Hostile Ground Part 27

The grizzly business was done, and over the p.r.o.ne corpse, he met O'Neill's grim gaze.

"That was fun," he said.

Teal'c lifted an eyebrow but did not comment.

From behind O'Neill, the boy emerged and it was only when Teal'c took in his ashen face that he realized dawn had crept upon them.

"Hey," O'Neill said to the kid, putting a hand on his shoulder. "You okay?" The boy just stared and O'Neill ruffled his hand through his hair. "You'll be fine." He looked over at Teal'c. "Where's the girl?"

Looking back to where she was hiding, Teal'c lifted his hand and beckoned. She was running toward them in an instant and, when the boy saw her, he started running too until they collided together in a tangle of hugs and tears.

O'Neill cleared his throat, sniffed, then glared at Teal'c - daring him to comment. He did not dare.

"Hey," O'Neill called over to the children. "You two got a home to go to?"

The girl looked up over her brother's head. "We live in the Way Back."

"Parents?"

She shook her head. "Just me and Bryn."

"Then get outa here," he said. "They might send back-up."

With a nod, she took her brother's hand, but before she led him away she turned to Teal'c. "You're him, aren't you?" she said, gesturing toward his forehead. "You're Dix."

He exchanged a look with O'Neill who just lifted his eyebrows and left it to Teal'c to answer. He chose to let the girl draw her own conclusions and simply bowed his head in silence.

She gave a short bark of laughter. "I knew it," she said, bending down to talk in her brother's ear. "Dix saved you, Bryn. How about that?"

The boy looked up at him, his tear-swollen eyes going wide as the girl, Jem, pulled him away.

"You kids take care," O'Neill called after them, his voice tight with frustration. Teal'c understood his feelings; they could not protect these children, nor any of the thousands who lived here. The next night, perhaps, the Amam would come again and they would be taken - or the night after that.

O'Neill shook his head and stared down at the bodies at their feet. All around them Teal'c sensed people emerging with the morning light, staring in shock and fear at the fallen Amam.

"I'm not sure we did these people any favors," O'Neill said, looking about with obvious unease. "Someone's gonna come looking for these guys."

Teal'c followed his gaze, but alongside the fear, he saw something else in the faces watching from the shadows. It was not exactly hope, but perhaps it was something that could turn to hope.

"It will do these people no harm," he decided, "to learn that the Amam can die at their hands."

"They've got no weapons, Teal'c."

"Not yet," he said. "But if they value their freedom they must learn how to fight for it." He lifted an eyebrow and fixed his friend with a serious look. "This is not our battle to win, O'Neill."

He gave a tight nod, accepting the point even if he did not like it, and then slapped Teal'c on the arm. "Come on," he said, "let's get back. The sooner we get off this rock, the better."

Hunter was right and the flood of people washed past them. Daniel watched, sickened, through a gap in the canvas as three Amam stalked after their prey - driving the panicked population ahead like frightened sheep.

After the Amam were gone, they tried to eat. Daniel broke open one of the MREs in Sam's pack, sharing out the content, but the wretched screams continued and no one had much of an appet.i.te. He flinched when he heard a man shrieking in the distance, trying hard not to imagine that it was Jack or Teal'c.

"How often does this happen?" he asked Hunter, as much to distract himself as anything else.

Hunter sat hunkered with his wife, the child still sleeping in the hide they'd created beneath their shack. "A hunt?" He shrugged. "Depends. Sometimes they hunt the same place every night for a month. Other times weeks go by without a sniff o'them. Hunting's just for sport, though. When they want to harvest, they use the s.n.a.t.c.hers." He glanced at his wife, who pressed her face into his shoulder with a shudder, and drew her closer. "That's how they got me."

"You mean the beams of light?" Daniel said, wiggling his fingers to ill.u.s.trate a transporter beam.

Hunter nodded. "We call 'em s.n.a.t.c.her beams."

"I can see why. That's how they got us too." He glanced over at Sam who sat guarding the entrance, as if her weapon and the sc.r.a.p of canvas could keep out the Amam. He supposed it made her feel like she was doing something while they waited. "Hunter?" he said, in a voice loud enough for Sam to hear. "Have you ever heard of an Amam healing someone who was dying?"

Sam glanced over at him, gave a slight warning shake of her head.

"No," Hunter said. "Why would they? We ain't nothin' but livestock to them." He scratched a hand over the stubble on his jaw. "There are the Feeders, though," he added, "people who slave for the s.n.a.t.c.hers. Heard it said they get fed." He made a clawing gesture with his hand. "Instead of taking life, they're given more."

"Really?" He resisted the urge to touch the place on his chest where the Amam had healed him. "I wonder what kind of affect that has on them?"

"They say their bodies live forever, but they ain't got no soul left inside." Hunter grimaced. "Makes me sick just thinking about it."

"Yeah, it's certainly... a disturbing thought," Daniel said, meeting Sam's alarmed look with one of rea.s.surance. He wasn't going to admit to anything. "So, um, you've never met anyone it's happened to?"

"If I ever met one of the Feeders I'd kill him, not talk to him."

"Right," Daniel said, ignoring the 'shut-the-h.e.l.l-up' looks Sam was throwing in his direction.

"Probably just camp-tales anyway," Hunter added. "Can't believe most of what people say around here."

"But Dix is real?" Sam said from the doorway, changing the subject. "And the resistance?"

"Yup," Hunter said. "They're real, for dead sure."

"I wonder," Daniel mused, unwilling to be distracted, "why they'd do that - the Amam, I mean. Why would they heal people?"

Hunter shrugged. "Who knows? They're monsters. Why do they do anything?"

But Daniel didn't believe in monsters and whatever these Amam were, they were intelligent and rational creatures. That meant they could be explained. He rubbed a hand absently over his chest, where the Amam had touched him. Unlike Sam, he felt no lingering pain. A life for a life, the Amam had said, which meant they had the capacity for moral thought. For altruism, perhaps. They might look like monsters, they might act like monsters most of the time, but that was too easy a way to dismiss them - and, perhaps, to underestimate them.

"It's getting light," Sam said, opening the canvas a crack with the tip of her gun.

In the distance someone started screaming again - it sounded like a child.

She grimaced, moving into a low crouch as she opened the gap wider. He saw her recoil a little, and in a grim voice she said, "There are bodies out there."

Hunter nodded. "There always are."

"Do they only hunt at night?" Daniel said.

"Yes, mostly. They see better in the shadows. You saw how dim their s.h.i.+p was - I think they see differently to us."

"Photosensitivity," Sam said, still watching the creeping dawn. "It explains the shape of their pupils."

"I wonder -" But Daniel's question was cut short by the distant but familiar rat-tat-tat of an MP5.

Sam was on her feet in an instant and out the door, Daniel only a couple of steps behind her. Weapon raised, she was scanning the area, but the sporadic gunfire was at least half a mile away.

"It's coming from over there," Daniel said, gesturing off to their right.

"Yeah." She lowered her weapon, jaw clenched tight. "I hope they're okay."

It went on for at least five minutes - swift bursts of gunfire and beneath it the sizzling sound of a staff weapon discharging. Then, after a longer and more intensive firefight, it stopped.

They waited, but nothing else happened.

"It's over," Sam said tightly.

But who had won? Daniel reached for his radio but Sam shook her head.

"Radio silence," she reminded him with a grim expression. "The colonel will contact us when it's safe."

Behind them, Hunter emerged into the thin light that was starting to lift the shadows from the camp. He looked around with caution and then his eyes fell on something Daniel hadn't noticed in his concern for his friends: two desiccated bodies, crumpled together amid the trampled shacks opposite. Daniel's gaze automatically flinched from the sight, but Hunter walked toward them and dropped to his knees at their side. Head bowed, he sat in silence and Daniel wondered if he'd known these people. He supposed that he must have.

At the doorway to the shelter, Hunter's wife appeared with their son on her hip, his sleepy head resting on her shoulder. She too looked over at the bodies, and all around, Daniel realized, people were emerging from within the ragged camp.

Lifting his head, Hunter reached out his hands and rested one on each of the bodies. "Oh Hecate," he said, loud enough for his voice to carry, "you are the beginning and the end, Mistress of the Crossroads and keeper of the Gateway. You guide us on our path to the world hereafter. Hail, G.o.ddess, and attend to this our sacrifice."

Sam glanced at Daniel, but her usually bright curiosity was tempered by anxiety and her attention quickly returned to scanning the camp for signs of Teal'c and Jack.

Hunter rose to his feet. "That's done," he said. "Hecate will avenge them in the time to come."

"You mean the afterlife?"

"I mean," he said, "when we drive out the s.n.a.t.c.hers."

You and whose army? Daniel thought, but kept his skepticism to himself. After all, at first glance, no one would have thought the Abydonians could have overthrown Ra.

"Daniel?" Sam said suddenly, "I'm going to go check -"

Static burst out of their radios, making them both jump, and then Jack's scratchy voice said, "Carter, Daniel, report."

With a grin of relief, Sam toggled her radio. "Good to hear from you, sir. All okay here. What's your status?"

"Heading your way, Carter. Have Hunter ready to move out."

"Yes sir." She hesitated a moment. "Colonel - we heard gunfire."

There was a pause, another burst of static, then, "The b.a.s.t.a.r.ds are hard to kill, Carter. See you in five. O'Neill out."

Sam smiled at Daniel, then Hunter. "You heard the colonel," she said. "It's time to go see Dix."

Rocks, dislodged by the ha'tak, blocked the road up to the Cheyenne Mountain Complex so they had to abandon the SUV and walk the last half mile.

They were in the shadow of the s.h.i.+p now, where it perched on the mountain like some great, ugly bird of prey. Death Gliders swarmed around it, returning to base.

"Ground a.s.sault," Makepeace said, thinking aloud. "That's why they're calling the gliders home."

Maybourne glanced at him. "Then we'd better get inside."

There were two Marines on the gates; Makepeace recognized them both from the SGC. Nonetheless, he approached with caution, hands raised. He didn't want to risk anyone's jittery trigger finger. "Major Jefferson," he said with a nod. "Lieutenant Booker. Draw the short straws?"

Jefferson gave a small, tight smile. "Something like that, sir." His eyes darted to Maybourne, disheveled and out of uniform, then back to Makepeace. "General Hammond said to look out for you, sir."

"How considerate," Maybourne said.

Makepeace ignored him. "You still got comms, Booker?"

"Yes sir, I'll tell the general you're on your way down."

He disappeared into the guard post and Jefferson came forward. Twenty-something and hard as nails, he'd been a.s.signed to SG-5 for the past three months. He jerked his head toward the city. From this entrance you could see smoke rising over the trees, but the city itself was hidden from view. "What's it like down there, sir?"

"Bad," Makepeace said.

Jefferson shook his head. "Glad my folks are still in Austin."

Makepeace didn't answer that, he doubted anywhere would be immune from this by the end.

"Sir?" Booker called, stepping out from the guard post. "General Hammond said to get down to the gate room as fast as you can. They're -"

The unmistakable sound of a ring-transporter activating cut off his words. Behind Booker, between the gates and the tunnel leading into the complex, Goa'uld rings dropped down and lifted again to reveal six Jaffa.

Makepeace opened fire immediately, took two down before the others had time to lift their staff weapons. "Get into the tunnel!" he yelled as another set of rings activated, depositing a further six Jaffa between them and safety.

Jefferson and Booker both dived to the side, firing from the shelter of the guard post, while Maybourne scurried behind them like the rat he was.

"Frag out!" Jefferson bawled, pitching a grenade with precision.

Makepeace turned his face away, ducked as the detonation threw up sharp pieces of stone, taking out half the Jaffa. "Nice!" he yelled at the major. "Got any more of those?"

"Yes sir!"

But the remaining Jaffa weren't giving up. "Kalach shal'tek!" bellowed one as he advanced, leaping over the bodies of his fallen comrades. Staff weapon raised, he fired. Makepeace pressed himself against the wall of the guardhouse, felt the heat of the plasma scorch past him, as Jefferson yelled a warning and threw his second grenade. The detonation flung the Jaffa forward, face first into the dirt. Makepeace heard his neck break, saw the dead-eyes staring up at him. Jaffa or human, dead was dead.

"Colonel!" Booker shouted, gesturing with his weapon; there was a clear path to the tunnel.

"Go!" he barked. "Get the blast doors closed. Maybourne -" He turned just in time to see more rings activating behind them. "d.a.m.n it."

Six, Jaffa appeared. Twelve. "Rak'lo najaquna shel're hara kek," hissed one of them, raising his staff weapon.

"Whatever," Makepeace said and lifted his own weapon. "Maybourne! Get behind me."