Fever's Fire
Fever's Fire
by Soles
Title: Fever's Fire
Author: Soles
Email: soles@gamewood.net
Category: Angst
Episode related: 604 Frozen
Season: Season 6
Pairing: Sam/Jack
Rating: G
Warnings: none
Summary: Exploration of events in Frozen.
Disclaimer: Stargate SG-1 and its characters are the property of Showtime/Viacom, MGM/UA, Double Secret Productions, and Gekko Productions. I have written this story for entertainment purposes only and no money whatsoever has exchanged hands. No copyright infringement is intended. The original characters, situations, and story are the property of the author(s).
Fever's Fire
By
Soles
((((((((
He felt someone's hand on his chest, but the fog enclosing his brain prevented him seeing just whose hand it was. It didn't matter anyway, the hand had only lightly touched him and was then gone... the most fleeting of connections.
He barely remembered the sound of a soft moan; followed by the even softer sound of a body falling to the floor...it was probably only the feverish delusions of a sick man....
The Colonel lay on his bed, fully clothed, shivering from the freezing cold...no, not cold, the fires of Hell were burning in here. The weight of his limbs pressed his body into the mattress, curtailing any ability to move as the overwhelming fatigue of illness siphoned off any desire. The sickness rose up to claim his complete attention, leaving only weakness, pain and suffering in its wake.
He wanted to curl up in a ball, curl up and die, curl up and ease the fierce fire, burning in his gut and chest. He wanted to move his legs, or arms...to rub, or massage, or caress his aching joints. Joints so painful, it felt like they were disintegrating.
God, it's hot in here...no, minus thirty degrees, not hot...cold...fffreezing.
Sweat poured from his body, soaking his layered clothing, permitting the lower temperature of the room to further jeopardize his weakened condition.
He couldn't move and could only vaguely comprehend movement around him, as Dr. Fraiser and the others crowded into the room. His eyes were feverish slits, seeing nothing and no one, oblivious to the scurry of medical activity emergently tending to his person, nor the Haz-Mat team preparing for his transport to another area of the research facility.
He felt more hands on his body, hands lifting him with practiced ease, lifting him from his bed of misery to another place...just as miserable. The sounds of people talking over him, around him, and sometimes to him penetrated the fog which completely isolated his brain, but it was too late...the need and the desire to respond were gone...gone like...gone.
He let the cotton wool darkness carry him away from the misery.
(((((((
Samantha Carter sat alone, outside the isolation room. The hustle and bustle of getting the Colonel here had faded away, leaving only a desperately ill man...a friend...alone, and fighting for his life. If they couldn't find a cure, and fast, the Colonel...Jack was as good as dead. It shouldn't end like this. He shouldn't die fighting a virus...a tiny microorganism which he couldn't even see, and whose name he wouldn't want to pronounce - even if there was a name to go with it. His life shouldn't end with a whimper, when the tale of his honor would light the entire night sky, if it were written in fireworks.
There was so much she wanted to say to him, things which had never been given a chance outside of that room, words she had practiced in the quiet of her own solitude; thoughts, feeling, and emotions meant only for one Jack O'Neill.
In the late wee hours, Carter watched as a nurse sponged the perspiration from O'Neill's face; she should be the one, down there, taking care of this man whom she loved. She should be the one trying to ease his pain and suffering, if only by uttering soothing nonsense. She wanted to be the one he looked to for protection and support, the one he was fond of and held most dear.
Regulations - it had fast become a dirty word.
Sam watched - other than sponge the fevered body and provide temporary comfort, there was very little anyone could do for her colonel.... It was also a travesty, of grand proportions, that such a private man who intensely guarded his own personal identity, should have to suffer the indignities of being cared for in this oh, so public place. Carter wiped the sudden sting of moisture from her eyes.
Hold on, Jack. Hold on until the Tok'Ra can, at least, send someone. Someone who can help...who can, maybe...use the healing device. Please, please hold on. We need you...I need you....
Her silent entreaties passed through the isolation window like benediction's from the Pope - sincere and heartfelt, only to fall on deaf ears and a fevered mind.
The colonel's oft times strange sense of humor would appreciate the irony, that a virus millions of years old, would toll its death knell for the intrepid, inter-galactic soldier/explorer Colonel Jack O'Neill. A tiny organism would accomplish that which the Goa'uld and their System Lords - and any combination of all the bad guys tossed O'Neill's way during his career, had not been able to achieve - the death of a gallant soldier.
((((((
He lay quiet now. The monitor beeped, in monotonous detail, to the slow steady beat of Colonel O'Neill's heart. The film of moisture coating the oxygen mask was the only sign of life in that so-still body, as his vibrantly healthy physique appeared to shrink into his bed of pain. The duty nurse, protectively dressed in Haz-mat gear, tended to his every need.
The Colonel was quiet now...the vomiting, the agonizing joint pain, the crushing headache and the shakes - from both chills and fever, were quiescent now; finally yielding to the anti-pyretic's, the painkillers, and the sedatives given to comfort the stricken man. The cooling blanket hummed loudly in the background, as it provided comfort where the medications failed.
Dr. Fraiser and her staff were unable to find a cure, but were still valiantly trying, and despite the Tok'Ra having finally arrived...although faster than usual - which in itself was strange, they had brought no miracle cures to offer. No magic panacea, no last minute reprieve, no long lost cure...nothing. Except, the unthinkable.
((((((((
Who in their right mind had ever conceived the sick scheme of blending Jack O'Neill with a symbiote?
How many times, and on how many planets, and in how many other desperate situations had O'Neill made his distrust and distaste known? ...And to how many reluctant listeners?
How many ways could you say "Over My Dead Body?"
Samantha Carter, again, sat outside the colonel's sickroom. They wanted Colonel O'Neill to blend with a Tok'Ra symbiote, and even without asking him, or discussing it with him, she knew; smiling as she thought about it, exactly what his response would be. And she knew; the smile fading to a frown, equally well what she had to talk him into.
The Haz-Mat suit was stifling - even with the climate controls, her nose was showing an aggravating tendency to run, and her eyes kept tearing up - and who could wipe teary eyes behind a mask?
Hell, Damn, and Spit!
Carter couldn't talk herself into entering the colonel's room, her brilliant mind was curiously blank; blank to the point of not knowing how to put one foot in front of the other to walk into the containment room. The arguments she needed, to convince Colonel O'Neill to do this thing - of which he'd always been frightened, were nowhere in her dazzling, overachieving mind.
What phrases could she concoct that would convince a sick and dying man; who took pride in having, and maintaining control of every nuance of his own body and life, to turn over or share that control with a distasteful, distrusted and disturbing alien - if only for a short recuperation period?
Those words didn't come easily.
((((((((
Carter finally entered the isolation room, intent on her mission. Glancing surreptitiously out of the corner of her eye, she saw the General in the booth above, along with Jonas - both looking equally uncomfortable. Both men staring at her, willing her to perform a miracle.
The epinephrine, which Janet Fraiser administered to her patient, took its own sweet time to react...or was Jack O'Neill too far gone, too deep in a coma state to be brought forward?
Sam leaned over the bed.
" Sir...I don't know if you can hear me...."
His pithy response was just as expected, and just as deadly. With a heart beating too fast, and her stomach wrapped in tight knots, Carter continued, explaining about the willing symbiote - willing to leave a host who did not want it, willing to give up its own life if need be, willing to cure O'Neill and move on...to another host who did wish for the blending.
The Tok'Ra Thoran, painted a picture of a humanitarian, in a snake's body...and if Jack O'Neill were not fighting for his life, he'd be the first to question the idea.
Vague doubts filtered into the cognizant part of his brain - since when had he trusted the word of a Tok'Ra, and when exactly had they ever given us anything, without major expectations in return... The doubts were carried away like wisps of smoke in the wind, as Carter concluded her monologue.
" Sir, Please?"
O'Neill looked into her eyes, briefly - holding his head up was difficult and painful, and the bright glare of the lights stung and hurt his sensitive eyes. But, he saw despair, regret, and anguish in those clear, honest, blue eyes, and he never wanted to see those emotions in her eyes again - not for him.
Jack O'Neill did one of the hardest things he had ever done in his life - bar none. A simple nod, a simple movement of his head, to relinquish his body and mind into the care of another being - a despised snake; even if he was one of the good guys.
O'Neill's eyes closed, darkness hovered so very close. He never saw the smile on Sam Carters face, or the smiles of relief from General Hammond, Dr. Fraiser, and Jonas.
It was time to rest, and time to let the darkness silently carry him away.
((((((((
" Okay people, times a'wasting, Dr. Fraiser get Colonel O'Neill ready to travel. You'll need to send someone with him..." Fraiser nodded affirmation,
" Then make it happen."
The general felt he was finally on solid ground and not some medical nightmare. Orders he could give, people he could move around - like pieces on a chessboard, if it came to that. That's why he got the big bucks - planning, organizing, and working at that lofty place where the buck stopped.
People rushed to their assigned tasks - too much ground had been lost, and if Jack O'Neill was to be freed from the arms of death, everyone had to move, as in now!
Dr. Fraiser quickly called out orders for her medical staff; while well-oiled plans and procedures went into action.
Sam Carter removed herself from the center of activity; she'd already played out her part in this - this what?
This act of kindness for a man who deserved it?
Or rather, presenting the Tok'Ra with what they wanted, when they wanted it, so that planet Earth could still remain their friend...their inferior ally?
With Jack O'Neill as the willing conduit?
Carter felt tears of frustration sting her eyes - she had to get out of this zoot suit, find the biggest coffee-ice-cream-with-hot-chocolate-fudge-sundae she could manage, and then cry herself into oblivion - or at least until she saw the colonel off.
Pulling the headgear from over her head, Carter was startled to find the General bearing down on her, as she exited the isolation room. Waiting for an indication as to why he was here, she silently cursed her inability to immediately gratify her frustration and fear. Without preamble, the general gave new orders for SG1.
" Major Carter...I want you, Teal'c, and Jonas to go with Colonel O'Neill. Aside from having his team nearby, I'm not sure I trust these people - anymore than the colonel would. I want someone there I can trust to see to our...interests. Oh, and Thank you, Major, I do realize just how hard this must have been...especially knowing Colonel O'Neill's wishes."
Carter nodded silently, tiredly.
General Hammond seemed at a loss, from Carter's silence, for further conciliatory words. He nodded his head, as if making a decision, and then instructed the major to be in the gate room in one hour, to escort Colonel O'Neill's entourage off world.
The two officers parted company, each headed in a different direction - General Hammond to prepare for sending Jack O'Neill off world; an officer whom he worked with, and a man he admired - to an unknown fate, while Samantha Carter, Major USAF, went in search of a mother lode of ice cream and chocolate in which to drown her fear, anger, and despair.
((((((((
The control room seemed to be unusually packed with silent, unmoving people as the containment capsule was carried up the gate ramp. The open wormhole beckoned the escort team, as each member repositioned his or her hands for a better grip on the vessel. It wouldn't look good if they dropped poor Colonel O'Neill on the Tok'Ra front doorsteps, or in the freezing wormhole.
A grim Major Samantha Carter led the procession; followed closely behind by a stoic Teal'c and a worried Jonas, each apprehensive of the hours ahead, each determined to see O'Neill delivered from his death sentence.
Carter's last thought as she stepped into the shimmering blue miasma, a quote, she didn't remember from where, or whom..."a friend would accompany you to the gates of hell; a true friend will accompany you through the fires of hell and beyond "-... could she do any less?
(( The End ((
Author's note - I don't have a Beta reader, so any mistakes are solely my own, if anyone is interested in the job...just e-mail. Thanks, Soles
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