was going on here? Sure, I’ve had nightmares before – who wouldn’t after some of the stuff that I’ve been through – but this one had been so real that it frightened me. I sat up and rubbed my eye with my hand, trying to blink away the blurriness. Hovering on the edge of my memory was the feeling of something sharp being pushed forcefully into my eyeball. I shook my head and pushed myself up off the floor.
I thought that I was over that whole Ba’al thing – or as over it as I could hope to be. Damn, but I felt terrible. The prospect of getting up in three hours time wasn’t one that sent me all a quiver with enthusiasm. It was pointless trying to go back to sleep now. Even with the memory of the nightmare receding rapidly, my heart was still pounding in my chest.
Christ! Had I yelled out? Had I woken the whole floor?
I sat on the edge of the bed and listened.
No sound of doors opening or worried voices in the corridor. Thank God.
I tried to remember the dream, but all I had was a feeling of terror and pain.
Could be any number of repressed memories from my exciting and colourful past.
The mini bar suddenly looked very inviting, despite its overly inflated prices.
o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o
“O’Neill?”
I jerked awake to find myself in the badly stuffed armchair beside the window. Getting up to let Teal’c into the room convinced me that I was much too old to be sleeping in a chair. My back would be making this point for the next day at least.
It wasn’t until Teal’c came in and gave me a very disapproving stare that I noticed the row of miniature bottles lined up along the windowsill. That explained the headache.
“Major Carter asked me to remind you that we were meeting for breakfast. We have been in the dining room for thirty minutes.” Teal’c’s voice was unemotional, but I could feel the disappointment.
Way to go, Jack. Great start to the team bonding exercise.
“Just give me a few minutes and I’ll be down, T.” He left without another word.
It took me just under ten minutes to tidy myself up enough to be respectable company.
I hadn’t been sure that Teal’c would have said anything to the others, but it was obvious that he had. He must have been very pissed at me. Pissed didn’t cover the expression on Daniel’s face and I couldn’t see Carter because she was resolutely refusing to look at me.
“Hey, guys.” I tried to act as if nothing was wrong but that didn’t work. I think that I turned a little green when I saw the bacon on Daniel’s plate. I ordered a coffee and sipped at it. The silence was beginning to be unbearable.
Finally I took the bull by the horns.
“Sorry.”
Well that went down well. The silence stretched on.
“Shit, Jack. Can’t you bear to be in our company unless you drink yourself stupid?”
That got my attention. I looked up and glared into Daniel’s angry face. “What exactly is that suppose to mean?”
“Just what I said. It seems that whenever you have a problem you try to solve it with alcohol and from where I’m sitting, we have become one of your problems.”
Carter reached out and put her hand on Daniel’s arm. “Don’t.” Only one short word, but it conveyed a world of hurt.
“It isn’t like that.” I had gone from angry to desperate in the space of a breath. “You know that the last time I got drunk was because of being so ill after …” I stopped and looked around. We couldn’t talk about this here. In fact we really couldn’t talk freely about anything. That was part of the problem. “Listen. We obviously need to clear the air about some things. What say we go for a walk along one of the trails?”
One of the things that I had learnt since become a General was when to step back and take a hard look at the whole picture rather than going in guns blazing. I was, by nature, a guns blazing sort of guy, so this lesson had taken me quite a while to learn.
Daniel had begun to shake his head, but Teal’c overrode him. “Indeed, O’Neill. I believe that that would be a good idea.”
o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o
The first few minutes of the walk were done in silence. The crisp air was beginning to clear my head and I began to warm up as we strode along at a fast pace. It was as if we all wanted to force the angry feelings out of our bodies with the exercise. When we reached the top of a small rise, far enough away from listening ears, I called a halt.
“Okay. First I want to apologise.” I sat on a flat-topped boulder and massaged my aching knee. “The only excuse I have for last night is that I had a bad dream and couldn’t get back to sleep.”
“What was the dream about, sir?” I could hear the concern in Carter’s voice and knew that she was thinking about my reaction to Ba’al’s memory stripping machine.
“That doesn’t matter, Sam.” I softened my words with a slight smile. “What does matter is that I’ve let you down a few too many times in the past months. I’ve been taking you all for granted and none of you deserve that. There has been times and will be again, when I can’t tell you everything that is going on, but I swear that from now on I’ll be there as much as possible.” I said all this while staring at the dirt around my shoe.
It was very interesting dirt.
Daniel cleared his throat. “Ah Jack, I can’t speak for Sam and Teal’c but I do understand that you are under a lot of pressure at the moment. The thing that really bugs me is that you can take the time to play poker with Thor, but you can’t take the time to talk to your friends here on Earth. The only time that we see you is in meetings and on the occasional mission. It feels like there isn’t an SG-1 anymore. Just General O’Neill and three friends who wait patiently for him to notice them. You throw us a scrap of friendship every now and then.” He must have found the dirt very interesting too because he didn’t look up once during his speech.
I thought about what he had said and knew that there was some truth in it. My team was hurting and I’d done nothing to help them. Sure, they were adults and as such I could have told them to live with it and stop sulking, but that wasn’t what they were doing. They had been genuinely pleased when I had been promoted. It was probably my fault – I had been the one to assure them that nothing would change. I had been wrong.
Very wrong.
Of course it had changed.
Everything had changed and it was impossible to go back to the way that things had been.
I dragged my gaze up and looked at each of them in turn. Carter was obviously upset. I knew that she never liked these sort of emotional scenes – they made her uncomfortable. Daniel looked a bit apprehensive, probably worrying that I would react badly to what he had just said and Teal’c was studying my face as if trying to see what was behind the mask.
Oh yes – there was a mask. I may have decided to talk candidly to them, but I would never bare my soul. I have too many things to hide.
“There will always be an SG-1, kids, but it will never be the same as it use to be” I dropped my words into the puddle and watched as the ripples reached them. They each reacted as I had expected. Carter looked resigned, Daniel looked angry and Teal’c just nodded in complete understanding. “I can’t deny that things have changed and I won’t pretend that they’ll go back to the way they were, but I’m going to do my best to make sure that we are still a team. I can’t say much more then that.”
“That is all that I expect, O’Neill” Teal’c’s deep voice rumbled towards me. He stood and brushed down his trousers. “I believe that we should be able to reach that far hill by lunchtime.”
I squinted into the distance and spied a vague outline a very long way away. I moaned.
I would take my punishment like a man.
o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o
The pain hit just after we had reached the summit. I would have done my stoic best to ignore it, but I couldn’t. It was like someone was pushing a knife into my gut.
“What’s wrong, sir?” Carter had obviously noticed something. Must have been the groans and the clutching of the stomach – go figure.
I didn’t answer. It’s hard to speak when you are being disembowelled. I shut my eyes and tried to ride out the pain. I knew that the others were watching me anxiously, but I couldn’t say anything to reassure them. To be honest, I was as scared as hell.
I felt a hand on my shoulder as I stood hunched over. Then, just as suddenly as it had begun, the pain stopped. I opened my eyes and looked into Daniel’s worried ones. It was a minute before I could manage to catch my breath enough to speak.
“That was fun.” Jack O’Neill – master of the sarcastic understatement.
“What is it?” Daniel put a hand on my forehead and I shrugged it away.
“I don’t know. I’ve never felt anything like it before.” But I had a sneaking suspicion that I might know the cause. Visions of ulcers sprang to mind. I had experienced a lot of stress over the past months. I sat silently and thought it through while my friends exchanged concerned looks.
No – I was not an ulcer sort of person. No. I might bottle things up inside but I didn’t stress – I just got angry. And before you think it, I know that anger can cause stress, but I am NOT an ulcer sort of person. I refuse to let it be an ulcer.
“General, we need to get you back and let a doctor look at you.” Carter had assumed her unofficial role of team medic. I knew that she was probably right, but I didn’t want to go back just yet. I needed to think.
“Let me sit here for a minute, then we’ll go.” I interrupted her protest with a shake of my head.
Something was niggling at the back of my mind. I concentrated on that tiny feeling and tried to remember when I had felt it before. Then I remembered. In the early hours of this morning. When I had been woken up by the nightmare.
Shit! I had felt the same agony in my dream, except it wasn’t in my stomach. It had been in my eye. That was why I had thought that it was caused by memories of Ba’al, but this was different. I hadn’t been asleep and I refuse to believe that I was suffering flashbacks while walking up a Colorado mountain.
There was something else going on.
o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o
Sometimes I had to stop and ask “Why me?” Wasn’t there anyone else on this planet that could be the victim of mad gun people, rabid NID agents, megalomaniac snakeheads, bounty hunters, fanatical natives, or the food in the SGC mess hall? Did it always have to be me?
If it sounds like I’m whining – that’s because I am.
I repeat – “Why me?”
Having got that off my chest, I got back to the matter at hand.
I felt fine. We walked slowly back to the hotel and I refused Carter’s orders to see a doctor. Instead I took them all up to my room, lay on the bed and explained my theory.
General Jack O’Neill - universal target.
I don’t think that they were completely convinced, but they knew better than to argue too much. After all, we had been through some pretty strange things over the years.
I told Daniel to pay the bill and explain that we were leaving early. The sooner we got home, the better.
“I still think that you should see a doctor, just to be on the safe side, sir.” Carter wasn’t going to give up without a fight. “We could stop off in town before we head back to the SGC.”
Her hands were clenched together, her knuckles white. Not a normal Carter pose. I knew that it would make the trip home much easier if I went along with her now. Wasn’t that what I wanted – to make my team happier? I resigned myself to the inevitable.
o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o
The plump elderly doctor poked his finger into my guts, not appreciating how close he was to having it amputated permanently. Carter sat in the uncomfortable plastic chair next to me and beamed.
I was glad that one of us was happy.
“There doesn’t seem to be anything wrong with your hubby.” He smiled condescendingly at Carter. ‘Hubby’ – what in God’s name was a hubby? Then it dawned on me why Carter had been allowed into the examination room with me.
She stopped beaming when she saw my face. In fact she sobered up extremely quickly.
I gave an evil grin. “The little woman worries too much, Doctor. You know how they are,” and exchanged deep looks of male understanding. I stood. “Come on now, Honey.” If I could have gotten away with patting her on the head, I would have.
I don’t know which was funnier – Carter’s obvious fear of what I was going to do to her or her indignation. I just knew that it took me over ten kilometres before I could control my laughter.
An hour down the road there was nothing to laugh about.
This time the pain hit in my bad knee. If I had thought that the other incidents were bad, this one proved how wrong I was. It felt like my leg was being completely twisted around, pulling the knee out of its socket.
All I can say is that, when the agony receded, I was very glad that I hadn’t been driving.
We made record time back to the mountain.
o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o
General Hammond was very surprised to see us all back so soon, but as soon as he saw my face he didn’t stop us, just followed the procession down to the infirmary.
“General O’Neill?”
“Just a slight hitch in the vacation plans, sir.” I sat on a bed and waited for Doc Fraiser to finish examining Sergeant Stiler’s nose. That man really should be more careful – he’s a walking accident waiting to happen.
As soon as she saw us she was over in a flash, leaving Stiler to the less than tender mercies of one of her nurses.
I told her about the mysterious pains. Then I told them what I suspected – that they had nothing to do with injury or illness and everything to do with an outside influence. I watched the Doc and the General exchange resigned looks. They didn’t argue with me either. It may have seemed a leap in logic to the casual observer, but all these years at the SGC had honed my senses when it came to trouble.
And no one ever accused me of being logical.
Naturally the Doc had to prove to herself that there was nothing wrong with me.
What is it about doctors and penlights?
After what seemed like hours of tests – probably because they were – it was finally agreed that there was nothing physically or mentally wrong with me. I just had an annoying habit of doubling over in agony ever hour or so.
o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o
I hadn’t seen Daniel since before lunch, but I wasn’t at all surprised when he bounded into my room in the infirmary. Janet had insisted I stay there so that she could observe me. Exactly what she expected to observe, I don’t know. The total disintegration of an Air Force general?
“Jack!” I saw that the reticence that he had shown before entering my office just a couple of short days ago had completed vanished. My wonderful team bonding strategy had obviously worked.
Yeah – as if! It was probably just the pleasure of seeing me in pain that was making him so enthusiastic.
“I thought that I would see if I could find any references to similar occurrences.” He grinned, excitement oozing out of every pore.
“And did you, Daniel Jackson?” Teal’c seemed equally intrigued. He had been keeping me company and had made me play poker with him. He had said that it was to keep my mind off things. I think that it was in revenge for Thor.
He doesn’t really own my truck now, does he?
“I did.” Daniel paused for dramatic affect and was very put out when I interjected with a disgruntled -
“For crying out loud! Just tell us!”
“Okay, Jack.” He gave me an injured glare. “Voodoo.”
My face must have been completely blank because he hurried on with a brief rundown on the cultural and anthropological significance of voodoo in some Earth cultures.
Did I say brief? Must redefine my definition of ‘brief’.
Finally his battery ran down and he ground to a halt.
“So what you are saying, Danny Boy, is that someone, somewhere is sticking pins in a doll that looks like me?” I had to admit that that was exactly what it felt like.
“Yes. Or otherwise manhandling the figure representing you, thereby causing the damage to be mirrored by your real body.”
This was getting into serious Twilight Zone territory. Suspending my disbelief was one thing, shutting the closet door on it was quite another.
“That’s just ridiculous!” It would have had more impact if my words hadn’t been accompanied by an involuntary cry of agony. I clutched at my chest, trying to stop what felt like a dagger pressing through my flesh and straight into my heart.
“Janet!” I heard Daniel’s panicked call as if from a great distance as the dagger’s point twisted and turned. I knew that Teal’c was holding me as I writhed on the bed, doing anything to get away from the intense pain.
It only lasted a few minutes but this time the effects were still there when the pain stopped. I lay back, panting and feeling for all the world as if I had just had a heart attack.
It was getting worse. We had to find the bastard that was doing this to me.
o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o
Then the pains stopped. For eight hours I was blessedly free. Eight hours in which I could sleep.
And that gave us our first clue.
Carter was the one that pointed it out. The eight hours that I was free of the torture were the length of the average person’s sleep pattern. And not just any sleep pattern. Here on Earth. And to narrow it down still further – within the same time zone as us.
At least now we had somewhere to start.
“We need a list of any one that you may have upset that lives in the area, sir.”
Sometimes I think that Carter is just too naive to be working with people like me.
Teal’c snorted. “I don’t think that we have that much time, Major Carter. Or that much paper.”
“Alright then, Jack. What say we begin with the obvious ones?” Daniel pulled a notepad towards him and picked up a pen.
And so we began.
o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o
I had managed to prise myself out of the Doc’s clutches for the evening after I had promised to sleep in the infirmary. I knew that she was worried about me – the ‘what if’s’ running through her mind.
Well, they were running through my mind too.
The one that headed my list was the “What if whoever is doing this decides to finish it?” one. But I couldn’t tip toe around being constantly worried that some vengeful son of a bitch was going to off me.
If I worried about that sort of thing I would have lived in a state of fear for the last twenty or more years.
We didn’t go to the mess hall or anywhere else public. We hid out in my office, surrounded by the evidence that a general’s paperwork is never done. After all, it wouldn’t do for General O’Neill to start screaming in the mess hall – it would put the troops off their food and hungry troops are unhappy troops.
Lucky we did. There were two incidents in the space of an hour. That voodoo doll was certainly getting a workout. I hope that its arm is sewn back.
I had to order the guys not to call Fraiser and promised to tell her all about it. My latest party trick was clutching my head so that my brains didn’t fall out.
I really wanted to find this bastard and kill him – very, very slowly.
We came up with a short list of about twenty names. Most were ones that my team weren’t familiar with and I didn’t want to go into details about them unless I had to. And then there were the ones that they knew. Kinsey. Several NID agents.
And top of the list – Juliet.
When Carter printed it out and gave us each a copy, we all just looked at each other.
She was in prison, wasn’t she?
I reached for the phone and saw that my hand was beginning to tremble. The sensation of having your fingers broken one by one is one that I will never forget.
I’ll never forget it all right, because this wasn’t the first time that it had happened. Oh the joys of remembering my sordid past! I was just glad that this person hadn’t read my medical file. They were inventive enough with that damned doll as it was.
Daniel gently took the receiver from my hand and hung it up again. Then we sat and waited while I rode out the pain.
o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o
Juliet was still in prison. The attempted murder of an Air Force general had gotten her a long sentence. Her cell was searched, her few possessions gone over with a fine tooth comb.
Nothing.
Back to square one.
o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o
General Hammond and I got together the next day to discuss my situation. It really had become a major problem for us. I couldn’t operate as a fully functioning member of the SGC with this hanging over my head all the time. We didn’t know if that had been their intention, but if it was, it certainly had worked. Perhaps the motive wasn’t just revenge after all.
And didn’t that thought open up a giant can of worms!
George watched me with obvious sympathy as I bent over his desk, trying not to beat my fists against it in frustration.
“Doctor Jackson has explained his theory to me, Jack. Do you really think that voodoo is a logical explanation for what’s going on?”
“It’s the only one that we have at the moment, George and I’m hoping that he’s right.”
He was startled by my answer. “Why?”
“Because if it’s someone off world that’s doing this then I’m screwed. I’ll never find them.”
I thought of all the enemies that I had made out there in the very large wide universe and shuddered. Yes – I would be royally screwed if I had to sift through them to find the culprit.
o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o=o
“Sir!” Carter and Daniel came rushing into my office like something was chasing them. No more of that pesky knocking.
I didn’t bother to ask any questions – I knew that whatever it was, they would tell me anyway.
Then I noticed the figure standing in the doorway behind them.
Ferretti.
Lou was looking very concerned about something. I ignored the kids and got up.
“Lou?”
“General.” He wouldn’t look me in the eye. Lou is one of the most straightforward people that I know. If he couldn’t look me in the eye then I knew that there was something seriously wrong.
“Jack, we’ve found something.” Daniel held out his hand, palm upwards. “Actually, it was Lou that found it. Lucky that he thought to bring it to me.”
The object that he held was very long, pointed, with an extremely elaborately decorated head.
A pin.
“Planning to do some sewing?” I knew exactly what the pin represented, but I couldn’t help myself. Flippant comments are often my way of dealing with the more unpleasant aspects of life.
Carter gave me an irritated glance. Yes, things were definitely getting back to normal. “It’s a voodoo needle, sir.”
“And you would know this, how?”
“Because Daniel told me, sir.”
Of course – silly me!
“So where did you find it, Lou?” I noticed that Ferretti had been keeping uncharacteristically quiet.
“God, Jack, I‘d no idea what was going on until Sam told me. I mean, I thought that it was odd that you all came back from vacation early, but I just assumed that you were needed back here for some reason.”
I took a long, assessing look at Lou and then gestured for the others to leave us alone. Lou didn’t even look up when they shut the door.
“Lou, what’s going on?”
It was as if I hadn’t spoken.
“I know that you did the right thing, Jack. You have to believe me.”
Now I was puzzled. “What are you talking about? Come on, Lou – talk to me.”
He finally looked up, his face haunted.
“I found that in the locker room. It fell out of Baxter’s locker when he shut it.”
Captain Baxter – one of Ferretti’s team.
I was contemplating my next question when I felt a blow as if someone had kicked me in the kidneys. This was much too hard to ignore. It was as if I was being beaten within an inch of my life. The blows and kicks rained down on me as I lay curled up on my office floor. I had a vague impression of Lou’s frantic voice in the background, but there was no way that I could ask for help or tell him what to do.
This time it wasn’t stopping.
There was a hand on my back, steadying me and I recognised Carter’s voice telling me to hold on, that Janet was coming. Under any other circumstances I would have worried about the anxious tone, but I was having too much trouble fighting to stay conscious and just to breath. I really thought that I was losing the battle when, as suddenly as it began, the attack stopped.
I rolled over, taking shuddering breaths.
“Shit!” I rose to my feet, ignoring the Major’s protests and used my desk to prop myself up. Carter kept her hand on my arm and I have to say that without it I think that I would have fallen again.
“Sir?” The Doc came running in, took one look at me and made me sit down. Her hand snagged my wrist and she began to take my pulse. I could have told her what she needed to know. My heart was racing.
For a few minutes we just sat there, Carter and the Doc watching me like I was a delicate ornament that might break at any moment. I tried to get myself back under control.
I would not crack – I wouldn’t give this bastard the satisfaction.
I was just about to question the absence of Teal’c, Daniel and Ferretti, when I heard heavy feet in the corridor and the very people that I had been wondering about burst in.
“We got him!” Daniel was grinning broadly until he took in my appearance. I saw Janet give him a quick reassuring smile and decided that I wasn’t dying after all.
Nice of her to tell me.
“Who, Daniel? Who have you got?”
It was Lou that answered. “Cliff Baxter, Jack. We caught him in the act. He was in his quarters.”
“He had this.” Daniel took up the story and held out a small misshapen figure of a man, made of rough cloth with small tufts of straw showing through burst seams. “We’ll have to be very careful with this until I can work out how to dispose of it.”
At the word ‘dispose’, I shuddered. “Just don’t drop it, Daniel.” I had visions of having my legs broken.
More material for my nightmare file. Gee – and I so needed that!
Daniel took one look at my face and carefully placed the doll on my desk, as gently as possible. I couldn’t take my eyes from it. Such a stupid looking thing to cause all these worries.
“General.” I tore my gaze away and turned to Ferretti. He was standing rigidly stiff. “I realised that Captain Baxter was upset by the way that you disciplined me last week. I had a word to him and explained that you had no choice. I thought that he understood.” He paused and shifted slightly, uncomfortably. “I did, sir. I know why you did it and I have no problem with it at all.” He gave me an imploring look, asking that I believe him.
Of course I did. I gave him a small smile and a nod to continue.
His stance relaxed a trifle. “When I found the pin I thought that it looked a bit odd and wondered if it might have been from a planet that we had visited recently. I didn’t want to get Cliff into trouble for no reason, so I took it to Daniel to see if he knew what it was.”
At this point, Daniel jumped in. “As soon as I saw it, I knew recognised its purpose. I explained what was going on to Lou and came to see you. It also explains why the last few instances were more physical beatings rather than the stabbing pain. He had lost the pin. We found him with the doll on the floor, stamping on it. Lou grabbed him and you know the rest.”
I could feel a load lifting from my shoulders as he spoke. It was over at last. No more wondering when the pain would strike next. No more hiding away.
It may have lifted from my shoulders, but it was heavy on Major Ferretti’s. I knew that he wanted to defend his man, but that he knew also that the Captain’s actions were indefensible. His loyalty was divided and he had to choose between his team mate or his friend.
“I have never heard of such a thing, Daniel Jackson. How is it possible?” Teal’c had been eyeing the figure warily.
“Well, that’s just it, Teal’c. It isn’t. At least not with what we know about voodoo practices here on Earth.” Daniel was getting excited. He bent to pick up the doll to illustrate his point. I reached over and grabbed his hand, stopping it. “Ouch! Okay, Jack. I get the hint.” He pulled his hand away and rubbed it. I could see marks where my fingers had dug in.
I was being very protective of that doll – go figure!
“Captain Baxter told us everything. He had always had an interest in the occult, dating back to when he was a teenager. It had only been a hobby. He collected a few items just out of curiosity – like that pin and had done a bit of reading, but never had any intention of taking it further. Then he met a - I suppose you could call her a witch – on a planet that he visited with his team several weeks ago. Naturally he was intrigued and talked to her, comparing occult customs. She gave him this doll as a gift. He should have reported the incident to Lou here, but instead he chose to keep the doll for his collection.”
I could picture Baxter – a short, slightly balding man, with what seemed to be very few interests outside of his work. I had never taken much notice of him. He had seemed so nondescript. Now it seemed that there were hidden depths to the man that I’d obviously taken for granted.
“I don’t know that he thought that it would really work, Jack. He was pissed with you and just hit out the only way that he knew how.”
“When most people get pissed at the boss, Lou, they complain about it over a few drinks. They don’t go sticking pins in an effigy!” I was remembering what little I knew about the subject of voodoo – mainly from countless B grade horror flicks that I had seen from the back row of the local cinema. Admittedly, my mind was usually concentrating on comforting my girlfriend of the moment, but some information had seeped in. “Didn’t he need some item from me to make this work? Like hair or fingernails?”
Daniel, Sam and the Doc exchanged looks which clearly conveyed that they were surprised I knew that much. I wasn’t about to tell them the source of my knowledge. Teal’c raised his eyebrow and looked troubled. And Lou answered.
“He went into the locker room after you had showered and took some hairs from your towel.”
Okay – that was just gross. Eeew!
“Daniel! That’s it.” Carter excitedly interrupted. “What if we take the hair out of the doll? Wouldn’t that make it useless.” She turned to the Doc. “What do you think, Janet? Do you think that it will work?”
The Doc shook her head. “Don’t ask me. I would have thought that the whole idea of voodoo was patently ridiculous, but I’m obviously wrong.”
“Only one way to find out.” Ignoring the protests of everyone in the room, I picked up the doll and probed it with my fingers. I didn’t feel a thing. Maybe it didn’t work when it was the victim doing the handling. Then I felt a slightly harder patch inside the seam on its left side. Pulling on it, I extracted several short grey hairs. With a grimace, I deposited them in the waste paper bin by my desk. “Okay, now what?” I asked the group.
“We have to make sure that it worked, Sir.” Carter put into words what I already knew.
I handed the figure to the one person in the group that I knew could cope if it hadn’t worked.
“Be gentle with me, T.”
Teal’c ignored the sniggers of laughter from the two women. “I will endeavour to be as gentle as possible, O’Neill.” He took the pin from Daniel and pushed it slowly into the figure’s right arm.
They all stared at me, Daniel, Carter and the Doc with almost clinical interest and Lou with a very concerned frown.
Nothing.
I breathed a sigh of relief.
Then Daniel spoke. “You know, we really should put the hairs back and try it with them in the doll. Then if Jack reacts, we should take them out and do it again. Otherwise the experiment is valueless.”
I cradled the figure to my chest and gave him my best glare. ”Better still, Danny Boy, why don’t we try it on another test subject altogether. Like a certain big mouthed archaeologist that I know.” I stopped and smiled at my friends. It felt like it had been a long time since I had last been able to relax and laugh. “And anyway – it isn’t a doll. They don’t make dolls of Air Force generals. It’s a General Jack action figure.”
The End
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