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hathor_girlSummary: Sam will soon be giving birth, and the Goa'uld Naunet is getting ready to complete her plan.
Back in Ria's palace, Martouf/Lantash and Jack are getting frustrated with the lack of progress, and it almost comes to blows.
Time passes...
"We can expect you to arrive in a week, then, my Lord?" Jolki asks, bowing his head and smiling ingratiatingly.
"Yes, according to my calculations the female Tok'ra should then be close to nine months along in her gestation. I have secured nanites for the fast growth of the child, and wish to start the process as soon as possible. The nanites were expensive, but if I wait until the child and its genetic memory matures naturally, much of the information it holds may be out of date." Naunet grins.
Jolki smiles and bows, pleased with his Lord's happiness. "Very well, my Lord. You are as always as cunning as you are beautiful." He frowns, remembering something. "That reminds me... the priestesses informed me that they believe the female is carrying not one, but two offspring."
"Excellent! This is even better! That means I can keep one of them to extract information from, and give one to Heru'ur. He will be most pleased, and I will gain much influence!" Naunet cackles with pleasure.
Jolki bows again, then signs off on the communication unit.
Sam POV
I get up from the bed with some difficulty. My stomach is huge now! One of the servant girls - who is actually kind, compared to the others, and talks to me regularly - has told me that the priestesses believe I am expecting twins. I think I believe them!
In a couple weeks I will be nine months along. I am well and truly ready for this child - or these children - to be born. He, she, or they move around a lot!
I just really really wish Martouf and Lantash were with me - or rather that I was with them, because I don't want them imprisoned too, of course!
Part of me is very worried, but another part is excited. I just desperately hope my friends free me before the Goa'uld come for me. The kind servant girl - which is named Jina - has told me someone will be picking me up in a week or so, and take me to someone. She did not know who, but she sounded frightened.
I fear it is Naunet, the Goa'uld, who will be coming to collect me now when the child or children will soon be born. Will she use her/his/their genetic memory against the Tok'ra? Almost certainly.
I sit down at the table and start to eat the food they have brought me. It is fairly good, at least compared to what I got when I had just been captured.
I sigh and look up at the trap door. A couple weeks ago, I made an attempt to flee. I managed to overpower one of the servants, and was almost up the stairs before I was caught! If I had not been heavily pregnant, then I am sure I would have made it away.
Martouf POV
We have finished scanning all the parts of the planet where the priestesses could reasonably have taken Samantha, unless they had a vessel of some kind. We have found nothing!
Ria thinks it is worth it to manually search the entire area of the woods up near the mountain range, because deposits there could interfere with the scanners. I suspect it is a long shot - the mountain range is far away, and it would have taken them a long time to get Samantha there.
But with no other places left to search, we are willing to try anything. By now Samantha will be close to giving birth, and we are not with her!
~We will find her. We must! Ria has picked up encrypted messages that she believes are communication between Naunet and her first Prime. She is working at decrypting them.~
~Then we must hurry even more! That would be proof that Naunet knows, and she will also know that the child is born soon. We must free Samantha before that.~
~More...we must kill Naunet and her first prime before she tells anyone else. Only then can our child be... fairly safe. We must still find a place to hide it, so it will grow up safe.~
~I know... and I really don't want to have to hide the child away. I want him or her to be with us!~
~Of course, so do I. We will find a place where we can visit very often. Perhaps on your homeworld? Until the child reaches the age when the memories awaken. Then he or she must be with the Tok'ra, of course.~
~I am not sure how safe my homeworld is. I have not visited since I was taken by the Goa'uld Bastet, to be a host.~ He hugged Lantash . ~I am so grateful the Tok'ra freed me and I became your host instead!~
~Likewise. I could not wish for a better host! You do have family back on Ra'vosh, where you come from. Two younger sisters and a brother.~
~Yes, unless they were taken as my older sister and her husband were.~ I sigh. ~But yes, we should visit and see if they are still there, and are amenable. It has been approximately twenty years, though, so I do not know how they will react to seeing me again, after thinking me lost.~
~We will worry about that then. Now we should go and assist Ria. Perhaps we will be able to determine where Jolki is based, from the signal's origin.~
We are on the way to Ria's laboratory when we meet Jack O'Neill. I nod at him. We will probably never be the best of friends, but we are no longer directly adversarial against each other. We work for the same goal - saving Samantha.
"Hi, Marty - any news?"
I shake my head, sadly. "No, not much. Ria has intercepted an encrypted message, which she believes is communication between Jolki and Lord Naunet. If that is so, and she can decrypt it, we may learn something useful. Lantash and I are going to help her - we hope to locate the origin of the signal on this world, and perhaps find Jolki."
"Yeah, it's getting to be about time, don't ya think? Carter must be close to giving birth by now, and from what I understand it could be really bad news if the Goa'uld get their hands on the kid."
I nod. "Yes, very." I get a very guilty expression. "It could endanger all of the Tok'ra."
"Then perhaps you shouldn't have been so careless when you screwed her!" Jack remarks.
"You do not need to remind me. I blame myself constantly for not being more careful." I smile a little. "I will have to admit, I do very much want a child with Samantha. I desperately hope all turns out well, and we get her and the child freed."
"Then you also get your Jolinar back." Jack says, an unfriendly undercurrent in his voice. What is the matter?
"Yes, and I look forward to that, though please understand that I love Samantha just as much as I love Jolinar."
"Then you should not have endangered her like this!" Jack suddenly explodes.
"Endangered her? What are you talking about? She is on this world because we crashed. That is hardly my fault!"
~Give me control!~ I cede control and Lantash jumps forward. "Samantha and Jolinar decided to free us, Jack! As grateful as we are that they came to rescue us when Heru'ur had us imprisoned, we had not asked them to come! In fact, we told them to escape while they could, several times! Besides, she saved you as well!"
"We were only there because your snaky girlfriend had wandered off with her! After forcing her Carter to care for you, no doubt!"
"What is wrong with you? Jolinar would never force Samantha to do anything! You are just jealous because she is not with you!" Lantash insists.
"That is a lie!" Jack grabs hold of Lantash's arms and push him up against the wall. "Carter is a good friend, nothing else!"
"Let go of me, human!" Lantash shouts, barely restraining himself from hitting Jack.
What is wrong with Jack? Why is he being so unreasonable? Lantash feels like beating him up, and those feelings influence me. Not that I wouldn't have been angry otherwise, I am sure I would. It is just that Lantash is a little more hot-blooded than I am.
"If you love her so much, then why didn't you watch her more carefully when you knew there was a damn conspiracy here! She told you she had overheard those priestesses! Anyone would have been able to deduce they could have discovered her and that you shouldn't just let her walk around unguarded!" Jack pushed Lantash harder.
Suddenly Lantash snaps and tears free from Jack, turning us around so Jack is against the wall. It happens so fast that Jack doesn't seem to notice what has happened before Lantash's left hand is around his throat, and he is being lifted into the air. "How dare you push me, human! I could beat you to a pulp or snap you in half without even expending any effort! How dare you imply that I should have guarded Samantha better! Samantha is not a delicate thing that needs to be guarded! You know that as well as I do!"
In all of this, we had not noticed that Daniel, Teal'c, and Jacob had come into the room, but they had.
"Whoa! Calm down!" Daniel yells.
"Let go of me, snake!" Jack wheezes, having a hard time talking with Lantash squeezing his throat. He tries to hit us with his fists.
Lantash flashes our eyes and without letting go with his left hand, he grabs one of Jack's fists with his right hand and squeezes it hard, pushing it against Jack's nose. "I will beat you to death with your own hand, human!"
Jacob suddenly is beside us and is trying to push us apart. "Okay, that's enough! You're both acting like children!"
Lantash and Jack ignores him for a while, continuing to trade insults and grapple. Lantash hits Jack hard over the face, splitting his lip.
Suddenly, Selmak comes fore and yells. "Samantha needs you to cooperate, fools!"
That gets both Lantash's and mine, and Jack's attention, and Lantash slowly let go of Jack. He glares at him, but take a step back. "You are correct."
Jack breathes deeply and glares at us, then nods. "Yes, you are." He shakes his head. "I don't know what came over me."
Lantash is relaxing as well. "I...agree. We need to work on saving Samantha. There was nothing any of us could have done to avoid her capture - we could not lock up everyone. All we could have done, I suppose, was assuring no one ever walked alone, but it is easy to wise afterwards."
Jack takes a deep breath. "Yes. It is."
"You are all frustrated and angry because we have not yet been able to locate Captain Carter." Teal'c observes.
"Yeah, and the frustration is taking a toll on all of us. That's why you reacted this way." Daniel says. "We all feel a need for someone to blame."
Lantash and Jack both nod.
"Yeah, sorry, Lantash. I didn't mean the things I said. You're... a good man, and I know you love Carter."
"Thank you. Jack. I know you are a good friend for her, and that you would do anything to see her not get hurt. We should work together, as the others suggest."
Together, we all go to Ria's laboratory. Perhaps this small altercation actually helped us all. We have all been walking around worrying, and not talking about the things on our minds.
We must just hope this actually helps us to free Samantha!