Getting there now!
As MacGyver grew closer, he realized that O’Neill was still conscious and squirming as Teal’c tried to help him.
Not dead, thank heavens. Blood, however, had soaked the whole left side and middle of the colonel’s jacket, and that tended not to be a good sign.
Mac had seen some pretty nasty injuries located in that area in Vietnam, and he knew it was very easy for a person’s insides to be quickly outside if the wound was deep enough.
Kneeling at Jack’s side, he tried not to dwell on those memories as he tugged out his pocket knife and began to carefully cut the material away from the wound.
“Are you trying to finish me off with that thing?” Jack coughed out, still attempting wit. “’cause I really don’t think it’s big enough…”
Mac let out a breath in relief as he saw what was under Jack’s bloodied shirt.
Not too bad… Ignoring the officer’s remarks, he concentrated on what he had to do next.
The cut was deepest on the left side, and he guessed that was where the Jaffa had started his slicing. It gradually petered out across O’Neill’s stomach as if the bad guy had been distracted.
Teal’c firing his staff perhaps?
MacGyver didn’t waste time asking.
He needed to stop Jack bleeding as soon as possible, and then they could worry about how this had happened. “Teal’c, do you carry a first aid kit of any kind?”
The ex-Jaffa nodded and silently retrieved a small bag from his pack. He offered it up to Mac, who waved him off.
“Find something in there and dry the sides of the wound as much as you can.” As MacGyver spoke, he was rummaging in his own backpack. “I know he’s still bleeding but do your best.”
Teal’c didn’t hesitate, swiftly finding a large wound dressing to mop up as best he could.
Jack grimaced as his friend apparently applied just a little too much pressure. “Hey, what is this, a new method of Jaffa torture?” He sputtered blearily.
“I am sorry, O’Neill.”
“Yeah, well next time do you think you can maybe come to my rescue before your buddies try to give me a matching pouch?”
Teal’c raised a brow. “I was already engaged in battle with the first prime.” He looked almost sorrowful that he’d let his friend get hurt. “If I had not taken him on, he would have joined the Jaffa at your location also…”
Mac watched the exchange as he worked, grateful that Teal’c was keeping O’Neill both awake, and distracted. He doubted the officer was going to like what came next very much.
While Teal’c had dried the sides of the wound to the best of his ability, Mac had been using his pocket knife to cut long, narrow strips of duct tape. Now he had to pull the sides of the cut together and use those strips like giant butterfly clips to hold everything in place.
And it was definitely going to hurt big time.
O’Neill seemed to have sensed Mac’s apprehension and stopped chiding Teal’c. He looked up to see the strips of tape, and guessed what was coming next. “You…you gotta be kidding me..?”
Mac ignored the comment and carefully squeezed the cut together where it was deepest, then applied the first strip, followed by the next and the next all the way along, leaving small gaps between each “clip” to allow air to the wound, and any infection that might occur out.
Mercifully for both men, Jack only remained conscious for the first few seconds of Mac’s attempt to patch him up.
“Will he recover?” Teal’c watched on both with curiosity and concern, the stoic expression on his face melting just enough for MacGyver to realize that he had very great respect for O’Neill.
And that didn’t come lightly from a Jaffa, Mac was sure.
Mac was also pretty certain after his own experience with wounds that Jack would be okay, but he checked for the throb of blood at O’Neill’s neck anyway.
Jack’s pulse was a little fast, but still reasonably strong and steady.
The gash had bled a lot, but they’d dealt with it pretty quickly.
And the rather garish head wound Jack had also sustained was nowhere near as nasty as it looked. A couple of butterfly clips in that department and the officer would be good as new. Well, apart from a headache the size of Mount Rushmore.
“He’ll be okay, but we need to get him back to the foundation labs.” Mac finally answered, now focusing on pressing a field dressing over his handiwork and then dealing with the gash over Jack’s brow.
The colonel groaned. “I’ll be fine, Teal’c, just as long as you keep Rod Stewart and his duct tape from hell away from me…”
Teal’c seemed bemused and relieved. “I do not know this Rod Stewart?”
Jack groaned again, this time not from the pain in his side. “The
mullet, Teal’c?”
Teal’c shook his head, but Mac was convinced there was the slightest hint of a smile on his lips. Whether it was because Jack was awake and had enough energy for sarcasm, or whether he really did know who Rod Stewart was, the trouble shooter wasn’t sure.
Jack tried to roll onto his good side to pull up into a sitting position, grimaced, and then dropped back down onto his back puffing a little when he realized he didn’t have the strength. “So, did you zap the snakehead lover who cut me or what?” He asked Teal’c. “We got at least one of them, right?”
“I did not,” Teal’c confessed, his voice getting lower as he seemed to actually feel shame about his lack of victory. “The first prime is stronger than I anticipated. It was all I could do to keep him at bay, O’Neill. When I saw the second Jaffa about to harm you, I could only let off a blast from my staff weapon in his direction, and hope he would be distracted.”
“It's a good job he was,” Mac cut in. “Because if that wound had been any deeper…”
Jack winced. “I get the picture. I’d be looking at parts of myself from a whole new angle.” He looked at MacGyver hopefully. “How ‘bout you? You’re at least still in one piece. Tell me that means I didn’t get sliced and diced for nothing.”
“You didn’t. I got lucky, I guess. The one I caught is still invisible, though. The paint thing doesn’t last.”” Mac admitted. “I should go and make sure he’s secure while Teal’c gets you back to Phoenix.”
Teal’c features grew stoic. “Perhaps I should go and speak with him? I believe I may be able to convince him the goa’uld are not gods, and turn him to our cause. And if not, I stand a much better chance of subduing him than you, Mr. Mac.” He cocked his head. “Also…you have much greater medical skill than I, should O’Neill require it.”
Jack scowled. “Gee thanks, Teal’c, but I think I’ll pass on any more attention today,” he moved jut a little, and obviously found it uncomfortable. “What makes you so sure you can sway this guy, anyway?”
“I am not sure, O’Neill. However, as you say, it is not worth a try?”
“He has a point,” MacGyver agreed. “Because I’ve noticed something that we can’t ignore. I think the Jaffa cloaking devices maybe directly linked to why you jumped time and realities. The cloak has a strange blue glow, just like Daniel described. If I’m right, we need the Jaffa and their devices intact to recreate the journey through the gate.”
O’Neill made a face. “Oops…”
Teal’c blinked. “Oops?”
“I kinda took out the cloaking device of the Jaffa that cut me.” O’Neill looked almost apologetic. “It did glow with some freakish blue light.”
Mac wasn’t swayed. “If we can catch him, maybe we can fix it. Especially if Teal’c can get the one I caught on our side. He might know how the technology works.”
Jack wasn’t convinced. “Good luck with that.”
Teal’c took the statement as a green light and nodded. “I will go now, and if he is amenable, I shall rendezvous with you at the place you call Phoenix.” He turned to leave, and then looked back. “We should not waste too much time. The first prime will most likely be angry at our recent actions and seek revenge. I believe he will try and return through the gate for reinforcements.”
“Just be careful,” both Jack and MacGyver echoed in unison, as if their very thoughts were aligned.
Teal’c nodded again, and then vanished stealthily into the thinning fog towards the captive Jaffa.
“Do you think he can do it?” Mac kneeled at Jack’s side and checked the dressing he’d not long applied. Thankfully, it was still dry.
Jack swallowed and blinked for a second as if he needed a moment to clear his thoughts. “If I know, Teal’c, he’ll sure as hell try…”
MacGyver offered the colonel a hand up, gently taking his weight and placing Jack’s arm over his shoulder.
Jack took a breath and leaned to try and pick up his rifle, still keeping his weight on the other man, but the motion jarred his side and he recoiled.
Mac lifted it up for him and slung it over his own shoulder, even though he had no intention of firing it. “You know, if Teal’c is right, the two Jaffa still out there are going to head right back to the labs to use the gate, and Pete and your friends aren’t expecting them.”
Jack came to a halt and keyed the mike on his uniform. “Daniel? Carter?” Only static hissed back at him, taunting the officer. “We’re out of range to warn them,” he sighed. “You better go without me. They need to know what might be heading their way.”
Mac shook his head. “I don’t leave anyone behind, and I suspect you wouldn’t either.” He tugged, urging O’Neill to move again.
Jack did, picking up speed ever-so-slightly even though it obviously hurt. “You’re a mystery, ya know that, MacGyver? You hate guns, and yet I get the impression you’ve seen your fair share of action?”
“Enough to know guns aren’t the answer.” Mac took a stride over a fallen tree branch and urged the colonel to do the same. “There’s always an alternative, if you look hard enough.”
Jack wasn’t won over. “So I’m guessing you’ve been on the battlefield? What as, a medic?”
That amused Mac. He smiled wanly as they moved back deeper into the forest again. “I was in bomb disposal in ‘nam. Let’s just say I preferred taking them to pieces rather than the alternative.”
Jack nodded as if the revelation explained everything, and then winced as he almost lost his footing. “So, c’mon, you can tell me now. It’s just you, me and the trees. Why’d you hate guns so much?”
MacGyver almost stopped dead in his tracks.
Almost. Except he didn’t have time to – not while they both had people in danger.
Instead, he pushed on, but his expression said his mind was reliving a moment he’d rather have left buried.
Eventually, he swallowed and decided his alter ego deserved to know why he chose not to use firearms, even again deadly aliens. “There was an accident, back when I was a kid. Me and a bunch of friends were messing around with a gun. We knew better, but it was just supposed to be a game, right up until Jesse got shot…”
“He make it?”
MacGyver stopped walking. All the guilt, all the memories washing over him like it had just that second happened. In his mind, he could still see Jesse bleeding, his eyes pleading to be saved.
And Mac had tried.
God only knew how hard he’d tried.
Mac couldn’t look O’Neill in the eye as he answered a simple and very final. “No.”
He expected a lecture from the officer at his side – a chewing out for letting one moment define him. But instead, O’Neill had turned a ghostly white and was looking at the ground as if he totally got where MacGyver was coming from.
“I get it,” Jack eventually mouthed, his voice cracking with emotion. “You see I lost my son, Charlie, pretty much the same way. It was
my weapon.
My fault.”
He urged Mac to begin walking again, and for a time, they trudged along in silence.
Eventually, Jack’s mood changed like he’d flipped a light switch. Mac suspected the jovial façade the officer often wore was sometimes a defence mechanism, and it worked extremely well.
“So, you got kids?” O’Neill gave a quirky smile as he asked. “I mean, is there a mini Mac out there somewhere playing with duct tape as we speak?”
“I have a son.” Mac couldn’t resist a smile of his own as he brought up an image of Sam in his head. They hadn’t known one another all that long, but he was proud of the way his kid had turned out.
“Any other family?”
Mac shook his head. It was getting painful again, but for some reason he couldn’t deny giving O’Neill the answers. “My dad and grandma died in a car accident when I was eleven. Mom later…”
“I’m sorry,” Jack offered genuinely. “I guess its hard telling me all this stuff, huh? I mean, me being you and all. Well, kinda…”
Mac was surprised to hear Jack admit they might be one and the same, and he was tempted, just for a second, to shoot some teasing remark of his own to lighten the mood.
It had been a pretty intense afternoon, after all, but then, it wasn’t over yet.
A voice, booming from somewhere ahead stopped any moment of mirth.
It was the first prime, and he was more than a little ticked.
Mac and O’Neill picked up the pace again until they reached the edge of the trees where they’d originally entered the forest.
Finding a good spot with plenty of cover, Mac propped the colonel against a tree and then dared to take a peek at what was going on.
The first prime and the de-cloaked Jaffa were standing in front of the open massive lab door, and on the ground in front of them, hands tied behind their backs was Pete, the security guard, Daniel, and Sam.
“Give yourselves up, Tau’ri, or see your friends die at my hand!”
Mac didn’t really understand the whole goa’uld and Jaffa thing, but he could tell in an instant the first prime meant it.
The lead Jaffa kicked Daniel to make a point, and the scientist grunted.
“Great, now what do we do?” O’Neill looked tired and very frustrated. “I should probably tell you, I’m really not in good enough shape for a full frontal assault.”
Mac was thinking, those famous inner cogs of his mind spinning at super-speed. “Maybe if Teal’c can convince the other Jaffa to help we’d stand a chance…”
“Sadly, that was not possible.”
MacGyver and Jack followed the sound of the voice to see Teal’c looking almost sulkily back at them. His bottom lip seemed even more curled than usual.
“I was not able to turn the Jaffa to our cause, so I secured him in the pit and returned.” Teal’c nodded towards the still shouting first prime. “I do not believe in our current situation we can take him without significant losses to our people.”
“I agree.” Mac nodded, his mind still racing, calculating, and evaluating every option.
“Well we can’t just sit and let this guy hurt our friends.” Jack took his sidearm out and pushed in a fresh clip.
Mac licked his lips. “No we can’t. That’s why it’s time to surrender…”
