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1700 hours. I paced the conference room. Why wasn't SG1 back yet? They'd been due three hours ago. I spared another glance at the Stargate, a massive and infuriatingly silent gray circle, an ugly round spinning thing. I was impatient for the team's return. The confusion of post-mission quarantine was always the best opportunity to gather information and take samples to send to my superiors at NID.
Lately, my bosses had been increasingly demanding. When I first transferred to the SGC from the CDC, they were thrilled with the biological material I sent out to Washington. Sam's half-Goa'uld blood, Cassandra's hok'taur DNA, and any number of natural and synthetic diseases had found their way into a lab that would make better use of them than the museum at Area 51. I'd even smuggled out a symbiote or two, and had heard rumors that they'd been implanted, though I tried not to think about it.
My employers were ruthless. I was ruthless. Our goals, though, were noble. That's what we told ourselves.
With such a steady stream of opportunities, my superiors were satisfied, and my life became relatively stable. I'd had time to ingratiate myself more fully onto SG1 and the base personnel, learning their secrets one by one.
But then Makepeace had gone and gotten himself caught, and now the scientific and technical intelligence-gathering fell on my shoulders. My superiors had lost a lot and they were taking their frustrations out on me, as the new senior NID operative inside Cheyenne Mountain. I had to accelerate my work, or lose my position to a craftier, and no doubt younger and prettier, operative.
The alarm klaxons interrupted my thoughts. *Unauthorized off-world activation.*
I ran for the stairs and made it to the control room just in time to hear Walter's voice. "SG1 IDC confirmed, sir."
General Hammond, standing at the window, muttered, "Open the iris."
I moved to Hammond's side and waited breathlessly. Sometimes they didn't need a medical team--those times were unfortunate. The puddle rippled, and four figures stumbled through. Sam was leaning heavily on Teal'c's arm, and Jack was being hauled down the ramp by Daniel. They were bloodied.
"Medical team to the gateroom!" Hammond bellowed, and I fled downstairs.
When I passed through the blast doors I saw Sam had collapsed onto the ramp. "What happened?" I demanded, as I rushed to her side. I knelt and placed my hand on her knee.
"We were tortured," she managed, gasping and reaching up to cover my hand with her own. Sam gave me a look of gratitude and trust that took my breath away, then her eyes rolled back and she fainted.
"Get her to the infirmary!" I ordered, and Teal'c scooped Samantha Carter into his arms and ran out of the gateroom.
So like her, I thought, to stop struggling to stay coherent through tremendous pain, the moment she saw me. When she felt safe. I counted her on faith. I had nursed it, earned it.
I moved to Jack O'Neill.
* * *
In the infirmary, or the chamber of horrors, as Jack liked to call it, Sam was still unconscious, and Jack was still fighting me. I prepared a sedative in a syringe, my largest. O'Neill paled when he saw the needle, and forced himself to relax. Mollified, I took out my penlight and began my examination while continuing a verbal interrogation. "What happened, Colonel?"
I shined my light into his right eye. He winced. I saw there was something lodged in his pupil.
"Some sort of mind-reading device," he mumbled, ducking away from me as I picked up the syringe again. I inserted the needle into his neck. I could kill him right now, I thought, and the taste of power filled my mouth, metallic, like blood.
"I think they were trying to read images our brain produced in response to the beatings. Maybe comforts of home, or fantasies about escaping, something that might show them our technology."
"Don't the Goa'uld have more sophisticated mind-reading techniques?" I questioned.
"They were not Goa'uld," Teal'c interrupted from his post at the wall.
Interesting.
Jack looked warily at his companion. I knew the Colonel liked to play his cards close to his chest. Even after all these years, he still didn't trust me like the others did. He knew, as I know, secrets have power.
I extracted the microchip from his eye, and slipped it into a sterile medical envelope. I would ship it to Washington, DC first thing in the morning. I felt along Jack's lymph nodes for infection, and then reached for a thermometer.
"Aw, Doc," Jack complained. "I don't know where that thing has been."
"Would you like me to show you where I can put it, Colonel?" I lifted my palm, so he could complain to the hand.
After another mumble, he opened his mouth and lifted his tongue. I unceremoniously stuck the thermometer into his mouth. When it beeped, I yanked it out, knocking against several teeth. The temperature was higher than normal, but not dangerously so. "All right, Colonel," I said firmly. "12 hours downtime, then come and see me for a final check."
He slid off the bed, and then spared a glance for Sam. "What about Carter?"
I felt a flash of jealousy, but bit my tongue as I followed his gaze. My expression softened. She looked so innocent when she slept. "I'll let you know if things change, sir."
She was still out cold, suspended between heavy sleep and coma, her body thinking the residual Goa'uld would heal her, but instead the machines were doing the work. She was hooked up to monitors and sensor stickies were on her chest and temples, I went to her beside, and allowed myself a long gaze before I leaned down to push open her eyelid extract the device from her eye. I checked her bandages, making sure the nurses had fitted them correctly.
Samantha Carter. My lover. I'd been drawn to her immediately--as the smartest person on the base, she was the alpha dog, and my main target. I'd seduced her. It'd been remarkably easy. I learned too late that she didn't spill her secrets in pillow talk, like so many men. I learned too late her loyalty to the uniform superseded all interpersonal relationships. She'd even become estranged from her father, the most important man in her life, over the secrets she kept. I fared no better than he approaching her personal side.
I learned too late that I could learn all I needed by being her lab partner and co-worker. She shared her goals and missions freely with me. She trusted my opinions. She respected my intelligence. The sex was immaterial.
I learned too late, because dumping her now might jeopardize our working relationship, and that would lead to repercussions.
Her eyes fluttered open. "Janet?" She croaked.
I took her hand. "You're going to be fine, Sam' I felt the answering squeeze of her fingers. "You're going to be fine.
* * *
0900 hours. Sixteen hours had passed. O'Neill had gone through his check-up and was pronounced fit. The nondescript brown envelope had been shipped. Sam had been moved to her base quarters.
I finished my post-mission report, sent it off to Hammond, and closed the laptop, relishing in the satisfying click I associated with a job completed. I went to see Sam. I slid my card through the reader on the door to her room, then entered, carefully carrying a mug of warm milk balanced on a saucer, a tool to make her sleep for a few more hours, so she could heal.
She was already propped up on the bed, reading. I could see she had a headache. When I stepped through the door, she turned to me, her face lighting up. "Janet."
No one purred my name like she did. "Hey, Sam," I answered, perching on the edge of the bed, setting the mug on the side table. "You're supposed to be asleep."
"I wanted to figure out how these retinal devices work," she confessed guiltily. "Daniel brought me the schematics." She set the papers aside, and wriggled over, until her long, lanky form was entwined with mine.
I took her in my arms. I felt her breath, gusty with emotion, blow across my chest. "The worst thing about being tortured," she murmured as I rubbed her back, "Is thinking about you, and wishing I got to tell you how wonderful you've made my life."
Sam scooted up, taller than me even sitting. She took my face in her hands. Her touch was strong and sure. My cheeks warmed. "I won't waste the time I've been given," she said, and kissed me.
I succumbed to her mouth. My heart beat faster. I leaned into her. She urged me back, onto the pillows.
"Sam," I protested. "We're on base."
"Don't wanna waste any time," she said again, and then her body was on mine, her hands were all over me. Her lips found my neck and I moaned, my skin hot, my clit pounding. I couldn't deny that surrendering to Sam was a gift the universe allowed me. The others I had seduced--the congresswoman on the oversight committee for the CDC, and the nerdy young male analyst at the NID--had been all too willing to be controlled in bed. The power of being pleased appealed to them, and they revealed their secrets easily because they needed to brag.
I'd found my job despairingly easy then, just as I found Sam frighteningly hard to conquer. Like a wild animal, she might have been tame, but never truly owned, and far smarter than me. Sam revelled in possessing me, and in making me scream. She seemed to live for the moment when I lost control, seemed to sense control was what I'd sought, all my life.
Here in her bed, with her large hands moving on me, I felt powerless, and whole. Maybe that completeness is what my former targets were seeking from me. At the touch of Sam's mouth, I succumbed. I wasn't allowing myself this passion--Sam was demanding it from me. In return, I got... nothing. I didn't need the sex to learn Sam's secrets, though she was certainly learning mine.
I had too much blood on my hands to suspect I deserved it. The universe was setting me up for punishment down the road for my crimes, surely. Still, I succumbed.
Conscious of the mountain around us, Sam hadn't fully undressed me. The buttons were open on my top and my belly was covered in teeth marks. My skirt was bunched up around my waist. I was shameless in my need. Anyone could walk in and my career would be over. My superiors would dispose of me. With Sam's finger pushing aside my panties, sliding into my wetness, dipping between my lips, I didn't care. I convulsed, arching into her stroking hand.
"Janet," she whispered, as her blue eyes found mine, and I lost myself in them, and came.
When I came back to my senses, I buttoned my blouse and straightened my skirt before settling into her arms. I rested my hand on her thigh.
Sam grinned. "Shouldn't I rest, Doctor Fraiser?"
"I've been trying an experimental procedure, tailored to the needs of female astrophysicists," I crooned, as I worked the buttons open on her fly. "I'd like you to help judge my new technique."
"Well, if the doctor orders it," she said, and I leaned in to kiss her. I knew this kiss was the real reason I would continue to steal for an organization that made me soulless, and the real reason I would make myself invaluable to General Hammond, and the real reason I would work harder to win Colonel O'Neill over. I would never leave Sam.
