Magical Cage 7
Rated TEEN
Jack stalked Xander's six, glad that the boy was still in military mode and walking point silently. Right now Jack couldn't handle the boy's babbling. Fuck, fuck, fuck, and oh yes, more fuck. Normally, when the team got captured, they could count on certain things. There would be bragging and gloating and torture, and even worse—long boring hours spend in a cell staring at each other. Now… fuck. Now all the rules had changed.
A small part of Jack wished he had just shot that Jaffa instead of leaving the blabbermouth tied up on the path. The way he was feeling right now, he truly did want to kill someone. As many times as Jack had killed in the line of duty or to protect his people, he rarely felt the *desire* to kill. Today was the exception.
Xander stopped in the path, and Jack moved to the cover of a tree even though Xander hadn't thrown up any warning signs. He still wasn't sure when to expect this thoroughly competent Xander to vanish, and the class clown to reappear, and that wasn't making him any happier. Okay, let's be honest, nothing about this FUBAR mission was making him any happier.
"We're here, but I'm not sure where here is," Xander said in a voice a little above a whisper. Jack double-timed it up to the boy, and yep, this was the cliff and path. After getting the information about the team's capture and a location out of the Jaffa, Jack detoured toward the cave. They'd have to pass it anyway to get to the Goa'uld ship, and with his bum hand, Jack was going to need Xander's cooperation. That meant, the boy needed to check on Willow.
"You take left, I'll take right," Jack ordered, and then he paused. "Will you recognize the area with the cave?"
"Yes, sir," Xander agreed, the military precision of the words grating on Jack's last nerve.
"Then move out, soldier. The first one to find the cave double-times it back to find the other, and watch your six," Jack warned the boy before he turned and started heading to the right. Xander didn't give him another "sir," but he did turn left and start walking the path.
Jack pushed away all his feelings into a little box marked "Repress now, forget later," and he focused on the landscape. Find Willow, ensure Xander's help, get his team back. Then he could worry about the rest of this FUBAR mission when he had Carter to explain it away and make the universe bend to her will. He *would* find them alive, and he should see this as an opportunity… an opportunity to kill the snakeheads who definitely needed killing AGAIN. He just wondered how many times he had to kill the same fucking snakeheads.
Jack shook his head and focused on repressing and watching the terrain.
"Jack!" a voice shouted some time later, and Jack flinched. Oh yes, babbling Xander with his ability to give away their position had returned. Jack turned to see Xander hurrying toward him, the P90 bouncing on his hip, and Willow following behind.
"Slowing down now? Slowing down would be good," Willow said as she breathed fast, the red rising in her cheeks as the kids finally caught up with Jack.
"Good to see you safe," Jack nodded toward the girl.
"Oh goddess. That looks like it hurts," Willow said, and Jack glanced down. He had pushed away the pain along with the frustration and homicidal tendencies, but looking at the purple and black flesh of his hand, he could feel the aching throb sink into his bones.
"You think?" he groused, and she pulled back with wide eyes. Sarcasm wasn't her thing, but then Jack wasn't exactly feeling like coddling a civvy.
"Maybe I can… you know, help," she nearly whispered. Jack raised an eyebrow, but she set her shoulders and stepped forward.
"I call on Asclepius, healer of the gods, and on Nehtor, high spirit of the dream. Hear my prayer. Accept my offering. Sospitas. Efflagito," Willow chanted softly, her hands dancing over his injury, and Jack looked skeptically toward Xander.
"Um, thanks for trying," Jack interrupted her as her forehead wrinkled in concentration.
"It didn't work," she said in dismay as she opened her eyes and looked down at the injury.
"It probably just takes time. Give it a week or two, and I'm sure the magic will kick right in and make it heal," Jack commented dryly as he turned toward the direction of the Goa'uld base the Jaffa had described.
"My magic was working earlier," she said, distressed.
"Maybe you just need to concentrate more, not that I'm the one to coach you on concentration with my definite lack of."
Jack flinched. Okay, no having Xander take point if the class clown was back. "Guys, let's not announce our presence," he suggested as he headed down the trail, his weapon held in his left hand and his back itching at having the two civvies behind him.
"Sorry. Big with the quiet, got it," Xander breathed.
"There's something definitely wrong with my magic," Willow continued their conversation, but at least now she was being quieter. "It's like the magic is wavy, so sometimes it's there and sometimes it's like it's all drained away."
"And magic isn't normally wavy?" Jack couldn't resist asking. It was like poking a bruise or picking a scab, and Jack did that too.
"Magic is kablewwy and futzy and a lot of time it's kinda backfirey, but it's not generally wavy. Big with the not normally wavy." Willow agreed.
"Will, maybe I should…" Xander trailed off, and Jack glanced back to see Xander gesturing toward him. Jack stopped, and waited with his jaw tight as he watched Xander. What should Xander do?
"What?" Willow asked, saving Jack the effort.
"I'm the one with the big gun, so I should walk point, but talking and walking point… not so much with the good," Xander said with a shrug, and his expression looked apologetic.
"You go be your bad soldier-self," Willow assured him with a pat on the arm, and Xander flashed her a smile before trotting off down the path, passing Jack with a nod.
Okay, so the boy obviously did have some soldier background. Funny how, when Jack had pumped the boy for information, that little bit hadn't come up. Then again, Spike had shut the boy up pretty quick when the subject of the military had come up.
"So, we're going to save the others? And then we'll go save Spike?" Willow asked as she switched to talking to Jack as Xander walked point, the weapon once again a natural part of his body's movement instead of something bouncing against him.
"That's the plan."
"And what about the super-vamps?"
"We won't save them," Jack answered sarcastically. Willow made a strangled sound, but at least it made her fall silent.
The uneven sounds of metal clanging against metal warned Jack that they were approaching the settlement, and Xander faded into the trees at the side of the increasingly worn path.
"Okay, that's sounding ungood," Willow said, and Jack grabbed her arm, tugging her into the woods.
"Shh," he admonished her, and she closed her mouth and made a locking gesture over it. Jack groaned at just one more piece of proof that these were kids who really shouldn't be in the middle of a battle zone. Unfortunately, there really wasn't a way to leave them out of it, not with his injured hand. Hopefully Willow would be willing to stay behind when he and Xander tried to make it into the camp.
Xander slid toward them, moving nearly silently through the trees, and Jack gestured in a direction. Without a pause, Xander followed the covert signal and detoured to take point through the trees.
Slowly and carefully, they moved their way to the edge of the clearing. In a field, a familiar village lay in the shadow of a pyramid… a pyramid but no Ha'tak. Fuck and fuck. Okay, there was still a chance that SG-1 was being held in the village.
The clanging came from a division of Jaffa practicing hand to hand combat, and Jack was still amazed that fighters who looked so good in training could be so ineffective in the field. Even more surprising, no villagers darted around, no children watched the Jaffa practice with admiring eyes, no women brought out drinks in rough-carved cups. Except for the grim warriors, the village stood empty. No smoke rose from chimneys and tools lay in the hot sun. Villagers were usually quick to abandon good tools. Jack's threat-assessment nerve was pretty darn threatened right about now.
"What now?" Xander asked, his voice little more than a whisper as he lay in the shadow of a fallen tree, the P90 trained on the village.
"We wait 'til dark," Jack answered. Waiting and watching, and maybe even a little praying. Not really much else to do right now. Jack turned so that his back was to the fallen tree so that he could watch for anyone coming up on their six.
"I'll try to get my magic working," Willow whispered.
"You do that," Jack said, not even trying to hide his skepticism as he slumped down to get comfortable. God, he wanted his team, his weapon, his hand to work, and most of all, he really, really wanted to be back in his own reality. The Jaffa's insistence that Ra still owned Earth and that Apophis and Sokar had been warring ever since Ra had forced Apophis out of his corner of the universe… not really news that made Jack any happier. Unfortunately, right now he could only wait for nightfall and hope that Carter could fix this one.