Chapter 17
Jack stood frozen by the turn of events and his inability to gain control. He noticed that Daniel was staring up at him, still in his prone position on the floor, totally baffled by the situation. Daniel's mind was working to try and clear the fogginess that surrounded it. Daniel's glance slid over the lone airmen standing in front of him, a confused expression worrying his face.
Talin squatted in front of Daniel, attempting to place a hand on his head as Daniel skirted away from his touch. "Feeling better, Daniel? I hope so." Talin glimpsed O'Neill's hand as it moved closer to the gun's safety mechanism.
"O'Neill. Come on… I think we are done with this little charade… hmmm?" Talin turned sadistic eyes on the man standing before him. "Before you shoot Daniel, at least let him see you for what you are."
Talin had released his hold on Daniel. With the lessened pain, Daniel was able to pull himself into a sitting position between Jack and Talin. Daniel furrowed his brow in concentration, attempting to sift through the fog that had settled in his brain. He squinted, forcing his blurred vision to focus as he gazed upon the man standing ramrod straight over him. "Jack?"
Jack ripped the device off, feeling his body morph into familiarity. "Don't worry, Daniel… I won't shoot you."
Talin laughed. "That's what you think. These past months, I've made you do things… and these acts were done without question. You've …"
"Stop, I know what I've done, I know what you are capable of doing to me. But I *know* I am *not* capable of shooting Daniel."
"You just don't get it…" Talin replied. "All bets are off. The show is done. Over. Finished. Daniel actually saw to that… and I'm going to take him down with me. His curiosity… hey, in the beginning, it was a good thing… kept the show going. For the good of the earth, for the good of the people…but after a while…his sweetness can be a little bit nauseating. I believe I can echo your sentiment when I say it was never enough with him. Hmm… was it, Jack?" Proudly, Talin bragged. "I…I made sure every iota of every planet became an argument. Stay, go, meet, greet. Jack don't shoot, stay, leave, *believe* me, Jack. Couldn't have Daniel turning the tables on me." Moving his arms to encompass the poster-filled walls of the control room. "The audience loved it. I was walking into the realm of segregating Daniel from the rest of the team. Playing on their angst factor. You know how it is… a little tweak here," Talin watched in glee as Jack's fingers released the safety… "A little tweak there." Daniel groaned.
Jack heard a plea buried in his subconscious, somewhere… begging him to put down the gun. A plea issued in Jack's own voice, but it didn't register. Talin's hold on him was too tight, the messages that had been flitting through Jack's brain had stopped and were taking root.
"If you shoot Dr. Jackson, I will let you go…I will let you all go, Colonel. Even your teammates that are in hiding. Through the Stargate to your home… earth. Twelve months since you have been there. Shooting Daniel will put him out ofm his misery. You are… what is it called… yeah… Special Ops… one well placed bullet, and it will be over in seconds. Otherwise, I can drag it out… for as long as it takes to shoot him." Daniel's screams reverberated through the control room. Jack gritted his teeth in anger.
Talin placed the devices on the desk directly in front of him, lifting his hands up in surrender. "They are yours for the taking… just shoot Daniel." Talin played his final hand.
Daniel was unaware of Jack's dilemma. His whole being existed around the pain Talin was inflicting. Ideas… thoughts cascading through his mind, the pain was horrific, but in one second, an inspiration became crystal clear, something he never felt more sure of in his life. "Please shoot me, Jack!" He begged. "I can't stand the pain anymore." Daniel paused. "He's done something… I'm having a problem seeing and… and breathing. I don't know what he's doing…" Daniel seemed to struggle to find the right words. "Don't let this… anymore." Daniel's breathing became gasps as he attempted to fill tortured lungs with air. "Can't breath..."
"Ple'se, 'ack… make h'm stop. Let me go." Daniel begged his eyes filling with tears as he struggled for breath and the ability to make Jack understand him through slurred words.
"I can't, Daniel!" Jack shouted, as he remembered a different time, a different Daniel standing in a gate room, begging to be let go.
"I need you to do this!" Daniel screamed, pounding his fists on the carpeted floor.
Jack's hand shook as he attempted to gain control, keeping his P-90 close to his body. "I can't. Goddamn it, Daniel! Look at me, please."
Daniel turned tormented eyes in Jack's direction.
Tightening his hold on the gun to steady it within his shaking hands, Jack continued. "I listened to you once before… I agreed to let you go… and I… we lost you. It almost destroyed us, SG1 and me. It was destroying me."
Daniel drew a ragged breath, turning his back to Talin, addressing only Jack. "That wasn't me, Jack. This… this is me! I need you to let me go."
"No, Daniel. You say it wasn't you. Screw you. From where I was standing at the time… it looked like you, it talked like you… it sounded like you. It *was* you. I listened to you then, I'm not listening to you now. I will not lose you again!"
Jack swung the P-90 around and began shooting. Glass splintered and the sound of various electronics shorting filled the room as Jack shot out the monitors. Jack continued shooting until all the screens were a shattered mess and the floor was covered with slivers of glass.
Daniel was curled on the floor in front of Jack, his arms thrown over his head in a futile attempt to keep the noise of the exploding monitors at bay from his distressed mind. Daniel never raised his head to see Jack leveling the P-90 to his exposed back. Jack's facial expression bore a marked contrast to the body language Talin saw before him. Hatred, pure unadulterated hatred was radiating from Jack's eyes. Fear, as the loss of control for what he was about to do to a member of his team…his friend.
"Just do it. Please finish it off!" Daniel's muffled voice begged.
"My pleasure, Daniel." Leske said, firing her weapon and taking down Talin with one shot. Leske's body shook with the pleasure of injuring, hopefully killing, Talin. Reveling in her momentary victory, she panicked when the vision of Jack's gun still trained on Daniel's exposed back became her focus.
"No, Jack!" she yelled, hoping that her voice would shock him back into reality. Frantically stepping over broken glass and electronic paraphernalia that littered the floor, she dropped her weapon. She stood between Jack and Daniel, leaning across the table, grabbing the barrel of gun and pointing it away from Daniel. She watched as Jack blinked hard, resembling a sleepwalker awaking. Leske screamed his name and watched him visibly deflate and tremble with the reality of what he had almost done. Looking at the position of the barrel of the gun in relation to Daniel, Jack swung the offensive item around to his back and knelt by Daniel's side.
"Daniel?"
Leske found what she hoped was the DaD that Talin was using to tweak Daniel, and turned it into the off position, praying that it would alleviate his pain… Jack's neurofilter would just have to be deactivated later.
"Jack." Daniel turned his face to Jack and slowly opened one eye.
"Can you sit up?" Jack gently placed a hand on Daniel's forearm, willing to assist him if need be.
"Um…I think so." As Daniel gingerly righted himself, his eyes widened as he was overcome by a wave of dizziness. Jack never removed his arm and steadied Daniel's wavering body. "I'm fine."
"Sure you are," Jack said, taking note of the continued grimace gracing Daniel's face.
"It's just a headache, now, Jack. Nothing a few Tylenol won't cure. Honestly, I'm fine. Just fine."
"Guys… tender moments aside, we really need to get the hell outta here."
"Leske, what are you doing here? Where are Sam, Janet, and…Teal'c?" Daniel asked, using Jack's shoulder to bring him to an upright standing position.
"Nice shot." Jack pursed his lips in admiration of Leske's skills with her firearm as he looked with disgust at Talin's prone body.
"Oh… OH!" Daniel exclaimed, attempting to bend down to check on the condition of their tormentor.
"Jeez, Daniel." Jack grabbed his arm and righted him back to a standing position. "I know you don't want to hear this, but I hope he rots in hell for what he did to us."
"Oh, me too, Jack." Daniel nodded his head for emphasis, placing a finger at his temple to alleviate the pounding. "I was just checking to make sure he was really dead. Our enemies have a tendency of dying and then… not staying dead."
Jack's answer to Daniel was a smile and a squeeze to his shoulder.
Jack turned his attention to Leske. "Where are the rest of my people?"
Leske gathered up the secondary device and motioned for Daniel and Jack to accompany her. Over her shoulder, she threw the answer, "Headed towards the gate room. Markhen…"
"Markhen?" Jack questioned.
"The guy in the blue shirt that was here in the control room."
"Oh. The nerdy guy."
"Jack," Daniel replied angrily.
"Sorry, Daniel… I'm not referring to *you*, only to… oh, never mind."
"Markhen is part of the resistance. Before he left, he obtained the codes to turn off the Environment. He is a computer genius and was able to hack into Talin's files and retrieve the necessary information to turn off SGC. He couldn't help you and Daniel, but he found me… Well, to make a long story short, he gave me the codes…" Leske quickly booted up the console and punched in a series of numbers from memory. "Okay, that should do it… Come on guys, let's go. Like I said, Markhen should be bringing the rest of your people to the gate room."
Out in the hallway that had once been a bustling corridor within Cheyenne Mountain, Jack and Daniel found nothing but what resembled a tremendous warehouse with corridors and doorways dissecting the hallways. The control center was a separately housed building containing Carcelan technology, not part of the Environment, so it was left standing in its original form. The access to the control center was now a plain door with a knob. Jack turned around and tried the knob, turning it easily in his hands. "I'll be right back," he said ducking back into the control room. Before they had a moment to protest, Jack returned to them. Daniel questioned his departure with raised eyebrows.
Jack answered with a grin, forcing Daniel to acquiesce.
"The gateroom?" Daniel inquired.
"This way," Leske said, hopefully leading them to their way home, and not into a secondary battle with Ronar and his cronies.