Happy Birthday

Complete
Drama, Romance
Other pairing
Season 6
Spoilers for Singularity, Show and Tell, Fair Game, Rite of Passage
FR-T
Violence

 Disclaimers:

Stargate SG-1 and its characters are the property of Stargate (II) Productions, Showtime/Viacom, The SciFi Channel, MGM/UA, Double Secret Productions, and Gekko Productions. This story is written purely for my own entertainment, and that of anyone else who may happen to read it. No infringement of copyright is intended. It is not intended and should never be used for commercial purposes.

The original characters, situations and ideas contained within this work are the property of the author.

Author's Notes:

It struck me as I was writing this that I was not just writing an SG-1 fanfic, but also pieces of a high school melodrama and a medical thriller a la Outbreak. Both are firsts for me.

The Colorado Springs High School building was designed by Scottish Architect and Colorado Springs resident Thomas MacLaren, who built a bunch of stuff in the city, including several high schools and the Cragmore Sanitorium. Although the high school in this story has little to do with the real high school, it's a great building.

A bunch of the high school politics stuff is cribbed from articles by and about Rosalind Wiseman, author of Queen Bees and Wannabees.

Memorial hospital is a real place as well. See their website for details, but be aware it's not that fascinating. I just like to make it clear that I don't just make stuff up.

The cows of P6F-11G were transplanted there along with the plants and the humans by the Goa'uld.

Brigadier General Kenneth DeCuir is a real person; the CO of the Cheyenne Mountain Air Force Station (as Llew points out, it's not a base, probably because it has no planes, although that's really just a guess). The use of his name is not intended as any slight or slur. Actual info on him, and a bunch of other stuff – such as the fact that the Mountain is a joint US/Canadian missile defence facility – can be found on the Cheyenne Mountain website. It's a secure military website, so they're probably watching you and stuff if you go there.

Cariad is a Welsh term of fairly intense endearment. It's kind of like the English 'sweetheart' in meaning.

Bach is slightly lighter term of endearment, used roughly as 'love' is in English, although its literal meaning is 'small'.

Taeog is a Welsh insult, and means what Llew says it means.

The CDC is of course the Centers for Disease Control.

FEMA is the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Their website will tell you that they have little real power and exist only to facilitate and coordinate relief efforts in the wake of major disasters. Conspiracy theorists will tell you that they are the secret government with the power to suspend the Constitution and take over the country on a whim, which is quite possibly not true, but altogether more fun.

The Naga were serpent people of Hindu myth, and in some traditions bore a nagamani – gem of the snake – in their brow. The Rajah Naga or serpent king was their ruler.

 Acknowledgements:

 Thanks to Sho.

The Prophet, 14th January 2003

Happy Birthday

Thursday morning dawned bright and clear, and Cassandra Fraiser was woken by the sunlight shining merrily through a crack in the curtains. She briefly entertained the notion of leaping out of bed, dancing downstairs and making breakfast into a big Broadway production number – or at least some manner of affectionate pastiche of same – but swiftly abandoned this plan of action as altogether too much physical and creative effort. Instead, she rolled over, put her back to the window, and failed to go back to sleep. So successful was this new plan that she was able to continue failing to go back to sleep until her mother brought her a cup of tea and told her it was time to get up for school.

Cassie bolted down the warming caffeine, got up, showered and dressed, before slouching her way towards the kitchen to have breakfast. One hearty sugar rush later, she was feeling much more human.

"Morning, Mom," she said.

"It speaks," Dr Janet Fraiser remarked, pointedly. "Good morning, Cassie."

"I didn't hear you come in last night," Cassie said.

"Busy night," Janet replied, apologetically. "I'm glad you didn't hear me. I got back about one in the morning and tried to be as quiet as I could."

"You shouldn't be this bright if you didn't get in until one," Cassie protested. "It's not fair."

"No-one ever said life was fair," Janet reminded her.

Cassie harrumphed. "Did you talk to Sam?" She asked, innocently.

"Yes, I did," Janet replied. "And we're still on for Saturday. Sam is taking me out to dinner, then we're going to meet Colonel O'Neill and Teal'c back at the Colonel's place for an over-aged slumber party." She smiled at her daughter's ill-concealed delight. "So you'll have the whole place to yourself until midday on Sunday at the earliest. Just don't do anything I wouldn't do."

"So I can write out drug prescriptions and marry shiftless, loser rednecks then?"

"You can also be grounded for all eternity."

"I'll be good," Cassie promised, feigning exasperation. "Even if I'm not, you know Llew will be a perfect gentleman. It'll just be the four of us..."

"You and Llew; JJ and Richard?" Janet asked, although they had been over Cassie's plans a hundred times.

"No," Cassie replied. "JJ and Richard can't make it, so I've got a couple of strangers to take their places; they're bringing candy," she added, innocently.

Janet glowered affectionately. "I should never have allowed Colonel O'Neill anywhere near you."

"Yes," Cassie amended, with a grin. "JJ, Richard, Llew and I. I'm still just cooking dinner, and JJ's bringing a cake; as long as she's over the flu. There will be movies, and possibly a very few drinks of the ever-so slightly alcoholic persuasion."

Janet smiled, but the expression was a little bittersweet.

"What's wrong?" Cassie asked.

"I just kind of wish I didn't believe you," Janet admitted. "I mean, don't get me wrong; I'm glad that you're going to be celebrating your birthday responsibly, I just...Is everything alright?" She asked, and not for the first time.

Cassie smiled wistfully. "If you mean 'am I happy in my life and myself', then yeah. I'm alive and healthy; I'm doing well at school and I have good friends. My boyfriend – who is practically perfect in every way – will be arriving in Colorado Springs this afternoon, I turn seventeen on Saturday, and I'm going to learn to drive. It's all good."

"But..." Janet prompted.

"But if you mean, 'am I still the Belle of the Ball, the life of the party and a prime candidate for Homecoming Queen next year', then no. I'm hanging with a different crowd now...a better crowd. The kind of crowd who don't call me a freak," she added, in a whisper.

"They're not still calling you a freak?" Janet asked, disbelieving.

"Hard to believe, isn't it?" Cassie replied, fixing her eyes on her cereal and trying to sound casual. "But poking fun at Freaky Fraiser apparently has more staying power than Pokémon." She prodded listlessly at her breakfast with a spoon. "Probably would've helped if it wasn't so alliterative."

Janet gave a contemptuous snort. "As if they know what alliteration is," she scoffed. "But haven't they found something else to grab their attention by now?"

"Oh no," Cassie explained. "See, there's this whole thing where I used to be one of them, so they have to try and erase all memory of our association, so they won't be contaminated by my freakishness. I mean, I was a big fish in the high school social jungle; practically a Queen Bee."

"A big queen bee fish in the jungle?" Janet asked. That got a laugh, at least.

"It's a sociological term," Cassie said. "For the head of a clique. I was top beta in Justine MacIntyre's inner circle and well on my way to co-regnant status when..." She set her spoon down on the table with an air of finality that told Janet she would not get any more without pushing. "I gotta catch the bus," she said, struggling not to sound disconsolate.

"Remember to brush your teeth," Janet called. "You don't want to have bad breath when Llew arrives."

As Janet had hoped, the mention of Cassie's long-distance boyfriend, Llew Midhir, and his imminent arrival cheered her considerably, but Janet still worried as her adopted daughter trudged upstairs to the bathroom. She dimly remembered the cruelty of high school girls from her own experiences, and even kind-of understood what Cassie meant about being singled out as a once-cool kid who had fallen from grace. Maybe it all seemed more regimented than in her day, but she did have some idea of what it was like to be scorned by the beautiful people. Having made the mistake of openly striving to learn at high school, Janet had been shunned by all and sundry; even her younger sister had given her the cold shoulder one time, and Janet had never really been able to forgive her.

Janet often thought that her outsider status at high school, and even at med school, had been a major contributing factor in her decision to marry the first guy to show a serious interest. Given how well that had worked out, could anyone blame her for worrying about Cassandra?

Even so, if that was all the worry she had, Janet might not have felt so bad, but there were also the nightmares. On the record, Janet did not even know about those, as Cassie had only confided in Sam. Janet had only known that Cassandra was hiding something from her, until Sam had become concerned enough to break her vow of silence. She had told Janet all about Cassie's nightmares: Recurring dreams of her dead family and friends on Hanka, and of the Goa'uld Nirrti coming for her. She did not have the dreams every night, but often enough, according to Sam, that Janet was worried for her daughter's emotional state, if not her mental health.

On the other hand, Cassandra did have Llew, who was indeed practically perfect in every way. Most importantly from Janet's perspective, he made her daughter happy, yet spent most of his time in a different country; well out of make-out range. She also had JJ, and JJ's boyfriend Richard – neither of whom considered Cassie's friendship a burden or a source of contamination – and several other school friends, if none as close. Then there were her other friends – SG-1 – but they were more like an aunt and two uncles, and not what a high school girl needed to maintain her social standing.

"Bye, Mom!" Cassie yelled, as she rushed out of the door.

"Have a good day, Sweetie!" Janet called back, but the slam of the door was her only reply.

Janet shook her head slowly. Cassandra troubled her, but then that was probably the way with all mothers and daughters. She sighed, finished her coffee, stacked the dishwasher and headed out for work. On her way out, she reached up to switch off the hall light. The bulb flickered, then blew out with a gentle 'ping'. Making a mental note to change the bulb when she got in, Janet turned off the switch and went out to her car.

*

Cassie had left the house early to escape the uncomfortable turn that the conversation had taken, but in her black mood she walked so slowly and morosely that she had to run the last hundred metres to catch the bus. It was no great problem for her – having such an active collection of role models, she was in good shape – but she was still out of breath, to the great amusement of many of the students already seated. At the front, an over-styled blonde girl whispered in her boyfriend's ear and he chuckled. The girl shot Cassie a superior look before planting a big kiss on the boy's lips. She was Anna Laurence, once Cassie's so-called friend and archrival, now her chief tormentor and the triumphant co-ruler of Justine MacIntyre's in-crowd. The boy was Dominic Curry; Cassie's ex.

One student did not laugh however, and instead scooted her bag over to make room for Cassie.

"You're back!" Cassie observed, delightedly, sitting and throwing a hug around the other girl's shoulders.

"Ten out of ten for observation, Cass," Jemima Jeanette 'JJ' Kendal replied. "I got up this morning and Dr Mom declared me fit to return to active duty." JJ's turn of phrase was more than mere sarcasm. The fact that both girls were the daughters – albeit in Cassie's case, adopted daughter – of divorced Air Force doctors was perhaps one of the great strengths in their friendship. That they had both been shut out and cut down by the MacIntyre Mafia was another.

"So; clean bill of health for Saturday?" Cassie asked.

"Absolutely," JJ assured her. "I wouldn't miss it for the world. I'm dying to meet this guy of yours."

A loud cackle erupted from the front of the bus. Cassie winced, but inwardly she always felt a small thrill of satisfaction to know that Anna's exquisitely honed exterior gave vent to such an appalling bray.

"Hey, Kendal," Anna called back. "You should know more than anyone that Mr Fabulous doesn't exist. Twenty bucks says he never shows."

Cassie blushed, furiously. She was never sure how word of Llew's existence had got around the school, but as soon as they picked up on it, Anna and her pack had started spreading the rumour that he was just a figment of Cassie's imagination; an elaborate fantasy cooked-up to lessen her feelings of social inadequacy.

"You're on, Laurence!" JJ replied, hotly.

"JJ..."

"No," JJ told Cassie, angrily, shrugging off her restraining hand. "If she's going to badmouth you, she's going to put her money where her mouth is." She grinned, viciously. "It's just a shame we can't take her mouth away as well; give everyone a little peace."

"Bitch!" Anna spat.

"Whatever," JJ replied, turning her attention back to Cassandra.

Cassie was never quite sure why JJ handled her rejection from the MacIntyre set with so much greater aplomb than she herself had, but suspected it might be because she had so much more knowingly been a party to her own dismissal. Who you were going steady with was a tremendously important part of the high school social hierarchy, and as losing Dominic had in part condemned Cassie, by dating Richard Dean, JJ had pretty much made her choice, and she accepted the consequences.

JJ had walked open-eyed into the dark unknown beyond the clique structure, and after a hard couple of weeks, she had few regrets. But Cassandra had tried so hard to fit in, and had lost everything. She had even been so desperate to belong – so overwhelmingly conscious of her, literally, alien status, and so anxious not to expose herself – that for five weeks she had followed the crowd, and treated JJ like she was nothing. Why in the world JJ had taken her back when the pack turned on her was something that Cassie had never been able to work out.

*

Janet looked up at the sound of a gentle knock on her office door. In entire Cheyenne Mountain facility, there were only a handful of people who knocked like that.

"Come in, Jonas," she called.

Jonas Quinn stuck his wide-eyed, earnest face around the door. "You wanted to see me?" he asked.

"Yes, Jonas. Please come in and sit down."

Jonas frowned a little, but closed the door behind him. "What's wrong?" He asked. "Was there a problem on my test results?"

"What? No," Janet assured him. "The whole team checked out okay; you didn't bring anything back from...wherever it was you went."

"P22-A13," Jonas told her. "It's an ice planet, and I mean there's nothing but ice. The city there is thousands of years old, but it's just ice; carved right out of a glacier. It's...But you didn't ask me here to talk about ice cities," he said.

"No," Janet agreed. "I wanted to talk to you about Cassandra."

Jonas looked a little taken aback. "To me?" He asked. "Well, I hardly know her. I mean, I hardly know anyone around here, but wouldn't you be better off talking to Major Carter?"

Janet shook her head. "I need..." She began, then stopped, drew a deep breath and continued. "I need to talk to an alien."

"I see," Jonas replied, showing no sign of offence. "But again, wouldn't Teal'c..."

"Teal'c...is different," Janet said. "He was part of the warrior elite of a slave society. He was trained to adapt, and to survive, in any surroundings, without complaint, and if necessary completely on his own. You're more like Cassandra. You need company; to talk to people. Teal'c sticks to his ways, but you try to live with ours much more."

"Teal'c needs to keep practising kelno'reem," Jonas pointed out. "And he can't do that in isolation. There's a whole body of philosophy and spirituality built around the Jaffa fighting arts as well."

"It's not a criticism," Janet assured Jonas. "I love Teal'c like some kind of weird cousin, I just...I need to know what difficulties you're finding adapting to life on Earth," she explained. "I think that Cassie has problems, and I don't think I'm equipped to understand what they are. You might be."

"Oh." Jonas thought for a long time. "Well...I suppose the biggest thing is the language."

"But Cassie's English is very good," Janet protested. "She hardly has an accent anymore."

Jonas shook his head. "Not that language. I mean the way that people speak; the cultural idiom. Any culture develops linguistic quirks and idiosyncrasies, even if it speaks the same tongue as another. I'll give you an example. Six weeks ago, on P6F-11G, they held a feast in our honour. Colonel O'Neill came to drag me away from their records office, and I got upset that I wasn't allowed to keep working. He told me not to have a cow, and I spent half the evening politely refusing the beef. You see what I mean?"

"You think Cassie doesn't get the lingo?" Janet asked. "She spends half her life in front of the TV."

"But it must still be strange to her," Jonas pointed out. "As much as she settles in, she'll always be aware that she isn't from this planet. I'm starting to make friends here now, but I'm still aware that I'm an outsider. It must be the same for Cassie, and if kids here are anything like kids in Kelowna, then it must be even more important for her to fit in than for me. I doubt it's just the language," he added. "That's just a symptom. But I wouldn't be surprised if she felt very alone sometimes."

Janet sighed. "If she is though...Why wouldn't she talk to me about it?"

"Maybe she doesn't think you'd understand," Jonas suggested. "Or maybe she doesn't want to worry you? Again, if Earth kids are like Kelownan kids, she pretty much thinks she can hide anything from her mother, even though the opposite is probably the case. If you think another alien might be able to help...?" He ventured.

"I'd appreciate that," Janet admitted. "I feel sure I could help if I could just get through to her, but..."

Ping. The bulb in Janet's desk lamp blew out.

"Damnit!" Janet muttered. "That keeps happening today."

*

Another of the many things that Cassie could not work out, was why Richard Dean was persona non grata with the beautiful people, as he could himself have been described as beautiful. It was odd, but during her time in the MacIntyre crowd she had never thought to question these things, and now there was no-one to ask. If pressed, Cassie would have guessed that he was deemed undesirable solely because no-one knew how to classify him. He was a disturbed context in the intricate stratigraphy of their world, and that scared them almost as much as it scared Cassie to realise that she was comparing high school social politics to an archaeological section. Many times she felt that Daniel had been, in his way, a worse influence on her than Jack; not that that made her miss him any less.

This uncertainty started at the lowest level and worked on up. JJ was a child of a white mother and a black father, and that was well and good in this day and age, but Richard was less of mixed race than he was of scrambled. His mother was almost pure Ute Native American, with a little Chinese thrown into the mix a few generations back, while his father was a mishmash of Wasp, Black and Hispanic heritage, who unabashedly described himself as a 'bastard American Colonial mongrel'. From this background, Richard had inherited a very eclectic appearance, with dusky skin, raven hair, high, fine cheekbones, large, expressive eyes and long, slender hands; definitely beautiful, rather than handsome.

He spoke Ute and Spanish as well as he did English, and immersed himself in 'the blood-soaked tapestry of American history'; again to quote his father. His open disrespect for his country's colonial forefathers was at stark odds with this love of and passion for the nation itself; another contradiction.

Richard's family was fairly unconventional: His parents were unmarried, but had been living happily together for twenty-two years, and tended to kiss and touch a little more openly than received wisdom says parents are supposed to. Richard had two older sisters and one younger, and perhaps as a result talked to girls more as friends and equals than the likes of Anna Laurence were comfortable with. He was creative and sensitive without really being an artist; bright but not overly scholarly; fit but not sporty; witty but not a clown; charismatic, but not a leader. No-one had ever really known what to make of him.

No-one except JJ, that was. She knew exactly what to do with Richard.

"Hey, Baby," JJ smiled, wrapping her arms around Richard's neck as he met them off the bus.

"Hey," Richard replied, after a kiss that was longer and more involved than the school authorities would have approved of.

"That's disgusting," Anna muttered as she passed them, her arm and Dominic's locked around each others waists in a proprietary embrace.

Cassie turned away from Anna, but JJ flipped her the bird, and kissed Richard again for good measure. Undeniably there was something more earthy and primal in JJ and Richard's kisses than in the sterile expressions of mutual ownership that Anna and Dominic exchanged publicly.

Cassie turned here gaze aside, feeling a gnawing pang. Her impatience for Llew's arrival grew a little stronger.

"Morning, Cassio," Richard said, once he and JJ had disengaged from each other a little.

"Hey, Rich," Cassie responded. "You guys done?" She added, trying to sound less bitter than she was.

"Sorry," JJ said. "I know it's hard, having Llew so far away and all. It's just been an age since I saw him anywhere but home; and then Mom kept sticking her head in every five minutes. I haven't gotten any sugar in weeks."

"Better than me," Cassie muttered to herself, although she knew how JJ felt. Both her mother and Llew's had an almost psychic ability to sense when they were about to kiss.

"Oh, cheer up, Honey," JJ told her. "He'll be waiting for you when you go home won't he? And tomorrow he can ride the bus with us, and we get to really rub Anna's nose in it."

"I guess," Cassie said, perking up little.

JJ smiled, warmly. "That's the spirit. So come on; let's get going." She looped one arm through Richard's, and the other through Cassie's, and together they marched off towards homeroom.

"Hi, Cassandra!" A girl's voice rang out.

"Ignore her," JJ whispered, but Cassie had already turned in response to her name.

"Hi, Justine," she returned, hating the shy sound in her voice, and the fact that even after a year on the outside, Justine could still make her feel special just by speaking her name; or feel like mud simply by refusing to look her way.

Justine MacIntyre, only a Junior – like Cassie – but the uncontested Queen of Colorado Springs High, sauntered up to the three friends, flanked by her court. Anna walked almost parallel to Justine, but despite her co-regnant status, she was always a step behind; never able to quite feel Justine's equal.

"Hello, Jemima."

JJ hid her cringe at the use of her given name. "Justine. So nice of you to make time out of your busy preening schedule to stop by."

One or two of the courtiers bristled, but Justine merely smiled. "Richard," she said, turning to him. "Lovely to see you."

"Justine," he replied, coolly.

"And Anna was just telling me that we're finally to be able to meet the mysterious Lou."

"Llew," Cassandra corrected, and immediately regretted it.

For a moment, the mask of friendship cracked on Justine's face, and a flash of livid rage leaped from her eyes. Then it was gone, leaving only Cassie's growing discomfort in its wake. "Well, we're all so looking forward to it," Justine went on, as though nothing had happened. "Do be sure to introduce us won't you," she added. "After we've heard so much about him, I'm just dying to meet this boy."

Cassie's stomach knotted inside her. She was not sure how Justine got to hear so much of what she said, but she did not like it. More than that, she was disturbed by the predatory edge that had entered Justine's voice, even though she was certain...ninety-nine percent certain that Llew would never be swayed by someone like Justine.

"I'll be sure to point you out," she assured the other girl, locking a rictus-like smile on her face. Anna's smirk told Cassie that her inner turmoil was pretty plain to see.

"Well; must run," Justine said. "Toodles. And all our best to Clew."

Cassie could not resist it. "Llew," she said.

Justine's eye twitched, and now it was her turn to break out in a patently false smile, as she turned and swept away. Cassie felt a momentary glow of pride, but the feeling soured as one of the crowd that tailed after Justine muttered: "Freak".

"Way to go, Cass," Richard said, once Justine was out of earshot.

"Oh yeah," Cassie mumbled. "I cringe with the best of them."

"Please," JJ snorted. "How many people in this school have actually managed to get under Li'l Miss Perfect's armour? I haven't, and God knows, I've tried."

Cassie smiled just a little. "I guess she doesn't like being corrected," she said.

"One to bear in mind," JJ replied.

"I just...I mean, it doesn't feel right. She's the only one of the old crowd who's still nice to me."

JJ sighed. "Because she doesn't have to be mean; she has people to do it for her. We've been over this, Cassie."

"I know," Cassie agreed.

"And because she still needs you to need her," Richard added. "Or her whole world falls apart."

JJ squeezed Cassie's shoulder encouragingly. "If you don't give her the attention..."

"I know," Cassie sighed. "She'll leave me alone. But...it's not the same for me as it is for you, JJ."

"Sure it is," JJ promised her.

"No it isn't," she insisted. "You walked out. I got kicked out when Dominic told everyone I gave it up then went all wiggy."

"Hey!" JJ snapped. "Whatever I say about Justine goes triple for that little..." JJ broke off as a teacher walked behind Cassie, casting a disapproving gaze at the three students. Realising that they were running late, JJ took Cassie's arm again and led her off.

"Dominic's not worth worrying about," Richard promised Cassie. "Everyone knows he's full of it."

"Anyway; no-one who goes with Anna Laurence is worth worrying about," JJ added.

"I know," Cassie repeated, but she could only wish that one day she might really believe it.

*

"I just don't know what to do!" Janet complained. "How can I help if she won't let me in?"

Sam Carter sighed. "I guess you can't," she replied. The two women were sitting in Janet's office, shooting the breeze while Sam waited for a micro-spectroscopy result and Janet entered routine vital readings into the medical database. "You just have to be there for her when she decides to open up. I mean...I don't really know," she admitted. "I'm not a mother, so everything's guesswork."

Janet echoed her friend's sigh. "Is there anything else she told you about the dreams?"

Sam shook her head. "I'm sorry," she said. "I wish I could help more, but she doesn't even seem comfortable talking to me about them. Sometimes she acts like I should know more though...I think she used to talk to Daniel about these things," she added, uncertainly.

"Daniel?"

"I think she feels a little stifled being surrounded by military types. Our lives have to be so regimented; that's hard for her, I think. There's a whole lot of 'thinks' and 'supposes' in here, but Daniel was someone who didn't expect her to work to a strict timetable; who understood that sometimes the response to running late could be 'oh well', instead of 'oh no'."

"You think I'm too strict?" Janet asked.

"I think your life might be," Sam replied. "Cassie gets why you can't go in late or come home early, or blow off work for a day, but sometimes she has to feel like she's in second place. I don't mean she feels neglected," she hastened to add. "Just that...there's a part of your life that she belongs in, and she can't break out into the rest of it. Your folks weren't military were they?"

"No," Janet replied. "Was that how it was with your father?"

Sam nodded. "It's probably not much different for any kid, but he lived his life in such a fixed pattern, and when I was a teenager – especially just after Mom died – I didn't want to wait for the scheduled 'quality time' when I needed my Daddy."

Janet sat down heavily. "Who knew kids could be so much work?"

Sam laughed. "Hey; at least you missed the labour pains," she said, with feeling.

Janet raised an eyebrow.

"I'm not sure," Sam admitted. "But I think one of Jolinar's hosts was joined with her after she almost died in childbirth."

"Ouch," Janet said.

"Plus I watched Daniel deliver enough babies to start feeling grateful I never had any luck with men."

"God Damnit!" Janet swore.

Sam looked shocked.

"Sorry," Janet said. "That's just the third time I've tried to enter these results, and the third time this damn machine's crashed on me."

"Let's take a break," Sam suggested. "And call someone in to have a look at the computer."

"Good idea," Janet replied. "I'm feeling pretty crappy today; maybe I'm coming down with JJ's flu or something. I hope not; I don't want to be bed-bound for Cassie's birthday. She'd never forgive me."

In the corridor, the two officers met Teal'c.

"You're a dad," Janet said. "Any advice on raising a teenager?"

Teal'c thought for a moment before replying. "I believe that by your standards, I would be considered a neglectful parent. This being so, I am not the best person to ask for advice on child-rearing."

Janet shrugged. "I trust your..." She began, but then slumped heavily against the wall.

"Janet!" Sam called, alarmed.

"Dr Fraiser; are you unwell?" Teal'c asked.

"Just a little dizzy," she assured them. "I'll...I'll be..." She slid heavily down the wall, and Teal'c barely caught her before she hit the floor. The lights in the corridor flickered.

"Infirmary," Sam said, decisively.

Teal'c lifted Janet in his arms, and bore her back the way she and Sam had come to the infirmary.

"Page Dr Flynn," Sam instructed a nearby nurse as they hurried Janet to a bed. Then she and Teal'c backed away to let the medical staff close in.

"She's hot," one of them reported. "Get an oral temperature."

"I can't; the digital thermometer's not working."

"Major Carter; the intercom won't connect. I can't page Dr Flynn."

Sam snapped her head around. "Then go down the hall and find an intercom that works," she snarled.

"Yes, Major," the nurse replied, nervously.

"This thermometer's dead too. Can't somebody find a damn mercury bulb?"

The lights in the infirmary flickered, and one of them died completely.

Sam felt a chill run up and down her spine. She grabbed another of the nurses. "Go down to the phys lab," she ordered. "Get me an EM field meter."

"Major Carter?" Teal'c asked.

"I have a very bad feeling about this," Sam said.

*

Homeroom was the usual chaotic hubbub of activity as Cassie and her friends entered and found their seats. Justine's court was well-established towards the front of the class, so as usual JJ steered them towards the few seats from which she could not be seen. As JJ put it, high school was like the cat game, in reverse. Cats always try to be where they can see everything, but not be seen; high school students always try to be seen, but not to look at anyone else. By excluding her from their eye line, they denied Justine a measure of her power.

Daniel would have said that JJ was treating high school politics as a form of ritual, sympathetic magic. He might well have told her that she was right, however.

As they sat, JJ put a hand to her head, and pinched the bridge of her nose. "Whoa," she muttered.

"You alright, JJ?" Richard asked, laying a solicitous hand on her arm.

"I'm okay," JJ replied. "Just a little head rush or something."

"Maybe you're not so recovered as you thought," Cassie suggested.

"I'm fine," JJ promised, sitting herself down. "Just a little tired."

A few minutes after they sat down, the door opened, and Miss Evans walked in. A quiet, studious-looking young woman, Miss Evans taught Math and had a will like an iron skewer. Her vulnerable appearance belied her inner toughness, but her homeroom class knew her well enough that they fell silent almost as soon as she entered.

"Good morning," she said, brightly, then sat down at her desk to take the roll call. "Jonathon Scott?" She began, following her usual habit of calling the roster out of order to keep the students on their toes. "Dominic Curry." Miss Evans continued, after Jon had replied.

"Huh? I mean, present," Dominic stumbled. Cassie suppressed a thrill of pure schadenfreude as Dominic was caught out, whispering sweet nothings to Anna when he should have been paying attention.

"In body if not in mind," Miss Evans quipped, raising a laugh from the class and a blush from Dominic. "Mallory Williams?"

"Present." Mallory was another of Justine's crowd; strikingly attractive, but too shy and not wealthy or cool enough to make the inner circle. She always gave Cassie a particularly hard time, but Cassie could not hate her for it, since she had good reason. Cassie shuddered to think how mean she had been to Mallory back when she was 'it'. That guilt was part of the reason Cassie had not told anyone that she had seen Mallory and Dominic making out on the sly last week, however much she would have liked to see the look on Anna's face.

"Cassandra Fraiser?"

"Here," Cassie replied, smartly.

"JJ Kendal?" Miss Evans was the only teacher in school who did not insist on calling JJ Jemima.

When JJ did not respond at once, Cassie nudged her. Still JJ gave no reply. Cassie looked at her friend, and saw that JJ's mahogany skin was beaded with sweat, her eyes gazing unfocused into the middle distance.

"JJ?" Richard asked, concerned.

Miss Evans saw that something was amiss with one of her students. "JJ? Are you all right?"

"JJ?" Cassandra added her own voice to the chorus of concern, while the other students began to whisper to one another.

"JJ?" Richard put out his hand to touch his girlfriend's shoulder, but snatched it back as a bright, blue-white spark jumped from her skin to his. "Ah!" He gasped, his hand twitching spasmodically. The fluorescent tube above them went out with a sharp pop, and the other lights in the classroom flickered and dimmed.

Cassandra stood up so fast that her stool fell over behind her, and she took an involuntary step away from JJ. Richard looked up at her in surprise, but the only eyes that Cassandra was aware of were Dominic's, boring into her with an unspoken accusation.

"It wasn't..." She whispered. "I didn't..."

"Cassio?" Richard asked, genuinely baffled now.

"It's so hot," JJ murmured, drawing Richard's full attention back to her, then she slumped sideways and began to fall.

Richard stooped to catch her, and Miss Evans hurried forward and laid a hand on her forehead.

"My God, she's burning up. Richard, help me get her to the nurse's office."

Richard nodded, and swept JJ up into his arms. He staggered a little under her weight, but refused to let anyone help him. "I can manage," he assured Miss Evans.

"Okay," she replied, gently. "I'll get the doors."

Richard moved around the desks, and he and Miss Evans left the room with JJ.

Through all of this, Cassandra could only stand and stare.

"She did it," Dominic accused. He was trying to sound tough, but he could not hide his fear.

"No," she replied, but her heart was not in the denial, because she could not be certain that she was not the cause. The way that the lights had gone when JJ blacked out was too like her own illness a year ago to be coincidence; and she had suffered with flu-like symptoms for a week before her first attack.

"It was you," Dominic went on.

"You freak!" Anna accused.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Mallory demanded. "She was your friend!"

Cassandra snapped her head up, coming back to herself with a start. "You think I'd do that on purpose?" She demanded. "If you think that then you're the damn freak, Mallory! And...and I saw you and Dominic last Wednesday!" She added for good measure.

"What?" Anna shrieked.

"It's nothing, Anna," Dominic replied, too quickly and casually. "Freaky Fraiser's just making stuff up."

Anna looked from Dominic to Mallory and read the sting of betrayal that his words had sparked in the other girl's eyes. "Well, Mallory clearly doesn't think it's nothing," she pointed out, acidly.

Cassie backed away to the wall, thankful for the respite as Anna and Mallory laid into each other, and into Dominic. The attention of most of the class had focused on that little threesome now, but Cassandra could feel at least one pair of eyes locked onto her still. She looked up, and it was Justine, staring at her in fear and confusion.

Cassandra looked back and could almost hear the thoughts rattling around in Justine's head. She was trying to put these bizarre events together with everything else she knew about Cassandra, and it was not fitting. Cassandra had become a mystery, and Justine hated people who were mysteries; they were impossible for her to control. In Justine's eyes, Cassandra might as well have been an alien; as of course she was.

"What is going on in here!" Miss Evans demanded.

The babble of conversation died away, leaving only Anna's strident voice, raised in accusation and uttering words and phrases that would probably have shocked her father – a Protestant Minister – into a state of denial.

"Miss Laurence!" Miss Evans snapped, appalled, fighting to sound stern rather than disgusted and enraged. "That is more than enough."

Anna stopped, realising with horror how far too far she had gone, and how entirely busted she was. In front of her, Mallory was in tears, looking to Dominic for support but not finding it. Cassie felt a twinge of guilt for exposing her to Anna's spite, but right now the mind-numbing fear loomed larger in her psyche.

"Miss Evans; how is she?"

"Unconscious; feverish," Miss Evans replied, turning her attention from Anna without moving her eyes. "There's an ambulance coming to take her to hospital."

"Which one?" Cassandra asked.

"Memorial, I think," Miss Evans replied, uncertainly. "I can find out for you later, but I need to deal with this, Cassie."

"I should..." She began.

"It was her fault!" Anna brayed, tears of anger choking her voice as she pointed at Cassandra.

A detached part of Cassie's mind noted that Justine had moved to stand by Mallory and was comforting the girl. Plainly she had chosen sides, and her court were following suit, ringing Mallory with goodwill, and freezing out both Dominic and Anna. In any other situation, Mallory might have found herself the outcast, but Anna's very public loss of face would make it undesirable for Justine to show her support. Dominic would probably find his way back in easily enough, but Anna would be shunned for months, and lose all her status when the circle did open to her again. Cassie could almost have felt for her, if Anna's hateful glower were not reminding her of the vicious brute that lurked under her pretty exterior.

"That will do, Miss Laurence," Miss Evans said, firmly. "I don't really care who started it, that kind of language would be unacceptable in a bar fight, let alone a classroom. Go down to the principal's office at once, and wait for me there. Mallory," she said, turning away from Anna before she could protest again. "Are you alright?"

Mallory nodded, despondently, as Anna reluctantly crossed the classroom to the door. She looked at Cassie with a face like thunder and hissed: "Freak bitch!"

"I heard that," Miss Evans said, without turning around.

Anna fled.

"Now," Miss Evans said. "I'm going to be in the principal's office with Miss Laurence; possibly for some time. Justine, will you keep an eye on the class until the end of period?"

"Yes, Miss Evans," Justine replied, all winning smiles and gentle manners.

"Just finish taking the roll call for me, then everyone sit and read quietly."

"I...I have to call my Mom," Cassie said. "I need to...She needs to know about this."

"Cassie; it's okay," Miss Evans told her. "There are plenty of doctors down at Memorial. They'll know what to..."

"No-one knows!" Cassie snapped. "I'm sorry," she murmured, surprised at herself.

Miss Evans pursed her lips. "Go home, Cassie," she said, gently.

Cassie was startled. "What?" She asked, in a low whisper, not wanting anyone to overhear.

"You've had a bad shock," she said. "And you're clearly rattled. Go home, speak to your mother if you have to, and get your head together."

"I can't just..."

"Go," Miss Evans said, firmly. "Richard looked like he was coming down with whatever JJ has, so at this rate I may have to send the whole class home," she admitted. "Just think of it as leaving early to avoid the rush. You feel alright yourself?" She asked.

Cassie nodded. "I think I've had it already," she said.

"Can you get home okay?"

"Yes," Cassie assured her.

"So go. I'll see you tomorrow."

"You'll let me know how JJ is?" Cassandra asked, as she gathered her bag.

"Well, it's not standard practice, but I'll give you a call if I hear anything."

"Thank you," Cassandra said.

"Just take it easy, and try not to get sick yourself," Miss Evans said.

"I will," Cassie promised. She slung her bag over her shoulder and left the classroom. When she got home she could call Mom. Mom had treated her when she was sick last year; she would know what to do.

*

"What's our status?" General Hammond asked.

"Six more cases so far," Sam reported. "Colonel O'Neill, Doctor Flynn, Sergeant Friar, Lieutenant Walters and Sergeant Siler are all unconscious. Captain Kawalsky is presenting symptoms, but so far she seems to be remaining conscious."

"Any connection?" Hammond asked.

"Yes, Sir," Sam replied. "Doctor Flynn, Sergeant Friar and Lieutenant Walters are all on the medical staff. They had a staff dinner on Tuesday, if you remember. Sergeant Siler did some electrical work at Dr Fraiser's house on Monday."

"So the connection is Dr Fraiser?"

"We do not believe so," Teal'c replied.

"Colonel O'Neill hasn't had any contact with Dr Fraiser outside of his scheduled medicals for two weeks, and a lot of people have had those medicals. But on Sunday afternoon, he and Captain Kawalsky took Cassandra to visit Daniel's headstone." Sam found it strange calling it Daniel's grave, when he was not buried there. "Cassandra was also at the medical staff dinner; she sat between Dr Flynn and Lieutenant Walters, and opposite Sergeant Friar. And the symptoms are similar to those of Cassandra's illness a year ago."

"So what are you thinking?" Hammond asked, as though he knew it, but did not want to admit it.

"We think Cassandra is the carrier. We believe that Nirrti mutated the retrovirus instead of neutralising it; that it has become highly contagious, and is passing through physical contact, or possibly even close proximity."

"Good God," Hammond whispered.

"We've started doing blood screenings," Sam went on. "It's slow going with half the patients in the infirmary shooting out electromagnetic pulses every ten minutes, but it looks as though most of the base is infected. We're going to send someone to check on Cassie's school."

"What about you two?"

"I'm infected too," Sam admitted. "But like Captain Kawalsky, the naquada in my blood should help me to fight the disease for longer than most people, and also absorb a great deal of the energy that the virus is trying to release."

"I am uninfected," Teal'c said. "It appears that the symbiote protects me."

"That's good," Hammond replied. "I may need you to do something for me later. If..." He broke off as his telephone rang, and snatched up the receiver. "Hammond," he said. "What? What kind of odd symptoms? I'll have to get back to you, General DeCuir. Yes, right away."

He set the phone back down and turned to Sam and Teal'c. His expression was grave. "One of the security personnel at NORAD has fallen unconscious. According to General DeCuir, they're having problems with their medical equipment."

Sam shivered. "Sir; as well as being contagious, this version of the virus seems to be progressing much faster than Cassie's symptoms."

"What can we do about it?" Hammond asked.

Sam frowned. "I'm not a doctor," she said. "But I suggest we get messages out to our allies while we still can, tell our offworld teams not to attempt to return until we know it's safe to do so, and put the mountain under quarantine. We should also get Cassie here, and try to get hold of a medical team from outside the facility who can work in full isolation gear to examine her and see if she has some anti-serum in her physiology that's keeping her from succumbing to the disease herself."

Hammond nodded his agreement. "Start contacting the offworld teams. Have SG-12 Gate to Cimmeria and contact the Asgard, and order the teams to assemble at the offworld facility."

"Yes, Sir," Sam replied.

"Teal'c. I want you to send a car to collect Cassandra Fraiser."

"Yes, General Hammond."

"I'll call the CDC; get them to send the best people they've got."

*

There was a bus from the front of the school every twenty minutes that ran back to Cassie's house. It went around the houses a little, but it was quicker than walking, and gave her time to sit and think. She knew that, if this was the same disease that had struck her, she probably had plenty of time to get in touch with her Mom, but she was feeling less and less certain that Janet would know what to do. After all, although it was Janet who had saved her last time, she had done it by pointing a gun at the Goa'uld Nirrti, who had originated the virus. They had in fact never found a cure.

Cassie sat near to the front of the bus and brooded over JJ's fate. If this was her virus, then she was responsible for JJ's collapse. She had carried Nirrti's plague to Earth; it had been allowed to remain solely because Janet, Sam and all the others cared about her too much to send her away for the good of the planet. She had tried so hard to fit in, to find a place here, and all that effort had achieved was to keep a dangerous disease in the midst of all her friends.

Was I ever anything but Nirrti's weapon? She wondered, disconsolately. Just a creation? Did I even have a mother and a father before I came here? Or did I imagine them?

So caught up was she in these thought of gloom that she missed her stop completely, and had to trek half a mile back from the next one when she realised her mistake.

She stomped up the path to the front door, feeling lost, dejected and alone, her eyes fixed on the ground at her feet. Suddenly, she was snapped out of her black fugue by a voice from the porch.

"So," the voice asked. "What's a nice girl like you doing in a funk like this?"

"Llew!" Cassie looked up at the boy, tears of relief welling in her eyes, and flung her arms around him.

Llew Midhir folded Cassandra gently in his arms and just held her there, not speaking.

"Oh, Llew," Cassie sobbed. "It's happening again! I'm..." She pulled away from him in sudden fear. "No!" She snapped. "Don't touch me! Stay away!"

"Cassie," Llew said, gently, opening his arms to let her step away. "What's the matter?"

"It's...Oh, God; it's not you!" She promised. "Please don't think...It's nothing wrong with us."

"I know," Llew assured her, and there was not a trace of offence in his face or voice. "Empathic; remember? Please; tell me what's wrong."

"I...I think I'm carrying a disease," she said. "The virus that hit me last year; I think it's mutated or something, and my best friend is sick, and you mustn't come near me or you might get sick and die, and I couldn't bear..." She broke off in a choking sob.

"Hey," Llew said, stepping towards her. "Don't worry about me, Cariad. I've never been a day sick in my life; and if I recall aright, Asgard nanites trump Goa'uld retrovirus."

"I don't know," Cassie replied. "God, Llew, I want to believe that; but Hel said that your nanites might just...integrate the virus."

"If we had children," Llew reminded her. "She thought that if we had children they might somehow inherit the nanites as well as the retrovirus, in which case it would be a part of their original makeup. I'm sure they won't let a foreign body start rewriting my DNA."

Cassie wavered, wanting to believe it; aching to be comforted.

"Cariad," Llew whispered, reaching out and touching her face. "I don't care what viruses you have inside you; I could never be afraid of you."

With a fierce pang of relief, Cassie let herself believe. She all but threw herself on her boyfriend, and let rip with another flood of tears.

"It'll be okay," he promised her, murmuring in her ear. "I won't get sick, and your Mam'll get to the bottom of this. You'll see."

"Yeah," Cassie sobbed. "Mom'll know. She'll..." She stopped, and drew away from Llew again.

"What?" Llew asked.

"Why are you standing on the doorstep?" She asked. "Mom was supposed to come meet you at the airport after she'd checked in at the Mountain."

"She never showed," Llew replied. "I left a message on the machine here and one at the mountain, and got a taxi instead. I just got here a few minutes ago actually. Why...? Oh no," he whispered. "You don't think...?"

"If I'm spreading this, who else is more likely to catch it?" Cassandra scrabbled with her keys and unlocked the door.

*

"Major Carter? Teal'c?"

Sam and Teal'c turned from the door of one of the makeshift infirmaries, to see a group of people in yellow isolation suits.

"That's right," Sam said, wondering why the lead woman's voice sounded so familiar. She struggled to focus, her head swimming giddily. She had begun to feel light-headed about ten minutes earlier; judging by Amy Kawalsky's progression, she had about half an hour before she lapsed into unconsciousness.

"We're with the CDC," the woman explained. "I need to speak to the doctor in charge."

"There is no doctor in charge," Teal'c told her. "Dr Finnegan from the NORAD infirmary succumbed to the disease fifteen minutes ago; he was the last trained medical doctor to remain active."

"There's a couple of nurses still on their feet," Sam added. "But most of the medical staff, down here and up above, were exposed to infected individuals before we really knew what we were dealing with."

"Janet Fraiser?" The woman asked, uncertainly.

"First casualty," Sam told her.

The woman appeared deeply shaken. "Oh. Okay...Um. You guys start setting up," she told the other CDC doctors. "Talk to the nurses; see what we're dealing with." Once they were gone, she turned back to Sam. "Jan's down?" She asked again.

"Yes," Sam replied.

"Oh boy," the woman said. "I was really hoping for her help on this one."

"We believe her daughter to be the carrier," Sam added.

"Cassie?"

"You know Dr Fraiser?" Teal'c asked, suspiciously.

"I am Dr Fraiser," the woman replied. "Alex Fraiser MD PhD virology. I'm Janet's sister. She was always the smart one," she added, ruefully. "Where is Cassie?"

"We sent a car to bring her here," Teal'c said. "It should have returned by now. I shall make enquiries."

"Be careful," Alex told him. "You may be infected."

"I am not," Teal'c assured her.

"He doesn't have the retrovirus in his system," Sam confirmed.

Alex nodded. "We should get you an iso suit," she said.

"I shall not need one," Teal'c assured her, then left.

"You sound a little like Janet," Sam told Alex.

"I'm told I look like her; although not so much in a suit." Alex sighed. "Tell me what happened."

Sam took Alex to her office, and as fully as she could, gave this other Dr Fraiser an account of the spread of the disease, and its symptoms. Alex was sceptical at first, but when her co-workers reported that all of their equipment was failing, she began to believe.

"The more people fall ill, the worse it gets," Sam said. "Like the fields are reinforcing each other; all emitting at the same frequency and in perfect synchronisation. It's spreading fast, too; we're running out of places to put people."

"Any idea why you're going slower than the others?" Alex asked.

"None at all," Sam lied.

"Okay," Alex sighed. "I guess we're going to have to do this the old-fashioned way. Optics and manual instruments. Any assistance that you can offer would be appreciated."

Sam gave a wan smile. "Well, I'm not a medical doctor, but I'll do what I..." She staggered as she tried to stand.

"I'll tell you what," Alex suggested. "You stay here and I'll call if I need your help.

Sam nodded, momentarily too spun to reply.

Alex left the office, and tried to rub her temples, the Plexiglas of her helmet defeating her. When she had been called out here, she had expected to be working with Janet, and that would have been bad enough; but to be working without her? She had not lied when she said that Janet was the smart one.

"Dr Fraiser!"

Alex looked back, and saw Major Carter propped against a wall.

"You should be resting," she said, sternly.

"Telephone call for...for you," Sam managed, before sliding down the wall.

"Hell," Alex muttered. "You!" She called to one of her nurses. "Get her to a bed, and get me a bloodwork on her and this other woman; Kawalsky. I want to know why the disease is progressing less quickly in them."

All of a sudden, a piercing scream cut down the corridor, and Alex followed it to another of the barrack rooms that had been adapted as a medical ward. Two men were strapped to beds, and they were thrashing and squirming so much that Alex feared they would do themselves an injury.

"What the hell is wrong with these two?" Alex asked.

"I don't know," her second in command, Dr Reed replied. "They just started screaming, at exactly the same time."

"Maybe one of them set the other off," Alex suggested.

"No," Reed replied, his thin face pinched into a frown behind the Plexiglas. "They started in perfect synchronisation."

Just as the noise was really starting to grate, the two men stopped, both screams cutting off at the same moment.

"Get them separated," Alex ordered, remembering what Sam had said about the EM fields matching. "Isolate them both. What are their names?" She asked, out of curiosity.

"Jonas Quinn and Nyan Tarnic." Reed frowned. "What the hell kind of name is Nyan Tarnic?"

Alex shrugged. "Right now I don't care. Check their records, see if you can find anything that would account for this reaction. Allergies, blood factors, previous diseases; anything common to them but not to anyone else. I have to take a phone call."

Leaving Reed to deal with the screamers, Alex hurried back to the office and snatched up the phone, hoping that the caller would still be there.

"Is that Dr Fraiser?" The woman sounded frightened. "It's a bad line."

Alex did not take the time to explain that the line was fine, she was just talking through half an inch of plastic. "Speaking."

"My name is Madeleine Evans; I'm Cassandra's teacher. We met a few months ago."

"I'm sorry," Alex said. "This is Dr Alex Fraiser; I'm Cassie's aunt."

"Oh; I see. Is it possible that I could speak to Janet Fraiser?"

Alex sighed. "She can't come to the phone right now," Alex said. "We've got kind of an emergency here."

"Likewise," Miss Evans assured her. "We've got nineteen sick kids and three teachers here, and the staff at Memorial Hospital say they haven't a clue what to do, and one of their doctors is sick too."

Alex drew in a sharp breath. "All right, Miss Evans," she said. "Just stay calm. I'll be sending someone over to the school and the hospital. Just sit tight."

"Thank you," Miss Evans said, then Alex hung up on her, having little time to spare for politeness. Quickly she dialled out. "Steve; shut up and listen. This is bigger than we thought. It's out in the civilian population, and it's serious." She paused. "Yes; I need you to quarantine the city and send at least five more teams; one each should go straight to Memorial and Colorado Springs High School. And give Bob a call for me, will you; from the looks of this place I may have to deal with military intelligence at some stage and in some form, and I'd like a big gun to pull out. Thanks."

As she hung up on her CDC district supervisor, Alex became aware of a figure blocking the door. She turned sharply, but relaxed a little when she saw that it was only Teal'c.

"How long until Cassandra gets here?" She asked.

"I do not know," Teal'c replied. "There was no response from the driver we sent out."

*

In the hall, the answering machine was flashing, but Cassie ignored it and snatched up the telephone. Llew followed her in, and moved past without a word.

"Come on," Cassie muttered, willing the line to connect, but all she got was a horrid squeal of interference. She redialled, twice, before she noticed that there were two messages on the answering machine. Her heart in her mouth, she pressed the playback button.

"Hi Cassie; Dr Fraiser. This is Llew. Um...I'm at the airport, and you don't seem to be, so I guess you got caught up with something. I'm going to get a taxi, so I'll probably be there before either of you gets home and...um. I'm not sure why I'm really bothering then, but there you go. Ah. See ya."

"Always embarrassing listening back to those things," Llew said, handing Cassandra a cup of tea.

"Thanks," Cassie said.

The machine beeped again. "Ah, Cassie. This is Jack. There's been some...Your mother's...ill."

Llew took the cup back from Cassie before she dropped it.

"We're not sure how serious it is," Jack's voice continued. "But we'll let you know as soon as we do. Call us as soon as you get in, and we'll send someone to come get you. Try to stay calm. There's nothing to be scared about."

"Oh no," Cassie whispered. She turned and buried her head in Llew's chest, squeezing her eyes shut and trying to make the message never have existed.

"Did you manage to get through to the base?" Llew asked.

Cassie shook her head. "No. There was just...static."

"Let's get a taxi then," Llew suggested. "We can head out there and find out what's happening."

Cassie nodded in agreement. "Thanks Llew," she said. "I don't want to sound like some drippy girly, but I'm glad you're here to think straight for me right now."

Llew smiled sadly. "You did the same for me when Mam was kidnapped," he said. "I know how hard this is for you."

Cassie's arms tightened around him for a long moment.

"You sit, drink your tea and settle your nerves a little," Llew told her. "I'll call a taxi."

Cassie tilted her head back and kissed him softly on the lips. "You're the best," she told him, gratefully.

Llew watched after her as she went through to the lounge, his heart aching for her, and the pain and confusion he could see dancing around her body. He was glad to be able to ease that turmoil a little, but it pained him that he could not do any more. It was the curse of the abilities granted him by his nanites that he was so sensitive to the feelings of others, yet no more aware than anyone else of how to make them feel better. He felt a particular connection with Cassie, and always had done. Her courage and strength were incredible to behold, yet she still seemed to think that she was the lucky one.

With a sad smile still playing on his lips, he turned from the door to the lounge and picked up the phone.

In the lounge, Cassandra sat and sipped her tea, trying to find comfort in the taste and warmth of her drink, and the relative normality of the moment. In the hall she could hear Llew's soft, lilting voice as he tried to book a taxi. Apparently he was having some difficulty.

"Yes, I'm quite aware that it's an Air Force facility," he said, then there was a pause. "Actually, it's a station, not a base; there's no planes or something." Another pause. "No I'm not a bloody Russian. I'm Welsh you bloody taeog!" Another pause. "Look; will you send the bloody taxi or what?"

Cassie held her breath, nervously.

"Thank you," Llew breathed. He hung up, and came into the lounge. "They'll be about fifteen minutes," he said, settling next to Cassie on the sofa.

"Thanks," Cassie said. She slid along a little and pressed into Llew's side, drawing strength from his warmth and solidity. He responded by wrapping an arm gently around her shoulders.

"I've never heard you get angry before," she commented.

"I'm sorry, bach," Llew said. "But I just couldn't stand hearing her rattle on about whether I was some kind of spy when you need to get to the mountain as quick as possible. I mean, people go walking on that mountain all the time, and I don't even sound Russian. Besides; I'm not so good on the phone. I can't read people if I'm not close to them; it confuses me."

Cassie leaned back, and rolled her eyes up to look at Llew. "What's a taeog?" She asked.

"Literally?" Llew asked. "A serf; peasant. No-one uses it literally anymore though. It went through a phase of being a foreign toady to the bloody English" – Cassie had learned that Llew used the phrase 'bloody English' to mean something quite different from just 'English' – "but these days it's mostly just boorish. Crude and impolite."

"Wow. Even when you swear it's really decorous."

Llew blushed.

"I'm glad you're here," Cassie said again.

"So am I," he said.

The two teenagers shared a long moment of intense connection, before they were interrupted by the doorbell.

"That was quick," Cassie commented, pulling reluctantly away from Llew. She took a last swig of her tea, and almost ran to the door. "Maybe it's the car from the Mountain." As she opened the door, she felt a slight twist in her gut. Her eyes widened in horror as she saw the figure silhouetted in the midday sun.

"No," she whispered, before a wave of force knocked her to the ground.

"Cassie!" Llew ran to her side from the lounge. He froze, staring at her attacker in terror and fury as the same slightly sick sensation rolled over him, the awareness of cold and utter evil that he only ever felt in the presence of a Goa'uld. He stood defensively over the fallen girl.

"Stand aside, boy." The voice was beautiful, in a way, but its arrogance – more even than the peculiar symbiote resonance – tainted its sweetness.

"Never," Llew replied, defiantly, desperately trying to feel as brave as he hoped he sounded.

The Goa'uld shrugged, and a ribbon wave struck Llew from his feet. He staggered to his knees, trying to muster his strength, but then his vision was filled with the hand and the stone and its light, and he felt the world falling away.

*

It was with a heavy heart that Teal'c entered the control room at Cheyenne Mountain, and entered the coded sequence to lock the iris in place over the Stargate.

With the electromagnetic fields generated by the victims of the virus beginning to affect the SGC's core systems, and the plague already spreading across the city of Colorado Springs itself, the Mountain had been abandoned. The CDC had created a special field hospital to house the victims, and were working as hard as they could to halt the spread of the disease, but it seemed clear that at least ten or fifteen percent of the population was infected, and the numbers were rising. The cases were mostly clustered around the military districts and the catchment area for the main high school, pretty much cementing Cassandra Fraiser as the carrier.

The final act before locking down the SGC facility was the sealing of the iris. Once the disease was contained and cured – or once all infected persons were dead and gone – the command would be reopened, and the offworld teams recalled, but for now, the Stargate Programme was to be placed in indefinite abeyance. As the only person with clearance who could move safely through infected areas, it fell to Teal'c to perform this solemn duty.

With a soft scraping sound, the iris rotated closed, and the lights at the edges of the Gate died. The Gate was now without power, and while it might have been possible to open an incoming wormhole, the iris could not move if it was not plugged in. As a final precaution, Teal'c dialled one final sequence to exhaust the Gate's internal capacity.

"Lieutenant-Colonel Grier," he said, speaking into the microphone, the wormhole whisking the radio signal to P3X-984.

"Any good news for us, Teal'c?" Simon Grier, commander of SG-12, asked.

"I have not," Teal'c replied. "Were the Asgard able to offer any assistance?"

"We couldn't reach them," Grier said. "All we got was Thor's answering machine. Gairwyn told us the Valkyrie have been silent for many weeks now, and that Thor's voice is never heard in the heavens. She managed to speak to Freyja in the Hall of Thor's might once last month, and she told her that the Asgard were besieged and might be unable to respond for some time. Since then, nothing. Truth be told, the Cimmerians are pretty spooked by it. They seem to think it bodes ill, and I have to say I agree."

"Perhaps you could try again at a later date," Teal'c suggested. "The power in the Gate is almost depleted. We shall contact you when it is safe to return."

"Good luck," Grier said.

"Thank you, Colonel," Teal'c replied. Moments later, the wormhole collapsed, and the Gate Room was silent.

The CDC had established their base of operations in a small, private hospital near to Memorial. There they had set up containment rooms so that they could study the virus, but come out of the iso suits when they needed a break. Once the Mountain was sealed, Teal'c made his way swiftly to the hospital. En route, he tried Dr Fraiser's number, but it seemed that all of the telephones in the city were now out. At the hospital, he found he way blocked by armed guards, who ordered him to keep back.

"It's alright; he's clean." Without her suit, Alex Fraiser sounded even more like her sister, and did indeed bear a close physical resemblance to Janet. Her hair was darker and longer, pulled back in neat French braid; her face was rounder; she was slightly taller and heavier; and her uniform was Army, not Air Force. But the eyes were the same, sharp and insightful, and backed by the same steadfast heart and mercurial temper.

"Please come in, Mr Teal'c; or is it just Teal'c?"

"Just Teal'c, Dr Alex Fraiser."

"Nice hat, by the way. I need to talk to you."

"How may I be of assistance?" Teal'c asked, following Alex along the corridors of the hospital.

"I need you to be honest with me," Alex replied. "I need to know certain things if I'm going to do any good here. I need to know why all of the medical files in the main SGC staff database have missing information. I need to know why three of those files – yours, Jonas Quinn's, and Nyan Tarnic's – contain almost no data, and why there are files on three civilians – two women named Archimea Smith and Ariadne Jones, and my niece, Cassandra – with as little information."

"The information on those patients is classified, Dr Alex Fraiser."

Alex nodded. "And more than classified; it's obfuscated. I finally found the paper files after almost an hour rummaging through Janet's filing cabinets."

"Those files are classified well beyond Top Secret," Teal'c told her. "I must ask you to return them to me, unread."

"Ask away," Alex invited him. "But I'm the senior doctor in the CDC investigating team here, and that means I get to look at any and all relevant files. Until this situation is resolved, you can think of me as the god of this city and everyone in it."

"You are no god," Teal'c replied, with more vehemence than Alex had perhaps expected.

"I don't care from classified," she told him, in a softer, more earnest tone. "I care that my sister, and hundreds of other people are dying, and that my niece is missing. I care that our statistical analysis shows that Cassie was spreading the disease since some time last week, but no one developed any symptoms, or began spreading it themselves, until early this morning. The first victim in the school was apparently weakened by a bout of the flu, but she can't have been infected more than half-an-hour before she collapsed. Call me nuts, but that speaks of design to me, and just the idea of an engineered retrovirus scares me more than I can say. So until my sister is well enough to say otherwise, you are not getting her files back from me."

"Dr Alex Fraiser..."

"No," she said, simply. "Anyway, it's too late to retrieve them unread, so I also want to know a few other things. Like what's a larval Goa'uld, and how does it protect you from illness?"

"It is an experimental drug treatment," Teal'c told her.

"Bull!" Alex retorted. "Teal'c, your place of birth is listed as The First Prime's Residence, Elysia, P99-E34. You have no family name, and most of your file I don't understand. Quinn and Tarnic both have a number of genetic markers in their DNA that I've never seen before, and lack several others that are common to all humans; as do you, and as does Cassie. Blood samples from Carter and Kawalsky show a non-human protein marker, and samples of a mineral substance which appears to be unknown to human science."

She gave a snort of disgust. "You seem an okay kind of guy," she told Teal'c. "Little weird, but okay. So let's you and I play a little game of make-believe here. Let's make-believe that I'm not a complete idiot, but rather the intelligent and experienced doctor trying to save all of your friends from an unpleasant death. If I'm going to do that, there are things I need to know. Like the fact that Cassandra displayed these exact symptoms a year ago. It would have saved precious hours if I hadn't had to find that out for myself.

"Help me, Teal'c" she pleaded, softly. "Help me to help them."

"That won't be necessary, Dr Fraiser."

Alex and Teal'c turned as one, as a group of men in dark suits approached them.

"We will be taking over here," the man who had already spoken told them.

"Who are you?" Teal'c asked.

"Dr Matheson; NID," he replied. "These are my...associates."

"No," Alex told him. "No way. We do not have time for this." She turned and stalked away.

"Dr Fraiser's denial notwithstanding, I am in charge now," Matheson told Teal'c in a soft, gentle voice. "I'd like to see the alien girl; now." He turned to one of his 'associates' and spoke in a low whisper. "Secure an operating room for immediate use and prepare for the aut...examination," he corrected, sensing the sudden intensity of Teal'c's glower, and realising that he could hear.

"Cassandra Fraiser is not here," Teal'c told Matheson. "Nor would I surrender her to you if she were."

"Don't play games with me," Matheson warned, his voice still soft, but no longer gentle. "I have full authority here, and if we can't examine the girl, maybe we should begin with you and...I believe it's name is 'Junior'?"

Teal'c took a step towards the man, who simply gazed back at him. Teal'c was appalled by the cold certainty in his eyes; the arrogant assurance of his own supremacy. It was so like a Goa'uld he could barely believe that this man was only human.

"You can step back, Teal'c," Alex said. "Dr Matheson will be leaving us now."

"I don't think so, Dr Fraiser."

"Oh, I do." Alex stepped up beside Teal'c. "Dr Brian Matheson..."

"How did you know my name?" Matheson demanded.

Alex ignored him. "This is Special Agent Robert Waylan. He will be taking charge of this operation."

"This is ridiculous," Matheson snorted. "The FBI has no authority here."

"I'm not FBI." The man's voice was as soft and measured as Matheson's, but it had a warmth that Teal'c liked.

"Then who..."

"I'm with the Federal Emergency Management Agency."

Matheson blanched. "FEMA? What does FEMA have to do with this?"

"There's a risk that we'll lose NORAD and the SGC," Waylan said.

"How do you know about...?" Matheson began.

"And the USAF Academy," Waylan continued, as though Matheson had not spoken. "As well as the danger to the lives of a substantial number of US civilians. What would you count as a Federal Emergency, Dr Matheson, if not this?"

"This isn't the end of this," Matheson said.

"It is for now," Waylan assured him. "Your personnel are unnecessary; please remove them from the city."

Matheson frowned, but knew he was beaten. "As you wish," he snarled.

Only once the NID doctor was gone did Teal'c turn to face Waylan. He saw an unassuming man of middle years and height, with an unlined face much younger than his eyes. He had neatly-trimmed hair that seemed to have turned iron grey before its time.

"Teal'c; this is Bob," Alex said.

"A pleasure to meet you at last," Bob said, holding out his hand and grasping Teal'c's wrist in the Jaffa manner. "I've read a lot about you."

"It is a pleasure to meet you also," Teal'c replied.

"It's lucky you called when you did," Bob told Alex.

"I knew they'd try some crap like this," Alex sighed. "It wasn't luck I called you; just luck that I have friends in low places. What was that about junior?" She asked Teal'c.

Teal'c turned to face Alex, and pulled up the tail of his t-shirt.

"Good God!" Alex exclaimed.

"Actually, bad god," Bob corrected her.

"What is it?" Alex asked, unable to tear her eyes from the squirming prim'ta.

"A bio-engineered organism used for blood filtration," Bob replied. "Developed at Berkeley for the Air Force as a non-restrictive replacement for the NBC suit."

"And you expect me to believe that?"

"You're much too smart for that," Bob replied. "But that is what I am telling you."

"How do you know so much about the SGC?" Teal'c asked, warily, as he pushed the prim'ta back into his pouch and tucked his shirt back in.

"I'm with FEMA. I know everything."

"Fascinating though this is," Alex said. "We need to get back to work. From Janet's notes I doubt that your immunity could help us, so I really need to examine Cassandra, which means we have to find her."

"We can begin at the house," Teal'c suggested.

"You go," Bob suggested. "I'll stay here and keep an eye out for any NID interference."

"Thanks," Alex said. "I owe you...well, probably a couple of dozen by now."

Bob waved the compliment off. "I can't say what goes on here," he said. "But it's important; too important to leave to butchers and hatchet-men like Matheson."

Alex stepped towards Bob and hugged him tightly.

"Take care of yourself," he whispered to her, squeezing her tightly.

"I will need a few things that we brought out from the SGC armoury, but we had better hurry," Teal'c said, as they moved away down the corridor.

Alex nodded. "Janet is fading fast," she agreed.

"There is another threat," Teal'c said. "The NID wished to examine Cassandra, and Dr Matheson used the word 'autopsy'."

"Oh God."

"If he can not make us surrender her, he may try to abduct her."

"So we need to get to her first."

"Can you trust Special Agent Waylan?" Teal'c asked.

"I'd trust him with my life," she said. "And his agenda's pretty much the same as mine; save lives, contain the disease."

"Good," Teal'c replied. "Then we have one less thing to worry about. Do you have a car?"

Alex nodded.

"Then I shall meet you in front of the building in five minutes."

"We'll find her, won't we?" Alex asked, her voice betraying her deep concern.

"We shall," Teal'c promised.

*

Cassandra woke up with an ache in her head. She tried to sit up, only to find that the same ache seemed to have permeated every inch of every bone in her body. Slowly and painfully she looked around her, and an icy chill of fear gripped her heart.

She was lying in the bowels of what could only be a Goa'uld spaceship, the walls decorated in obsidian relief, showing scenes of torment and slaughter. She was lying in a long gallery – longer than the bay of a teltac, she guessed – with a wall at her back. In front of her was a curtain of soft, blue light, as though the ceiling held a row of mini-spots, but there was no sign of any light source. She looked right and saw another such curtain; a third was on her left, and beyond it sat Llew. His body language was closed, his shoulders hunched and rounded. He was staring away along the gallery.

"Llew," Cassie whispered, struggling up and moving towards her.

"Cassie! Don't...!" He warned, but too late.

Cassandra recoiled as she struck an unseen barrier, and the air before her crackled and crystallised like frost on a window. "Ow," she grizzled.

"I hear ya," Llew agreed, rubbing his nose in sympathy. His words were light, but there was fear and tension in his voice.

"What happened?" Cassie asked.

Llew shrugged. "That woman knocked me down and put me under somehow. You were unconscious from the blast, but either the one she used on me was less powerful, or the nanites gave me some resistance. Not enough though," he added, angrily.

"It was Nirrti," Cassie said, softly.

"I thought it might be," Llew replied. "I'm not sure where we are now," he added.

"A ship of some kind," she told him. "A big one; maybe a ha'kal or even a ha'tak vessel. It's probably in Earth orbit, and if she's infected...If I've infected the whole SGC, there's no-one to stop her taking over the world."

"It's not your fault," Llew told her. "You mustn't think that."

"They should have got rid of me long ago," Cassie said, her voice cracking from fear and rage and horror. "I am a weapon; Nirrti's weapon. It doesn't matter where I come from, or who my parents were. She made me. She moulded me into a thing that kills, one way or another." Huge tears ran down her face and splashed onto the ground, but she did not sob. "That's all I am!"

"No," Llew said, softly, pressing against the barrier, as though testing for a weakness that would let him through to hold her. "That isn't true."

"Isn't it?"

Llew turned sharply at the voice, but he still heard Cassie draw in a sharp, terrified breath. He could sense her behind him, aware of her as he always was, close to, and he could feel her abject terror of this woman.

"It is true," Nirrti admitted, striding forward. "That two of my slaves provided the raw materials, but as they were mine, before I disposed of them" – Cassie shuddered at the memory of her mother's body – "so she is mine, and always has been; even before I forged that petty bundle of flesh and gristle into my instrument of wrath."

"She's not yours," Llew whispered.

Cassie could hear the tremor in his voice, and knew that he was trying to be brave for her. "Don't make her angry, Llew," she whispered. "Please; don't make her angry."

"She knows her place," Nirrti observed. "Like any good slave. She is one of the finest weapons that I ever crafted, yet any weapon has its faults. Some are there by design – this one is ineffective against Goa'uld and Jaffa, for example – others are not. Why she can not harm you, I do not know. But I will."

Nirrti stepped right up to the forcefield at the front of Llew's cell. "Do you know why you are immune? Tell me, boy, and you shall be spared the procedures that I would need to use to learn this for myself."

"My name is Llew."

Nirrti's eyes narrowed dangerously. "Your name is of no interest to me, boy," she told him. "I shall learn all that I desire of you from dissecting your organs, and your name shall not be written there."

"You'll learn nothing," Llew promised her.

"Llew," Cassie begged him.

"Do you believe that there is anything that your pathetic carcass that can deny my understanding? I have studied the ways of the body since before your wretched species had mastered the basest principals of science. I am ancient beyond your knowledge, boy."

"You'd be surprised how deep my knowledge goes," Llew told her.

"Would I?"

"You first came to Earth eight thousand years ago," Llew replied. "Gathering worshippers and sowing death and destruction for your own amusement. Three thousand years later you had taken a male host and become Nirrta, and you spawned Kali the Black by the Goa'uld Queen Durga. After that, no-one on this world really cared about you."

Nirrti took a step away from the force field, looking at the youth with something like fear in her eyes. Cassie was filled with a squirming dread, fearing that Llew was about to die, but in some small part of her mind, something about the look was oddly familiar to her.

"Tell me what makes you immune!" Nirrti demanded, her arrogance almost imperceptibly lessened.

"Hel worked it out in a minute," Llew said. "And she was not even Goa'uld."

Nirrti snarled in anger, she touched her wrist, and one section of the curtain of light vanished, allowing the Goa'uld to enter the cell.

"No!" Llew cried, his courage evaporating like fog.

Nirrti had stepped into Cassandra's cell.

"Leave her alone!" Llew begged, but Nirrti was heedless.

Cassie tried to avoid Nirrti, but the goddess struck her hard with the back of her hand. The girl spun away, rebounded from the force field between the cells, and fell hard on the floor, her head pounding. Nirrti leaned down, and dragged Cassie up by the hair. Cassie screamed.

"This is the way of the world, boy," Nirrti hissed. "Defiance is punished."

She held her hand before Cassandra, and the stone in her ribbon device burned, feeding a tendril of killing light into the spot between her eyes. Cassandra had thought she knew pain, but this was beyond anything she had experienced before. She gasped and sobbed, the anguish too utter for her to express with mere screams, as her brain seemed to catch fire behind her eyes. There were screams, all the way through, but they were Llew's, not Cassandra's.

"No!" Llew wept. "Punish me!"

After what seemed an eternity to Cassandra's tortured senses, Nirrti threw the girl down, and she slumped limply on the floor.

"I did punish you," Nirrti told Llew.

The boy barely paid her any mind, his eyes on Cassie's still form. Now it was his turn to feel the moments stretch into lifetimes, until at last a shuddering sob wracked her body, and she moved.

"Cassie!"

"Llew," she murmured.

"Tell me what I wish to know," Nirrti commanded Llew. "Remember," she added, when he hesitated. "Even if I kill her, I can bring her back. Force me to do this too often, and you shall no longer know her. She shall willingly become my creature, and I do not think that any pain I could inflict upon your flesh would wound you so deep."

Llew bowed his head in defeat, and choked the words from his raw throat: "I'll tell you."

*

Alex drove dangerously fast, but the streets were empty of traffic, so they arrived at Janet's house alive and in good time. An Air Force fleet sedan was parked outside, and Alex pulled in behind it.

"That is the car sent for Cassandra Fraiser," Teal'c said, as they got out of the car.

Alex frowned. "I don't like this." She moved forward, and peered in the window. "Oh my God!" She gasped.

"Not your God," Teal'c spoke at her shoulder. The driver, Sergeant Philip Rossiter, was dead, his face set in a rictus of pain and fear, his back arched, hand locked in a death grip on the wheel. His eyes had rolled back in his head, and his brow was marked with a small burn.

"Will you guys stop doing that?" She asked. "'Not your God'. 'Bad God'. All this God crap is making my head spin, and making me nervous."

"My apologies, Dr Alex Fraiser."

"And just Alex will do fine," she added. "We don't need to stand on ceremony here." She was wearing a sidearm, and now she drew it as she headed towards the house.

"Wait," Teal'c said. He went around to the boot of the car and rummaged in a hold-all he had stashed there.

"What the hell is that?" Alex asked, staring at the ray gun – and she could think of no other word for it – in Teal'c's hands.

"An experimental weapon," Teal'c replied.

"Of course it is. Built at Berkeley no doubt, for hunting particularly vicious cockroaches."

"You are closer than you know...Alex," Teal'c admitted, sounding a little uneasy using only her given name.

The two of them approached the front door, warily, with Teal'c sweeping the transphase eradication rod from side to side.

"You know," Alex said. "I'd figure you were just really unsteady, but you move like a soldier, so I'm guessing there's a point to all that swinging."

Teal'c paused a moment. "We believe this disease to be the result an artificially created retroviral agent," he said. "The creator of the virus is known to use a phase-shifting device to achieve a state of effective invisibility."

"Fine," Alex sighed. "Don't tell me then."

In the front hall, Teal'c sniffed the air. "They are no longer here," he said. "They were here, but they were attacked, and a weapon was discharged. They will have been taken from this place." He stooped and began rummaging in the counter drawer beneath the telephone.

"They? And what are you looking for?"

Teal'c indicated the luggage still sitting in the porch. "Cassandra Fraiser and her lover, Llew Midhir. And this is where Dr Fraiser keeps her local area maps."

"Her lover!?" Alex sounded appalled. "She's sixteen, and she has a lover?"

"She does," Teal'c said. Seemingly he had found the map that he was looking for, as he pulled it from the drawer and spread it on the counter, handing the TER to Alex as he did so.

"And you don't have a problem with that?"

"I do not. Neither did Dr Fraiser."

Alex snorted, sceptically. "Jan didn't mind some guy banging her teenage daughter? I find that hard to believe."

Teal'c turned to face Alex. "Cassandra Fraiser and Llew Midhir were not – to the best of my knowledge – 'banging'."

Alex's face flamed. "Well...you shouldn't say 'lover' then," she scolded. "If he's just her boyfriend..."

"I have noticed that word is used very lightly among your people," Teal'c said, turning back to the map. "I would not wish to speak so of their relationship."

"You're...a very strange man," Alex told him, puzzling over the 'among your people' comment.

"It has been said before," Teal'c admitted.

"At least there's no sign of Matheson," Alex noted.

Teal'c nodded, distractedly. "She will be in an open area; a park or garden. This one is between the house and Cassandra Fraiser's school; we shall begin there."

"Bonforte Park?" Alex asked. "What would Cassie be doing there?"

"Not Cassandra, but her captor," Teal'c explained, grabbing the TER back form Alex and heading for the door. "We must hurry, and hope that she has not left."

"What do you mean left?" Alex asked. "Why is she in a park in the first place?"

But Teal'c was already gone.

*

Llew told Nirrti everything; about the Asgard, and the nanites. The Goa'uld listened patiently, fascination in her eyes. When he was done talking, she had drawn blood from both of them, and left.

"Are you..." Llew began. "Stupid question. How do you feel?"

"I hurt," she muttered. "A lot." She looked up at him. "What the hell were you thinking?"

"I'm so sorry, Cassie," he said. "I didn't want her to hurt you."

"You thought if you made her mad she'd pick on you," Cassie realised.

After a pause, Llew nodded.

"Come on, Llew," she said. "You should know better. Bloody Justine MacIntyre knows you don't strike directly; you attack the person your target cares about." She gave a short, bitter laugh. "I can't believe I'm comparing Justine to Nirrti, but it kinda fits."

"You're right," Llew sighed. "I should have known. I'm so sorry," he said again.

"But that's not really the point, Llew," Cassie told him. "You don't want her to hurt me, and I love you for it, but, God; do you think it would hurt me less to watch her do this to you?"

"I...I didn't think," Llew admitted.

"What you feel for me; that need to protect me. You know that I feel the same about you. So please, Llew; don't be a martyr, because I couldn't stand to see you die."

"I promise," Llew said, in a small voice.

Cassie shifted position, trying to make herself comfortable, but the greatest pain was in her head, and it would not go away. "How did you know so much about her?" Cassie asked.

"I guessed," Llew replied. "Based on old myths and legends, and some stuff I talked about with Daniel one time. Nirrti first turns up in the Vedas, in about 6000BC; Kali in 3000BC. Nirrti becomes Nirrta somewhere in between, and it seemed logical that a Goa'uld with male and female aspects might have swapped host-gender at some stage. I hoped I might throw her."

"Well, it worked," Cassie admitted. "Just don't do anything like it again."

Llew began to answer, then stopped as they heard the sound of approaching steps. They turned, and saw Nirrti enter the gallery, a Jaffa warrior at her heels. The warrior wore a tall helm like a snake's head, but narrower than that of a Serpent Guard, lacking the spreading hood. The naquada of its surface was lacquered black, and in the centre of the forehead was a great, blue gemstone. He carried in his hands a long, wooden box, inlaid with gold and ivory.

Cassie shuddered. She had no idea what was in the box, but she did not doubt it would be something unpleasant.

"You are a most fascinating pair," Nirrti told them. "And handsome to behold. We may find...uses for you, when our curiosity is assuaged." She touched her wrist, opening a door in the field around Llew.

Cassie tried to steel herself for what was to come, praying that she could be strong when Llew needed her after the torture.

"Remove your shirt," Nirrti commanded.

Llew hesitated, but Nirrti turned a cold glance from him to Cassie. He got the message, and with ill grace took off his shirt.

"Handsome to behold indeed," Nirrti commented, but the eyes that roved across Llew's lean torso carried only a flicker of interest, and the icy control in her aura told him that this display of lasciviousness was entirely for Cassandra's benefit.

"Naga, kree." The Jaffa stepped forward and stood by his mistress. She turned and opened the box, removing a long, needle-like object. The forward part of the needle was of golden metal, but so slender that true gold would have simply bent when pressed against skin. The rear section of the device was a crystalline bulb, which tapered to meet the wider base of the needle itself. Nirrti had used a similar device when she drew blood from them earlier, but this one already held a straw-coloured fluid in the bulb. Nirrti held the device up to the light, scrutinising the fluid with a critical eye.

"What is that?" Cassandra asked. She could not help herself, even though she knew that was exactly what Nirrti wanted her to do.

"A serum of the virus," Nirrti replied. "Derived from your blood. Highly concentrated. I wish to see how resilient these Asgard machines truly are."

"No," Cassie begged, and as though that were a signal she had been awaiting, Nirrti jabbed the needle hard into Llew's neck.

The boy cried out in pain, and the bulb cleared as the fluid was driven into his bloodstream by some process unknown to Cassandra. Then the needle was withdrawn, leaving a tiny, bleeding hole in the skin of Llew's throat. Suddenly weak, he stumbled to the wall and slid down it. Cassandra moved as close to him as she could, with the force field still between them.

Nirrti replaced the needle in its case, and spoke to the Jaffa in her own tongue. Cassandra understood only fragments of the Goa'uld dialect, and had no idea what orders the warrior was being given.

"We're still on Earth," Llew whispered to her. "She's telling him to send a...some sort of signal I think, to recall her warriors. Something about the city being frozen...or paralysed."

"My God," Cassie said. "She's infected the city. I've infected the city. I've infected you."

"No!" He snapped, clearly fighting for consciousness. "Not you! It was she who infected me. All of this is her doing, do you hear me?"

"Llew..."

"Do you understand that? You mustn't blame yourself, Cassandra."

The Jaffa walked away, and Nirrti turned to stand over the two teenagers, an amused smile on her perfect lips.

Cassandra tried to ignore the Goa'uld, but Llew looked up at her, and his eyes filled with tears.

"Oh Gods," he whispered, his eyes shifting out of focus. "How she used to dance."

"Llew?"

"She danced so beautifully, that it was said she could charm the beasts and the birds, and the trees and the stones with the grace of her limbs and the rhythm of her body."

"Be silent!" Nirrti commanded.

"Great kings and lords of men desired her; and Gods too. They offered her the world if she would dance for them, but she danced only for herself; for the sheer joy of it."

"Silence!"

Llew shook his head slightly, then turned his eyes back to Cassie. "Cariad," he whispered, and then his eyes closed.

"Llew," Cassie moaned, tears welling in her eyes.

"I had not expected such a rapid result," Nirrti commented.

Cassandra looked up at the Goa'uld in surprise. She hid it well, but Cassie was certain that Nirrti was thrown and off-balance.

"What did he mean? About dancing?" Cassie asked, her voice thick with pain.

Nirrti snarled at Cassie. "Nothing!" She snapped. "He was merely delirious, and no doubt further confused by his desire for my host."

"Your host? He saw her," Cassie realised. "Or something of her; who she used to be."

"Silence! He saw nothing. He spoke in ignorance and lust."

"He felt no lust for you," Cassie spat, no longer caring of the consequences.

"Of course he did," Nirrti replied, angry and contemptuous. "All men are ruled by lust, and so weakened. That is a lesson I learned through pain and bitterness in the deceiving arms of my Queen, Durga, when I wore a man's flesh; when she tricked me into siring that thankless whore, Kali."

Cassandra was impressed by Llew's guesswork. No wonder Nirrti had been shaken.

"Isn't Kali a System Lord now?" Cassie asked, innocently. "One of the greatest of them."

"She is nothing!" Nirrti roared. "When they cast me down she threw dewy eyes at Cronos and his lust betrayed him as all men's will. He permitted her to claim half of my realms and armies, and so grow strong enough to stand as his equal. But I was not to be so easily defeated.

"I found a minor lord," she went on. "Byzar; weak and foolish, and easily swayed by his desire for my host." She turned a vicious smile on Cassandra. "He took me in and sheltered me. I thanked him with a kiss and a blade, and he died with a smile on his face."

Cassandra shuddered. "He...He doesn't sound like he was very bright," she said.

"Even Gods can be fools, and like all men their desires control and betray them."

Cassandra nodded, dutifully, the feeling of familiarity growing in her mind.

"Trust rather in the power of a Goddess," Nirrti advised the girl. "My star is rising now. The SGC is crippled, and only I know it. I shall conquer this world, where even Anubis failed, and I shall rule the System Lords. Perhaps I may learn something of Asgard technology myself before this manchild's body gives out. Or perhaps not. It matters little."

"You just want to destroy him," Cassandra accused. "You want to destroy Llew because you don't understand him, and that scares you."

"I fear nothing," Nirrti told her.

"You feared my mother."

"Silence!"

Cassie was afraid, but was on a roll. "I know you," she said. "Women like you. You're like Anna Laurence, seducing Dominic away from me to prove she could. Or Justine MacIntyre, afraid of me because she doesn't know how to control me."

"Be silent!"

"Men aren't only ruled by lust," Cassandra went on. "That's just the only way you know to deal with them. You're a...a cheerleader," she accused. "An eternal prom queen with nothing to you but looks and bitterness. I can't believe I've lived in abject terror of you for the past year. You're nothing."

"Be silent, or I will make you suffer."

"Newsflash, Cordelia!" Cassandra snapped, her voice cracking, choked with grief and fury. "You've killed my Mom and all my friends, destroyed my lover from pure spite, and I was the weapon you used to do it. There is nothing left that you can do to me now. You can torture me, kill me, run me through your sarcophagus a hundred times; there's nothing left for you to hurt."

Nirrti roared at her. She fixed Cassandra with her flashing eyes and honest-to-Godroared. Cassandra stood her ground, and Nirrti turned and stalked away.

"We shall see," she called over her shoulder.

Cassie stared after her for a long moment, then slid slowly down the wall. She drew her legs up to her chest, and began to cry.

*

Bonforte Park had been a bust, and so had the two others Alex and Teal'c had checked out. Alex was growing frustrated with Teal'c's refusal to tell her what they were looking for, instead insisting that the small scanning device he had given her was intended to locate cloaked spaceships.

"I thought that's what the ray gun was for?" Alex had asked, petulantly.

"The transphase eradication rod reveals a concealed individual through the interaction of the projected beam with the energy emissions given off by phase-shifted matter," Teal'c replied. "A cloaking device does not utilise phase-shifting technology, and a cloaked vessel will thus not be detected by a TER."

"And how big is this spaceship we're looking for?" Alex asked.

"It is most likely to be a teltac, and small vessel used for scouting and light cargo transportation. It is approximately thirty feet from nose to stern, and somewhat pyramidal in shape."

"A spaceship shaped like a pyramid? Now you're just being silly."

"I..." Teal'c froze, staring over Alex's shoulder.

Alex turned to follow his gaze. "What is...? Holy God in Heaven!"

"Our enemy grows overconfident," Teal'c said.

"What is that?" Alex asked, her eyes riveted on the huge serpent writhing in the sky above them.

"The banner of Nirrti; the Naga Rajah," Teal'c replied, swiftly calculating the location of the vo-cume device projecting the sign. "It is a summons to her warriors. We must move quickly, or she will be gone. The base of the sign is perhaps half a mile from here. We shall run."

"Run?"

"If we do not, Cassandra will be taken from this world forever," Teal'c explained.

"In the cloaked spaceship?"

"Yes."

Alex locked her gaze with Teal'c's, intent on cutting through the bull and finding the truth behind his words. She was taken aback to find no deceit, no obfuscation.

"This is real, isn't it?" She asked. "The aliens and spaceships: That's the truth of it?"

"Yes."

"Alright then," she agreed, pressing the disbelief and culture shock aside for later consideration. "We run."

*

Nirrti paced impatiently on the peltac of her ship, anxious to be away. While she was certain that no-one remained in Colorado Springs who could present a threat to her, she was not yet ready for a confrontation; not until her agents had secured for her a new ha'tak vessel at the least. She would have waited longer before putting her plan into effect, but the timed fuse that she had built into Cassandra Fraiser's retrovirus had forced her hand; it had seemed important at the time to unleash this hurt upon the girl and on her mother – who had dared to point a weapon at a goddess! – on or about the anniversary of her birth. As she understood it, this was a time when the Tau'ri gave each other gifts.

The death of her second homeworld – of her second family – was Nirrti's gift to the child who had defied her.

At long last, Sesha – First Prime of Nirrti and leader of the Naga Guards – entered the peltac and bowed low before his goddess. "Mistress."

"Sesha," she greeted him. "Are all of the warriors returned?"

"Two only remain," Sesha replied. "Those who went furthest afield to search for the child."

"I found the child," Nirrti said, implying failure on the part of her Jaffa. "Make ready for departure."

"Yes, Mistress."

Sesha was one of the few Nagas to have remained loyal to her after her fall from grace. He and a handful of others had refused to have his tattoo erased and replaced by that of the raven of Cronos or the leering demon-face of Kali. He and his fellows had fled from Cronos' retribution, and in time had found their way back to Nirrti's service. In reward for his loyalty, Nirrti had made him her First Prime, planting a great, red gemstone - the nagamani - in his brow in place of the sinuous tattoo which denoted her service.

At present, Sesha and his nine followers were all the loyal warriors that she had. Byzar's forces obeyed her, but his First Prime had defied her, and stolen away with her would-be master's only ha'tak vessel, and half his army. Most of Byzar's wolf-headed Varangar had left with their leader, and the few who remained were not trustworthy. Thus only the ten Nagas had travelled with their mistress on this most important mission. A necessary precaution, but it left her vulnerable.

"We shall depart once the ship is ready," Nirrti pronounced. "Whether the other two are returned or not."

"Yes, Mistress," Sesha replied, without hesitation. He knew that it was dangerous for her to lose any of her followers, but he also trusted in his goddess, and would never think to question her orders.

*

"Slow down," Alex begged, as they slogged through a small copse towards open ground. "I'm getting a cramp."

"There is no time," Teal'c told her, but then he did slow, stop, and half-turn towards her.

"Thanks," she gasped, but he held up a hand for her to be silent, and cocked his head to one side as if listening.

Suddenly, he put out a hand and shoved her violently to the ground, at the same time twisting away from her. A blast of energy hissed between them, striking a poor, blameless tree and blasting a large section of its trunk to splinters. Alex looked up from the ground as Teal'c wheeled about, swinging the TER until its beam illuminated a figure in charcoal armour. It carried a long staff, wore a serpentine helm with a gemstone in the brow, and was visible only from the legs on up.

The figure swung the staff casually to point at Teal'c, and the tip sparked in such a way that Alex knew it must be the source of the energy blast. The figure was quick, but Teal'c was quicker, and an energy pulse shot from the TER and struck the centre of the armoured chest. A fountain of gore erupted as the warrior was torn apart, and as Teal'c helped Alex to her feet, all that remained was that helmet and a pair of twitching legs.

"Oh, God; gross," Alex complained.

"A scout," Teal'c commented. "One of the Naga Guard."

"What the hell happened to him?"

"The blast from the TER has a potent disruptive effect on phased matter," Teal'c replied, slinging the ray gun and hefting the fallen staff weapon. "I had heard that the Naga Guards of Nirrti attacked from concealment, without warning, but I did not want to believe it of a fellow Jaffa. If he had struck openly, he might have defeated us," he added.

"How so?"

"I would not have sensed his approach from so great a distance without the phased matter emanations, and the TER would have merely wounded him." He looked around him. "We are heading in the right direction," he affirmed. "If we are lucky, they will wait for this one to return, but let us not count on it."

"Right," Alex agreed, distractedly, still trying to pull her eyes from the blasted carcass of the Jaffa.

"This way," Teal'c told her, taking her gently by the arm to lead her away.

"Thanks," she said. "I've seen some awful things in my time," she added. "But that..."

Teal'c laid one huge hand gently on her arm. "You must focus now," he said. "Cassandra Fraiser and Llew Midhir need us."

Alex drew a deep breath, taking strength from this strange man's hulking, stalwart presence. "I'm okay," she promised.

Teal'c nodded, and they went on, emerging from the trees into open parkland.

"Hey!" Alex exclaimed, softly. "I think I've got them!" She studied the readout on the hand scanner carefully. "Down there," she said, pointing across the grass. "Oh!"

Teal'c turned to her and raised an eyebrow.

"I...I'm not sure, but I think this thing is a little more than ten metres long."

*

The forcefield crackled under Cassie's hand as she pressed against it, trying to will her way through the invisible barrier to reach Llew. He lay on his side, his eyes closed, his skin deathly pale. He was very still, even his eyes unmoving behind their lids, and barely seemed to be breathing.

"Please don't die, Llew," Cassie whispered, plaintively. "Not from this." She wanted, desperately, to pray; to beg some higher force to come to her aid. But her God was the one who had made this happen, besides being no god at all. Given the absolute betrayal of her childhood belief system, Cassandra had found it impossible to accept Earth religion, and so she had no-one at all to pray to.

She reached a hand inside her shirt, and only then realised that Nirrti must have taken the Mjollnir pendant that Llew's mother, Angharad had given her. It was not like Llew's old pendant, a gift of the Asgard to protect him from the Goa'uld. It could not strike Nirrti down with a blast of lightning, but it would have been a comfort to have something to remind her that not all beings who moved as gods across the universe were evil.

Cassandra's reverie was broken by a movement on the far side of the barrier. It was very slight, and after she caught it from the corner of her eye it took Cassandra a moment to actually see what was moving, but Llew's hand was definitely sliding across the floor towards the force field; towards her.

"Llew," she whispered, but received no response other than the steady creep of his hand across the floor of the gallery. Cassandra ran her fingers down the force field, the frost patterns following the contact until her hand lay on the floor. Llew's hand was less than an inch away now, and she cursed the wall that stood between them.

A bright blue spark leaped from Llew's fingertips, passing through the force field into her. Her arm tingled, but not unpleasantly, and the frosting was pushed away from her hand, rippling outwards until it formed a rough arch about six inches in radius.

Holding her breath, hardly daring to believe, Cassandra moved her hand forward, and met no resistance. She reached out, and clasped her hand around Llew's, feeling his fingers tighten in response.

*

Sesha turned to Nirrti. "Mistress," the First Prime announced. "We are ready to depart, and only one warrior remains unaccounted for."

Nirrti nodded. "We leave, now," she commanded.

"By your will, Mistress."

The Jaffa turned to his control panel. He reached out, then snatched his hand back, as if burned. The lights of the peltac dimmed.

"Sesha?" Nirrti asked, her voice low and deadly.

"The ship will not respond to the peltac," Sesha told her. "The peltac will not respond to the peltac. All controls are frozen; monitors are failing, but report system malfunctions throughout the vessel."

"The cloak?" Nirrti asked.

"Is failing."

*

"Whoa!" Alex exclaimed. "Big spaceship!"

"A barque," Teal'c said. "A Goa'uld heavy transport vessel. It is unarmed, and appears to be suffering system failures. We shall likely not be given another chance," he added, handing Alex the TER. "Sweep continually along the ship; so that we are not ambushed."

Alex nodded. "Can we get inside? Get Cassie back?"

"We can try."

*

Nirrti stared sullenly at the flickering screens. "What is wrong?" She demanded.

"I do not know," Sesha replied. "It is as though all of our systems were suddenly disabled. Perhaps some weapon of the Tau'ri that we did not know of?"

"No!" Nirrti snapped, standing up suddenly. "Not of the Tau'ri." She strode down from her throne and turned towards the rear of the barque.

"Mistress!"

"What?" Nirrti snapped impatiently over her shoulder.

"Someone approaches. I did not see clearly who, but..."

"Kill them!" Nirrti ordered. "If they are warriors or no."

"Yes, Mistress."

*

"There!" Teal'c called, pointing, and Alex saw a hatch slide open in the side of the barque, the metal of the hull seeming almost to flow. Moments later, two of the armoured warriors stuck their heads around the hatch and opened fire with the staff weapons.

Teal'c moved away to his right, letting off a volley of suppressing fire from his own weapon, while Alex blasted away with the TER and cut left for the cover of a small water feature. She ducked behind the fountain drew a better bead, and fired three times, hitting the hull, the open space of the hatch, and finally the warrior returning her fire. He fell back, but another took his place.

Alex fumbled with her field radio; the reception was crackly and garbled, but it functioned. "How many are there?" She asked.

"There may be as many as thirty," Teal'c replied.

Alex looked over, and saw the big man lying prone on the side of a small hillock, using it as cover.

"Can we take them all?" She asked, dubiously.

"We can only try," Teal'c told her.

*

Nirrti heard the clang of enemy fire striking the barque's hull as she strode towards the cargo bay, and the sound did nothing to mellow her mood. If only she had been able to find a better ship with functioning cloak, but she was operating on a miniscule budget for the moment, and this was just one more annoyance to nettle her. For so many years she had ranked as one of the mightiest of System Lords that she had almost forgotten how much hard work was required when your resources were so limited.

"You!" She roared as she entered the long gallery of the cargo bay. "How are you doing this? What...?" She froze in horror. The force fields were gone, and Cassandra Fraiser sat in the open, cradling the recumbent form of Llew Midhir with his head lolling on her shoulder.

The girl looked up at the furious Goa'uld, her eyes shining with tears, yet clear and calm behind.

Nirrti hissed, and threw out her hand, the most potent ribbon wave that she could summon rolling towards the two children. The wall of light rushed out, and broke over her targets like a gentle wave, barely ruffling the girl's tangled blonde hair. The Goa'uld gaped in amazement, and held out her hand to summon another blast. She gathered the power in her palm, but her concentration was shattered by a sudden agony all along her left forearm. She cried out, and looked down, to see the metal bands of her ribbon device contracting around her arm.

"What are you doing?" She gasped. Stop this at once."

"You thought you'd killed him," Cassandra said, softly. "You were wrong. You've succeeded, Nirrti. Here is your Hak'tar. Why aren't you happy?"

Nirrti screamed as the bones of her forearm cracked like matchwood. "Please! Stop."

Slowly, drawing Llew up with her, Cassandra stood. Llew somehow found his feet, but his eyes remained firmly closed.

"Let us go," Cassandra said.

As the girl rose, Nirrti fell, overcome by pain she collapsed to the deck, whimpering softly. She looked on Cassandra, staring at this child in fear and confusion. She could not understand how this could be happening; how her weapon could be turned against her this way.

"Release us, or die," Cassandra whispered, and at that moment Nirrti – she who had stood before Ra in his fury, and faced the judgement of the System Lords for her attempt on the life of Cronos – felt that she had never beheld anything more frightening.

*

Alex fired another volley of shots to keep the warriors pinned down, but she was no longer scoring any hits. They had all drawn too far back within the hatch.

The sound of a struggle distracted her, and she turned in time to see Teal'c wrestling with an invisible enemy, and clearly losing. She swung up the TER, illuminating an armoured warrior. The enemy was pressing down on Teal'c, a knife in his hand, but Alex found it hard to pull the trigger, knowing what the weapon would do.

With his enemy now visible to him, Teal'c was able to drive a fist into his side, underneath the plates of his armour, and with an effort he shoved the Jaffa away. The warrior stumbled clear, fading in and out as Alex struggled to hold the phased electron beam on him, and grabbed for his zat'nik'tel. Teal'c reached for his staff weapon, knowing that he had no time, but a moment before the first zat blast would have rendered him immobile, the Jaffa erupted in a blast of gore. Even Teal'c, his nerves hardened on a thousand battlefields, felt bile rise in his throat at the sight, and he knew how hard it must have been for Alex Fraiser, a doctor, to pull the trigger of the TER.

He turned back to the barque, and made a quick count in his head. Including the one terminated just now by Alex Fraiser, and the scout he had killed in the woods, they had accounted for four or five Jaffa – he could not be certain how badly injured one of them had been when he fell back into the hatch. It was too slow, he knew it, but he had no heavier weapons, and would not have dared to use them anyway.

"Alex Fraiser," he said into his radio.

"Yes, Teal'c?" Alex's voice was unsteady, queasy.

"Are you well?"

"I feel sick."

"I feel alive," Teal'c said, softly, reminding her why it had been necessary. "We must take control of the hatch," he told her, gently, trying to get her to focus on what still needed to be done.

Alex gave an incredulous laugh. "Yeah, sure," she agreed. "I'll cover you, you rush them."

Teal'c nodded to himself. "As you prefer," he said. "On the count of three."

"Wait!"

*

Humiliated, and still in great pain, Nirrti led Cassandra through the corridors of her vessel. Llew leaned heavily on Cassandra's arm, unresponsive to anything around him, except for her.

"Wait!" Cassandra called, as they passed an open door. Within she could see benches and glassware; all of unknown design, but it was clear that this was a lab. "The blood samples; mine, Llew's. I want them destroyed."

"No," Nirrti replied. "I will not do that. This – you – are my life's work."

"As you wish," Cassandra said. Moments later a great crash came from the lab, as every piece of glass, every piece of crystal, burst into shards.

"What...? How?"

Cassandra turned her head on one side, eyeing Nirrti with contemptuous superiority, and stroked Llew's hair with a gentle hand. "Don't you know?" She asked Nirrti, in a voice that dripped poisonous spite. "This is your baby. Aren't you proud, Mama?"

Nirrti's eyes widened in horror.

"Move," Cassandra ordered.

Nirrti was physically shaking by the time she reached the hatch where her warriors crouched. The Nagas cried out in alarm as their weapons suddenly failed. At the same moment, Teal'c crested the hill and came barrelling towards the hatch, TER blasts still striking around the hatch.

"Teal'c; wait!" Cassandra called, pushing past Nirrti to the open air. The big Jaffa saw someone emerge and fired, pulling up hard and trying to divert the blast by sheer willpower when he realised who it was.

The staff blast flew towards Cassandra and Llew, but at the last moment it faded, and burst harmlessly in the air before them.

"Cassandra Fraiser?" Teal'c asked.

"It's okay, Teal'c," she said, softly. She turned, still supporting Llew against her shoulder. "You can go now," she told Nirrti. "But never come back."

Nirrti spat at Cassandra's feet, then backed quickly away from the hatch. A few moments later, the barque rose shakily into the air, and accelerated away from the park. Teal'c raised his staff weapon, but the blasts spattered harmlessly on the hull, and the ship vanished as the cloak came back online.

"I wish I could believe she'd stay away from us," Cassandra whispered to herself, but in her heart she knew that Nirrti would never learn from her fear; just let it rankle and fester in her heart, until it – like everything in her world – was just another reason to hate.

"Cassandra!"

Cassie turned to the voice. "Auntie Alex?" She asked. "What are you doing...?" She swayed, woozily. "Oh. Stay back," she cautioned.

Alex nodded, stopping where she stood. "Why not finish Nirrti off?" She asked. "You had her."

"She would have run. We'd...have had to have chased her through the ship," Cassie explained. "And I don't think I would have been able to keep..."

Cassie's legs buckled, and she and Llew tumbled into a heap together.

*

Cassie swam slowly up from a dream in which Nirrti was humiliating herself in the cheerleading tryouts at Colorado Springs High School, into a soft, warm, comforting darkness. Slowly, she became aware of lights around her, and the soft, distant sound of bustling people.

"Welcome back."

Cassie turned her head, smiling broadly. "Llew. You're alive."

Llew smiled back at her from the shadows. "Happy to say, and in a sight better shape than many," he added.

Cassandra's face fell.

"Hey now," Llew said. "Never mind the long face, bach; there's no lasting harm done. Alex says that everyone infected is going to pull through."

"Everyone?"

"Everyone. Alex managed to start synthesising an antiserum from our blood while we were still unconscious. By the time I woke up, your Mam was already trying to get up and help; half-asleep, and contradicting everything Alex said. They started on the ones who'd been infected the earliest, and worked on a vaccine that should make sure this thing never rears its ugly head again. Also, Alex says that the retrovirus is not just dormant, but gone from your system completely now."

"Where are they all now?"

"Sleeping," Llew replied. "Alex and Teal'c were on their feet almost thirty hours making sure everyone got their serum that needed it, and your Mam's worn out from fighting the virus. Besides which, it's pretty late now. I told your Mam I'd keep an eye on you while you slept."

Cassie breathed a sigh of relief, grateful tears streaming down her cheeks. "And the others?"

"It was touch and go with JJ apparently, with her immune system already whacked from the flu, but she's out of the woods. Everyone's on the road to recovery, and Captain Kawalsky and Major Carter are already on their feet. They're working with this guy called Bob, spearheading the cover-up; telling everyone they had sleeping sickness, and that the electrical disturbances were freak incidents caused by workers in the local substation dropping off on the job." He grinned. "And of course, Colonel O'Neill and your Mam kept trying to get up, but Alex and Teal'c wouldn't let them."

Cassie smiled at the image, but the grin faded as memory swept back over her. "I thought you were going to die," she told him, a catch in her voice.

Llew leaned closer to her, and she saw that he was dressed in hospital pyjamas just like the ones she was wearing. "You want to know a secret?" He whispered. "So did I." He reached down and took her hand, squeezing it tightly. "Everything was so dark, and I was so scared. You know, I've never been sick before. I'd never felt anything like that."

"Poor baby," Cassie said, earnestly, reaching up to stroke his face.

"Just when everything seemed darkest," he went on, looking into Cassie's eyes. "I heard your voice, and I saw a light and felt you reaching out for me. Then I reached back, and...well, you know what happened after that better than I do."

Cassie nodded. "You became the Hak'tar," she said. "Just for a while I guess; unless you can still..."

"Not me," Llew told her. "I never could."

"What do you mean?" Cassie asked. "I saw you!"

"Shh," Llew whispered. "It's late; people are sleeping."

Cassie frowned at him in confusion. "But you dissipated Nirrti's ribbon wave; crushed her arm. You made the lab explode."

Llew shook his head. "It wasn't me," he assured her. "Or at least, I think I might have been supplying some of the power. But I was out of it, completely. All I knew was that someone was drawing on my strength to do...something."

"But who, then?" Cassie asked.

Llew smiled, faintly. "You think I'd give my strength to just anyone?" He asked. "It was you Cassie," he told her, when her face remained blank. "Or maybe us together, but you were the guide; yours was the will. I couldn't see a thing, but I felt you. You were incredible."

Cassie heard the note of awe in his voice, and it worried her. "Well, I don't feel anything special now," she said, trying to keep the fear that he might not want regular Cassie now he'd had a brush with this super-Cassie; or that he would want to worship her, and set her on a pedestal. "If it was me doing that, I can't anymore."

Llew smiled, gently. "You were incredible," he repeated. "Not the power. You. You're always incredible, Cariad."

Cassie felt a lump building in her throat. "What does that mean?" She asked. "Cariad? I never asked."

Llew thought for a moment, then leaned over and kissed her with a gentle intensity, his mouth lingering tenderly against hers. Cassandra closed her eyes, leaning up into the kiss, and letting it go on and on.

"Wow," she whispered, when it was finished. She could still feel her lips tingling where they had touched his; the way her hand had done in the cell, only this was a deeper, warmer sensation. "That's Cariad?"

"That's Cariad," Llew acknowledged.

The two teenagers gazed at one another for a long, charged moment. Then Llew yawned, and Cassie laughed.

"Tired?" She asked.

"I have been awake a while," he admitted.

She smiled, wearily. "I'm pretty sleepy still myself." She shuffled over, and lifted the covers. "Come on," she invited. "I won't bite."

Llew kicked off a pair of hospital slippers and slid under the blanket with Cassandra, wrapping his arms gently around her.

"How long have I been...?" She broke off with a yawn.

"Almost thirty-six hours," Llew replied. "Which means it's very early on Saturday morning." He kissed her gently. "Happy Birthday, Cassandra."

Hak'tar