As the night in Atlantis wore on, the dining hall slowly but steadily cleared, and eventually the last few had to succumb to the need for sleep and the fact that there was nothing left to really do.
As Sam joined the trickle of humanity (and Athosianty) out of the mess hall, and she could already feel the urge to sleep starting to get the upper hand in her battle with it. However, she was not nearly tired enough to not remember Jack’s behavior at dinner, Jack, the humorous, lovable joker and life of the party and a sense of humor that was 50+-going-on-fourteen; was in an obscure corner of the room and had not said two dozen words since the arrival through the gate.
She knew he hated the quote, “Legalized theft of my tax dollars” that were the formal, dressy, special “events” thrown by the “lazy, corrupt, self-serving, idiotic Bureaucrats who would be of more use on the target range.”
At the same time, however, in spite of her long knowledge of his “viewpoints” on the black tie events, she had to admit that she had to strain her definition of black-tie to include this. This was not something conducted by the underworked, overpaid, sleazy suits that filed in looking for a way to profit off it some way or another.
However skilled Dr. Elizabeth Weir might be at fighting the irrational, unpredictable rapids and negotiating her way through the winding tributaries and falls of the mighty, unmerciful Red Tape River of Emptysuitonia, Sam knew her enough to know that she was a breed apart from the cynical bureaucrats that she herself all-to-often encountered. She also preferred to talk English as opposed to realpolitik, and was actually not that bad if you got to know her.
And for the rest of the Atlantis staff, they were normal people not unlike Jack had interacted willingly with before. Scientists, soldiers, some friendly aliens; people her CO actually could level with and talk on the same level as.
And yet, not one single word to anyone unless absolutely necessary. And not only with the Atlantis staff, but amongst themselves either.
And if the other things peaked her worry, it was that fact that chilled her. She knew he was not the easiest person to get to know, but she knew he was easy to talk to.
She barely paid attention to her surroundings, and hardly noticed that she had arrived at her quarters. As she got into bed, she thought ‘It’s probably nothing special, he is after all not used to gating anymore, and the negotiations were not exactly a walk in the park. That has got to be it. Right?’ while simultaneously trying to ignore what she could feel in the pit of her stomach.
The feeling that something was terribly wrong.
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Jack, on the other hand, was trying to do whatever it took to avoid falling asleep.
He tried pretty much everything he could think of, and as they failed one by one, he tried pacing, than twiddling his thumbs, and than dusting off a long-unused memory and began trying to recite the entire content of Cease’s Commentaries from the Gallic War from memory.
He got to “All Gaul is divided into thr-”
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Jack enjoyed a dreamless sleep; a rare luxury even in his “normal” schedule, which nowadays was even rarer.
However, he first came to return to conciseness when he felt something on his right hand. Something liquid. He bolted up with a start, and looked at the offending hand, and immediately wished he did not. The familiar red liquid that could only be one thing: blood. His heart beat faster, as he put his hand down; he realized an even more gristly sight.
Bodies. Piles of them, all around him. Broken, mutilated, butchered; the mere sight of them made him physically sick, as anywhere he looked there were more, in a circle with him in the middle. And it was not only that which made him disgusted, but he did not have to look long to ID who they were. The first one he noticed was the long-deceased CMO and petite spitfire on base, Janet Frasier, whose throat had practically been torn apart. Than came Daniel, whose jaw had come within a hair of being severed from his face entirely. And than, for a reason he himself did not know, he looked over his shoulder, and immediately wished he had not.
Behind him lay even more cadavers. Some he knew, some he did not, and more that he knew by heart. It made him physically ill.
On the top of the macabre pile, the familiar brown hair and newly-cracked glasses betrayed the identity of a near and dear archeologist, whose hands were not eagerly fiddling with some artifact or another, but were lying limp by his side, lifeless. He did not have to look long to find Teal’c, Hammond, McKay, Weir, Sheppard, and the others, as well as innumerable scientists, guards, MPs, people whose names he did not even know but whom he had seen numerous times.
But amidst the horrifying and nauseating sea of plainclothes and uniformed corpses, he noticed a strange discoloration in the piles of cadavers. Even not understanding himself how he could focus on such a thing in the middle of such gristly slaughter, he could honestly not know. All he did know, even when standing knee-deep in the blood and muck of his dead allies, friends, and comrades, he was driven by an unexplainable urge.
When he arrived, he found the discoloration was khaki. In a bloody mangled mess, surrounded by the lifeless shells of what once were MP Officers, was a familiar face. The tall, dead blond soldier in the khaki battle uniform that he first saw at the start of this nightmarish odyssey. Or at least what had once been khaki, as the sheer quantity of blood rendered it a sickening shade of red.
However, in spite of the gore, Jack was driven on. This was the unknown. The one person who he could not pin down at all in his previous hellish nights, and so he tried to ID whoever this mysterious corpse was.
He noticed, while holding back his vomit, to notice that even when soaked in blood, there was no mistaking the fact that this person had HAD fair skin, Dirty blond hair, and blue eyes that were now fogged over in the postmortem. However, he was looking for the ID of the uniform, and looked it over, ignoring the bloody mess on his hands, when he saw a faint glimpse of blue, white, and red on the dull brown helmet. He turned the helmet to the left, and the limp head merely yielded. However, before he could investigate the side, a familiar and unwelcome sound that chilled his bones to the marrow echoed across the blood-drenched ground.
“MUHAHAHA!” Jack heard as he felt his body be ripped off the ground and hurled back, into the center of the circle of corpses, his pants, face, hair, shirt, everything covered in the sickly red and black plasma.
He tried to face his foe, but something kept him pinned to the ground. He could not move his body or his head. However, he heard the sound of boots on the bloodied ground, and soon the shadow of what appeared to be a man had fallen on him from the rear of his head, and Jack came to the startling conclusion.
That MONSTER was standing over him, and he could not move. He was at the “mercy” of whatever this creature decided to do.
“Jack, O’Neill,-The all too familiar and horrifically cold voice began- you are wondering as to why I am here again. I am here to quite simply say that I your time is coming to a close. Do not bother trying to speak, as you will find that a little.. shall we say, difficult?”
At that sentence, Jack tried to scream, but nothing happened. His lips would not budge, and he could tell that he was making no sound nonetheless.
“You are confused, scared, and more than a little—“ He could practically feel the sinister smirk that his nemesis was now wearing; “afraid. You are wondering what the future holds, and are also looking over your back at every possible chance, unsure of where the attack will come and when. And no, you cannot move, or strangle me, or tear me limb from limb. Yet.
And with that, Jack’s brain seized up similarly to the rest of his body; but only out of shock ‘how did he know those exact details’ was racing through his head, as yet another gallon of ice seemed to make a home in his chest
“Not like that would change anything… but I digress. And as for how I knew those exact details, as you called them; to answer you, you are not a stupid man, Jack O’Neill, no matter how much you may attempt to convince others that you are. I believe that you can figure that out for yourself.”
With that, the only thought on Jack’s mind was a highly horrifying and unpleasant one: ‘Can he read my-’
His thoughts were cut off by a maniacal cackle from his unseen tormentor, followed by a continuation;
“Yes, I can. Was that so hard? But no matter, but hear this and know this. No matter what sarcasm, or anger, or actions you pull, the end result will hardly change, for the deed shall be done either by my hand or yours. And you are currently wondering when you will get a chance to rip my liver out? Well, let me tell you this much: It will be far sooner than you expect.”
And with that finalization, Jack saw the dark silhouette that fell over him move one of its’ hands, and suddenly Jack’s world was spinning. Around and around and around again, faster and faster with each rotation, like he was in Hell’s version of a shuttle test, the bloody surroundings having melted together into a disgusting red blur long ago, and the only thing he could hear was a steady, unseen, constant malicious laugh. “Muahahahaaaaaaaaaaaaaggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggg-”
Jack felt like his body was literally going to fly apart, with his legs and arms seeming on the verge of coming out of their sockets, and even through this hell, he tried again and again to say something, to damn his oppressor, to damn the slaughter, to curse the gods, to curse stargate, to curse himself, and sometimes only to yell, but he could hear no sound aside from the never-ending laugh that filtered through his ears. And finally, when he was on the verge of either unconsciousness or death, he no longer cared which, he tried one last time and………
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“YEEEEEEEAAAAAAGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!”
Jack let out at last, and seemed to fall to earth with a solid thud. His head shot up automatically, to his own surprise. However, even as he heard his own tortured scream echo on the walls of the ancient city at a volume that made him wince, Jack felt the thick liquid on himself and his cloths.
He grasped part of his shirt in fright, but when he looked at it, he identified not deep red blood, but his own cold sweat. He than lay back down on his cot and than closed his eyes. ‘It was all another dream. God, I hate it.’
And for some time, maybe a minute, maybe two, maybe half an hour, he lay there with his eyes closed, trying to regain his sleep.
Than he heard a noise.
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