FIC: Zymotic (7/12)
Chapter 7
Hallucinations can be very light on their feet, Jack noted as he and Daniel tiptoed through the corridors towards the incinerator. Daniel’s padded shoes didn’t make a sound. Jack wasn’t sure whether that was because they were designed especially for stealth, or because he was hallucinating and his subconscious just hadn’t gotten the hang of consistency yet.
Either way, both of them were completely silent as they passed room after room filled with sleeping colonists. Jack waited until they’d reached the incinerator shaft before asking the question that was on his mind.
“Where have you been hiding since you got here?” he asked as Daniel examined the door to the shaft.
“There are lots of cubbyholes in this place,” Daniel answered absently. Then he turned to face Jack and got straight down to business. “Did you bring your pocketknife?” he asked.
Jack eyed him suspiciously. “So you did leave it in my room for me to find,” he said.
Daniel nodded. “I figured that would convince you that I was real,” he said. “I need you to stick the blade into this slot right here,” he continued, pointing at a small, thin crack between the rock wall and the shaft’s metal door.
Jack went to do as Daniel said, but then he stopped to think about it. “Why me?” he asked. “Why don’t you do it?”
Daniel pulled out another knife from inside his robe. “Because I have to do the same on the other side,” he said.
“Oh.” Jack ignored the odd look Daniel was giving him and pushed the blade of his knife into the crack. “Now what?”
“Now we need to cut through the shale all around the doorframe,” Daniel said, demonstrating by jiggling the knife back and forth until the crack began to widen. “Once we’ve done that, we can pull the frame apart, and the force shield should come with it.”
“I thought you said Carter told you how to disable it, not remove it,” Jack said, confused.
Daniel didn’t bat an eye or break from his work on the other side of the frame. “Did I?”
Jack paused for a moment to try to rationalize what he was seeing and hearing, but he soon gave up. Daniel’s plan sounded weak at best, which led him to believe that this must be a delusion, yet at the same time, debris from the wall was crumbling to the ground at Daniel’s feet. That seemed real enough. But digging around a doorframe in a rock wall in order to disable a force shield? That sounded so crazy that even his subconscious mind couldn’t have come up with it.
He followed Daniel’s lead, digging through the crumbling shale with his knife, until he’d completed one side. His entire upper body was aching both with the effort and the beating he’d taken the night before, so he figured a break was in order. He leaned back against the wall and watched Daniel work for a minute or two.
“How are we gonna stop the other colonists from following us down there if we’re taking out the force shield?” he finally had to ask.
“We’re not,” Daniel said. “Every morning before the colonists wake up, the guards run a diagnostic on all the force shields in the entire colony. They’ll have it fixed before any of the colonists can find it.”
“How? Nobody ever comes in this place.”
Daniel sighed and dropped his arms to his sides in frustration. “Will you please just help me out here?” he said. “We don’t have a whole lot of time, so every second we spend talking about it means there’s one second less for our actual escape.”
Jack grudgingly dug his knife back into the rock and started working away at his half of the bottom of the frame. “I still don’t know whether this is for real or not,” he grumbled.
“Well, I guess you’ll soon find out, won’t you?”
Jack shot him a black look. “That sounded vaguely ominous,” he said.
“Just keep digging, Jack.”
He didn’t exactly have anything better to do, so Jack complied without argument.
As they worked, he couldn’t help but notice how careful Daniel was to stay well away from him. He couldn’t exactly blame him for that, but it was still a little disconcerting. He would have given almost anything for a pat on the back or even a handshake, just to know that Daniel was made of solid matter. After two visits the year before from ascended Daniel, though, he figured he should be getting used to this kind of thing.
The two of them each scraped away at their respective halves of the frame for the next few minutes, until their incisions finally met in the middle. Jack wiped the sweat from his face with his sleeve and looked to Daniel for further instructions. “Well? What now?” he asked.
“Now, I need you to pull the frame away,” Daniel said as he stepped back and reached his hand into his robe to put his knife away.
Jack almost scoffed at this, but shrugged it off instead. “Of course you do,” he said. His tone finished his thought without him having to say another word - Daniel was getting him to do it because Daniel couldn’t do it himself. Jack added another point to the score for “just a delusion.”
Still, there was no harm in trying. At least, he hoped there was no harm in trying. He dug his knife into the crack again until the tip of the blade reached the back of the frame, and then started wrestling with it, digging his fingers as deeply into the shale as they would go in an attempt to grab hold of the frame’s edge.
“There’s no way this is going to work,” he said after pulling and tugging until his fingers were raw. The frame had moved, but not enough to dislodge it from the wall. Jack gave up in disgust and turned to look over at Daniel. “Are you going to help me or what?” he snapped.
Daniel was leaning back against the wall a few feet behind Jack, holding a rope that had somehow appeared out of thin air. He seemed to be trying to make a noose out of it. “Keep trying,” he said without even looking up. “Sam promised me this would work.”
Jack grunted in frustration and turned back to the frame. He took his knife and jammed it back into the groove, running it along the outline of the frame from top to bottom, side to side, looking for a spot that might have been missed.
Halfway along the bottom of the frame, it came to a stop.
“What the…” Jack looked closer at the spot, and saw that the incision in the rock was only half as deep on Daniel’s side as it was on his. “Daniel!”
“Yeah?”
“You were talking to me about wasting time?” Jack said, spinning around to glare at him angrily. “You didn’t even do your half of the job right!”
Daniel gave him a blank look and walked over to the incinerator to take a look for himself. He scratched his head in confusion. “I could have sworn I…”
“Great,” Jack said, throwing his arms up in defeat. “So you are a delusion. Just perfect. Screw this. I’m going back to bed.” He threw his knife on the ground and stomped off in the direction of his quarters.
“Jack, just give me two more minutes, and I promise, I will get you out of here.”
Despite his better judgment, Jack slowed to a stop. He knew he was going to hate himself for it later, but the idea that Daniel was real and had just made a mistake burned in the back of his mind and refused to go away. After all, when had he had a delusion that had lasted this long and been this coherent?
Then again, maybe that was how the disease progressed.
He ran his hands through his hair irritably and turned back around. “Two minutes,” he said. “Then I’m going back to bed whether you’re a delusion or not.”
“Fair enough,” Daniel said.
Jack carefully bent over to pick up his knife, and the work began again. Both men worked feverishly away at the bottom of the frame, and just as Daniel had promised, they were done in less than two minutes.
“Okay, let’s try this together,” Daniel said, taking hold of the left side of the frame as Jack took hold of the right. “Ready? One… two… three.”
They each pulled as hard as they could, and the frame came away from the wall in a shower of dust and debris.
Jack almost laughed triumphantly until he realized half the people in the colony would hear it. Instead he gave a little jump for joy and pumped his arms in the air.
Daniel grinned, looking almost as relieved as Jack felt. “Okay,” he said, holding up the rope. “Time to get the hell out of here.”
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Once the rope had been secured to the wall by a metal clamp that Daniel had also magically produced from inside his robe, Jack turned to him with an inquisitive look. “So… who goes first?” he asked.
Daniel shrugged. “I’ll let you make that call,” he said.
“Okay… you go first.” He wasn’t sure why he figured that would make him feel better about the whole thing, he just knew that this was one mission where he didn’t want to take point.
“Okay,” Daniel said. He quickly fastened the rope around his waist and hoisted himself up into the gaping hole in the wall. “Here goes nothing,” he said.
Then he dropped out of view.
Jack stepped closer to the hole and peered down into the darkness. The shaft didn’t go straight down, he noticed - there was just enough of an incline for Daniel to almost crawl down the chute, only using the rope as a safety line in case he started to slip. Jack found that encouraging. At least he wouldn’t fall to his death right away, even if the rope turned out to be a figment of his imagination.
After a couple minutes, the rope moved as if someone was tugging on it. “I’m down!” he heard Daniel’s faraway voice shout. “Your turn.”
Jack took a deep breath and climbed up into the hole, half expecting to feel a jolt from the force shield they had so easily removed. When nothing happened, he braced himself and took the plunge.
It wasn’t a pleasant descent, by any stretch of the imagination. How scraps of food could go through an electrified force shield and still stick to the sides of the shaft and turn rotten was beyond him, but somehow it had happened. A lot. After moving just five feet down the shaft, he was covered in crud from head to toe.
“Ugh,” he grumbled as the smell of it turned his stomach. “Please tell me there isn’t a pile of this crap at the bottom.”
Thankfully, there wasn’t. What he did find at the bottom was a huge vat full of ashes and still glowing embers.
“Daniel?” Jack called. He could easily jump down onto the side of the vat, as the rim was almost wide enough for two people to walk side by side all the way around it, but he was hesitant to make a move until Daniel had confirmed that it was safe.
“Just jump down, Jack,” he heard Daniel say, though he couldn’t see him from his position half in and half out of the shaft.
“Easy for you to say,” Jack muttered. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath.
He was just about to jump when he heard an angry howl coming from above him. The rope was pulled out of his grasp, causing him to lose his balance and fall directly into the vat.
Even before he hit the ashes, his surroundings had changed and the sounds and smells of Netu invaded his senses. Wailing, screaming, blood, sweat, fire, fear… death.
“No,” Jack groaned, pounding his head with his fists as he found himself lying in The Pit. “I’m not here. Dammit, wake up!”
He heard another scream, but this time he recognized it as Jumas’ predatory cry. He was there - Jack could feel his presence with him in the vat - but he couldn’t see him.
“Daniel!” he cried.
Suddenly, he felt someone grab him by his shirt, and a fist connected with his face so hard that it jolted him back to reality. Jumas was on top of him, getting ready to claw him to pieces just for the pleasure of it.
Jack thought fast and reached into his pocket for his knife. Before Jumas had a chance to strike another blow, Jack flipped the knife open and plunged it into Jumas’ gut. He gave his wrist a sharp twist to finish the job, and quickly rolled out from under him as Jumas fell face down in the ash.
It didn’t occur to Jack until he saw the body lying motionless in front of him that it might have all been a hallucination. He felt his face drain of all colour as his stomach plunged down into his shoes.
What if he’d just killed Daniel?
“Daniel? You there?”
His fear intensified when there was no answer.
“Daniel? Dammit, answer me!”
“I’m right here, Jack.”
Jack spun around to find Daniel standing directly behind him. He clambered to his feet and glared at him angrily. “Why the hell didn’t you answer me?” he said. “I thought I’d killed you!”
“Hard to do that when I’m just a figment of your imagination,” Daniel said.
Jack felt a flash of rage, though he swallowed it down as best he could. “You think this is a time for sarcasm?” he snapped. “You finding this situation amusing, Daniel? Some rescuer you are.”
“No, I don’t find any of this amusing,” Daniel said evenly. “And you’re welcome.”
“For what?”
Daniel pointed to the body lying at their feet.
Jack looked down and blinked in surprise. There was a knife sticking out of Jumas’ back. “Okay…” Jack said slowly, massaging his forehead with his fingers. “Now I know I must be hallucinating. How the hell did you do that?”
“Lucky shot,” Daniel said irritably. He turned around and walked across the ashes and debris to the side of the vat, where the rope was hanging down from somewhere above. “Coming?” he called over his shoulder.
Jack glanced down at Jumas one more time. He still couldn’t believe it. Then again, maybe he could. He wasn’t sure what he believed anymore.
He shook his head wearily and followed Daniel to the rope. It wasn’t a long way up to the rim of the vat, but since he still wasn’t able to touch Daniel without making him sick, the rope sure came in handy. Once he’d hauled himself out, Daniel led him around the wide rim to the ventilation shaft on the opposite side.
“After you,” Daniel said, offering him a flashlight that he’d pulled out of his robe.
Jack took the flashlight, smiled and nodded. The shaft was barely four feet up from the rim of the vat, and seemed to slope upwards gradually enough that crawling through it would be easy. He hoisted himself up and began his long trip to the surface.
He could almost taste freedom already.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
To be continued...
Hallucinations can be very light on their feet, Jack noted as he and Daniel tiptoed through the corridors towards the incinerator. Daniel’s padded shoes didn’t make a sound. Jack wasn’t sure whether that was because they were designed especially for stealth, or because he was hallucinating and his subconscious just hadn’t gotten the hang of consistency yet.
Either way, both of them were completely silent as they passed room after room filled with sleeping colonists. Jack waited until they’d reached the incinerator shaft before asking the question that was on his mind.
“Where have you been hiding since you got here?” he asked as Daniel examined the door to the shaft.
“There are lots of cubbyholes in this place,” Daniel answered absently. Then he turned to face Jack and got straight down to business. “Did you bring your pocketknife?” he asked.
Jack eyed him suspiciously. “So you did leave it in my room for me to find,” he said.
Daniel nodded. “I figured that would convince you that I was real,” he said. “I need you to stick the blade into this slot right here,” he continued, pointing at a small, thin crack between the rock wall and the shaft’s metal door.
Jack went to do as Daniel said, but then he stopped to think about it. “Why me?” he asked. “Why don’t you do it?”
Daniel pulled out another knife from inside his robe. “Because I have to do the same on the other side,” he said.
“Oh.” Jack ignored the odd look Daniel was giving him and pushed the blade of his knife into the crack. “Now what?”
“Now we need to cut through the shale all around the doorframe,” Daniel said, demonstrating by jiggling the knife back and forth until the crack began to widen. “Once we’ve done that, we can pull the frame apart, and the force shield should come with it.”
“I thought you said Carter told you how to disable it, not remove it,” Jack said, confused.
Daniel didn’t bat an eye or break from his work on the other side of the frame. “Did I?”
Jack paused for a moment to try to rationalize what he was seeing and hearing, but he soon gave up. Daniel’s plan sounded weak at best, which led him to believe that this must be a delusion, yet at the same time, debris from the wall was crumbling to the ground at Daniel’s feet. That seemed real enough. But digging around a doorframe in a rock wall in order to disable a force shield? That sounded so crazy that even his subconscious mind couldn’t have come up with it.
He followed Daniel’s lead, digging through the crumbling shale with his knife, until he’d completed one side. His entire upper body was aching both with the effort and the beating he’d taken the night before, so he figured a break was in order. He leaned back against the wall and watched Daniel work for a minute or two.
“How are we gonna stop the other colonists from following us down there if we’re taking out the force shield?” he finally had to ask.
“We’re not,” Daniel said. “Every morning before the colonists wake up, the guards run a diagnostic on all the force shields in the entire colony. They’ll have it fixed before any of the colonists can find it.”
“How? Nobody ever comes in this place.”
Daniel sighed and dropped his arms to his sides in frustration. “Will you please just help me out here?” he said. “We don’t have a whole lot of time, so every second we spend talking about it means there’s one second less for our actual escape.”
Jack grudgingly dug his knife back into the rock and started working away at his half of the bottom of the frame. “I still don’t know whether this is for real or not,” he grumbled.
“Well, I guess you’ll soon find out, won’t you?”
Jack shot him a black look. “That sounded vaguely ominous,” he said.
“Just keep digging, Jack.”
He didn’t exactly have anything better to do, so Jack complied without argument.
As they worked, he couldn’t help but notice how careful Daniel was to stay well away from him. He couldn’t exactly blame him for that, but it was still a little disconcerting. He would have given almost anything for a pat on the back or even a handshake, just to know that Daniel was made of solid matter. After two visits the year before from ascended Daniel, though, he figured he should be getting used to this kind of thing.
The two of them each scraped away at their respective halves of the frame for the next few minutes, until their incisions finally met in the middle. Jack wiped the sweat from his face with his sleeve and looked to Daniel for further instructions. “Well? What now?” he asked.
“Now, I need you to pull the frame away,” Daniel said as he stepped back and reached his hand into his robe to put his knife away.
Jack almost scoffed at this, but shrugged it off instead. “Of course you do,” he said. His tone finished his thought without him having to say another word - Daniel was getting him to do it because Daniel couldn’t do it himself. Jack added another point to the score for “just a delusion.”
Still, there was no harm in trying. At least, he hoped there was no harm in trying. He dug his knife into the crack again until the tip of the blade reached the back of the frame, and then started wrestling with it, digging his fingers as deeply into the shale as they would go in an attempt to grab hold of the frame’s edge.
“There’s no way this is going to work,” he said after pulling and tugging until his fingers were raw. The frame had moved, but not enough to dislodge it from the wall. Jack gave up in disgust and turned to look over at Daniel. “Are you going to help me or what?” he snapped.
Daniel was leaning back against the wall a few feet behind Jack, holding a rope that had somehow appeared out of thin air. He seemed to be trying to make a noose out of it. “Keep trying,” he said without even looking up. “Sam promised me this would work.”
Jack grunted in frustration and turned back to the frame. He took his knife and jammed it back into the groove, running it along the outline of the frame from top to bottom, side to side, looking for a spot that might have been missed.
Halfway along the bottom of the frame, it came to a stop.
“What the…” Jack looked closer at the spot, and saw that the incision in the rock was only half as deep on Daniel’s side as it was on his. “Daniel!”
“Yeah?”
“You were talking to me about wasting time?” Jack said, spinning around to glare at him angrily. “You didn’t even do your half of the job right!”
Daniel gave him a blank look and walked over to the incinerator to take a look for himself. He scratched his head in confusion. “I could have sworn I…”
“Great,” Jack said, throwing his arms up in defeat. “So you are a delusion. Just perfect. Screw this. I’m going back to bed.” He threw his knife on the ground and stomped off in the direction of his quarters.
“Jack, just give me two more minutes, and I promise, I will get you out of here.”
Despite his better judgment, Jack slowed to a stop. He knew he was going to hate himself for it later, but the idea that Daniel was real and had just made a mistake burned in the back of his mind and refused to go away. After all, when had he had a delusion that had lasted this long and been this coherent?
Then again, maybe that was how the disease progressed.
He ran his hands through his hair irritably and turned back around. “Two minutes,” he said. “Then I’m going back to bed whether you’re a delusion or not.”
“Fair enough,” Daniel said.
Jack carefully bent over to pick up his knife, and the work began again. Both men worked feverishly away at the bottom of the frame, and just as Daniel had promised, they were done in less than two minutes.
“Okay, let’s try this together,” Daniel said, taking hold of the left side of the frame as Jack took hold of the right. “Ready? One… two… three.”
They each pulled as hard as they could, and the frame came away from the wall in a shower of dust and debris.
Jack almost laughed triumphantly until he realized half the people in the colony would hear it. Instead he gave a little jump for joy and pumped his arms in the air.
Daniel grinned, looking almost as relieved as Jack felt. “Okay,” he said, holding up the rope. “Time to get the hell out of here.”
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Once the rope had been secured to the wall by a metal clamp that Daniel had also magically produced from inside his robe, Jack turned to him with an inquisitive look. “So… who goes first?” he asked.
Daniel shrugged. “I’ll let you make that call,” he said.
“Okay… you go first.” He wasn’t sure why he figured that would make him feel better about the whole thing, he just knew that this was one mission where he didn’t want to take point.
“Okay,” Daniel said. He quickly fastened the rope around his waist and hoisted himself up into the gaping hole in the wall. “Here goes nothing,” he said.
Then he dropped out of view.
Jack stepped closer to the hole and peered down into the darkness. The shaft didn’t go straight down, he noticed - there was just enough of an incline for Daniel to almost crawl down the chute, only using the rope as a safety line in case he started to slip. Jack found that encouraging. At least he wouldn’t fall to his death right away, even if the rope turned out to be a figment of his imagination.
After a couple minutes, the rope moved as if someone was tugging on it. “I’m down!” he heard Daniel’s faraway voice shout. “Your turn.”
Jack took a deep breath and climbed up into the hole, half expecting to feel a jolt from the force shield they had so easily removed. When nothing happened, he braced himself and took the plunge.
It wasn’t a pleasant descent, by any stretch of the imagination. How scraps of food could go through an electrified force shield and still stick to the sides of the shaft and turn rotten was beyond him, but somehow it had happened. A lot. After moving just five feet down the shaft, he was covered in crud from head to toe.
“Ugh,” he grumbled as the smell of it turned his stomach. “Please tell me there isn’t a pile of this crap at the bottom.”
Thankfully, there wasn’t. What he did find at the bottom was a huge vat full of ashes and still glowing embers.
“Daniel?” Jack called. He could easily jump down onto the side of the vat, as the rim was almost wide enough for two people to walk side by side all the way around it, but he was hesitant to make a move until Daniel had confirmed that it was safe.
“Just jump down, Jack,” he heard Daniel say, though he couldn’t see him from his position half in and half out of the shaft.
“Easy for you to say,” Jack muttered. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath.
He was just about to jump when he heard an angry howl coming from above him. The rope was pulled out of his grasp, causing him to lose his balance and fall directly into the vat.
Even before he hit the ashes, his surroundings had changed and the sounds and smells of Netu invaded his senses. Wailing, screaming, blood, sweat, fire, fear… death.
“No,” Jack groaned, pounding his head with his fists as he found himself lying in The Pit. “I’m not here. Dammit, wake up!”
He heard another scream, but this time he recognized it as Jumas’ predatory cry. He was there - Jack could feel his presence with him in the vat - but he couldn’t see him.
“Daniel!” he cried.
Suddenly, he felt someone grab him by his shirt, and a fist connected with his face so hard that it jolted him back to reality. Jumas was on top of him, getting ready to claw him to pieces just for the pleasure of it.
Jack thought fast and reached into his pocket for his knife. Before Jumas had a chance to strike another blow, Jack flipped the knife open and plunged it into Jumas’ gut. He gave his wrist a sharp twist to finish the job, and quickly rolled out from under him as Jumas fell face down in the ash.
It didn’t occur to Jack until he saw the body lying motionless in front of him that it might have all been a hallucination. He felt his face drain of all colour as his stomach plunged down into his shoes.
What if he’d just killed Daniel?
“Daniel? You there?”
His fear intensified when there was no answer.
“Daniel? Dammit, answer me!”
“I’m right here, Jack.”
Jack spun around to find Daniel standing directly behind him. He clambered to his feet and glared at him angrily. “Why the hell didn’t you answer me?” he said. “I thought I’d killed you!”
“Hard to do that when I’m just a figment of your imagination,” Daniel said.
Jack felt a flash of rage, though he swallowed it down as best he could. “You think this is a time for sarcasm?” he snapped. “You finding this situation amusing, Daniel? Some rescuer you are.”
“No, I don’t find any of this amusing,” Daniel said evenly. “And you’re welcome.”
“For what?”
Daniel pointed to the body lying at their feet.
Jack looked down and blinked in surprise. There was a knife sticking out of Jumas’ back. “Okay…” Jack said slowly, massaging his forehead with his fingers. “Now I know I must be hallucinating. How the hell did you do that?”
“Lucky shot,” Daniel said irritably. He turned around and walked across the ashes and debris to the side of the vat, where the rope was hanging down from somewhere above. “Coming?” he called over his shoulder.
Jack glanced down at Jumas one more time. He still couldn’t believe it. Then again, maybe he could. He wasn’t sure what he believed anymore.
He shook his head wearily and followed Daniel to the rope. It wasn’t a long way up to the rim of the vat, but since he still wasn’t able to touch Daniel without making him sick, the rope sure came in handy. Once he’d hauled himself out, Daniel led him around the wide rim to the ventilation shaft on the opposite side.
“After you,” Daniel said, offering him a flashlight that he’d pulled out of his robe.
Jack took the flashlight, smiled and nodded. The shaft was barely four feet up from the rim of the vat, and seemed to slope upwards gradually enough that crawling through it would be easy. He hoisted himself up and began his long trip to the surface.
He could almost taste freedom already.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
To be continued...