Daniel made a detour to his office and collected a spare data pad. They had gained quite a collection over the years and this one had long ago had the contents translated and entered into the base records. If he copied the snitch Intel to this one for Teal’c, who could read Goa’uld as quick, if not quicker than he, then the translation would take half the time. When he entered the briefing room it was to find Janet and Teal’c had already returned.

The Jaffa had resumed his usual seat, however Janet was hovering around the table.

"Sam’s photocopying the notes." She began pacing around the room.

"Okay." Daniel slid into his chair, pressing the combination of the stolen data pad to copy the interviews. He couldn’t blame Janet for being antsy, but couldn’t think of a way to ease her mind. Having conducted the autopsy on Lieutenant Astor, Janet knew better than anyone how this could end. He figured that for the moment they should act as normal as possible.

"Anyone want a coffee?" Janet was jittery as all hell, definitely didn’t need a stimulant boost to her wired body, yet it would give her something to do to distract her away from the fact that she was the zatarc.

"Sure," Daniel replied. The download complete, he passed over the second device to Teal’c.

"Teal’c? Oh, you don’t drink coffee. Tea?" The doctor busied herself with setting up a new pot.

"Tea would be most welcome." He was already reading the first page of the transcripts.

Janet had just poured the cups and was looking for something, anything, else to do, when Sam arrived with not only the copied notes, but with the rest of the Tok’ra’s research. "Sam! Coffee? Tea? Water?"

"Coffee would be great." The major saw the manic expression in her friend’s eye and like Daniel decided that acting calmly was the wisest course of action, letting Janet ‘potter’ to work off her nervous energy however she could.

By the time Jack and Annika appeared in fresh BDUs, their hair still damp from the shower, Janet was doing a great job of wearing a track around the table.

"Um…Janet, from what I’ve read so far Ba’al really didn’t get a lot information." Daniel pushed his glasses up his nose. "At least not the type of information he was hoping for."

"I concur," Teal’c nodded.

It brought the doctor up short. "Really?"

Daniel beckoned her over and the doctor sat beside him, a mixture of hope and trepidation warring on her features. "This was the first day when Jack was cloned by Loki." He pointed to a set of glyphs. "Ba’al asked what is SG-1’s current mission. You’ve replied, ‘to find Colonel O’Neill a play station and to stop him from drinking coffee’."

Sam tried her best to stop her snort of laughter and received a glare from Jack for her efforts.

"I didn’t, did I?" Janet was scanning the symbols in disbelief.

"Yep, you answered every question literally without explanation. It took another ten questions before you even mentioned he was a clone." He tapped the screen. "By the inflection’s in Ba’al’s wording the further down in the interview I go, the more frustrated he was becoming."

"But I still told him," she sighed.

"But don’t you see? You were fighting him, Janet. He had to drag every little scrap out of you."

"That was the nanite," Janet shook her head. "It’s a machine, it doesn’t know how to think, that’s why the…my…answers were literal."

"I don’t think so," Sam contradicted, gesturing to Anise’s notes. "It’s bio-neural so it works in conjunction with your brain chemistry. It was programmed to respond to Ba’al, but it was your thoughts that came through."

Janet was unconvinced and she changed the subject. She didn’t want to know what missions she had compromised, a least not yet. She knew Daniel and Sam meant well, however nothing would change the fact, that no matter how long it took for Ba’al to get straight answers from her, he did get them. "What does Anise say about neutralizing the nanite?"

Sam winced. "I’m still trying to decipher her handwriting."

Daniel and Teal’c abandoned the data pads and picked up their copies of the Tok’ra’s theory. The transcripts could wait until later.

Daniel squinted at the tiny writing, recognizing it as a rare deviation of Goa’uld, with a few odd colloquialisms, which he assumed were part of Freya’s native tongue. If he’d known that Sam was having trouble reading the scientific report he would have helped translate this sooner.

The doctor sat silently in her chair as the two scientists and Teal’c quietly threw back and forth possible interpretations of the words giving them trouble. Jack and Annika, though not as proficient in the alien text as the others, were also trying their best to help. Janet stared at her own copy not really seeing the scribbles. It had been a token gesture on the team’s behalf; their attempt to make her feel like she was part of the investigation rather than the cause. She wasn’t fooled. Despite General Hammond’s careful wording earlier, Sam and Teal’c had been her guards to her lab. Until the nanite was destroyed, she wouldn’t be left alone. She understood. They couldn’t take the risk that the nanite would activate making her do something to sabotage their efforts. Understanding didn’t stop the hurt at having to be watched over by her friends. They couldn’t trust her, not for anything. Her gaze fell to Daniel who was leaning with his elbows on the table, sharing his photocopy with his wife. She noticed the gash on his arm. "You should have that seen to."

"Huh? Oh, I forgot it was there." He patted his side pocket searching for something, came up empty. "Anyone still got their med kit?" he asked of his teammates.

"Nope." Jack shook his head, not looking up.

"Mine was within my tactical vest." Teal’c turned the page.

Sam absently dug the small pouch from her BDUs and slid it across. "Here."

Daniel captured it and continued the slide to the woman beside him "Here, go for it." He sat back resuming his reading, moving his forearm to the armrest to give her access.

Annika was the first to notice that the doctor hadn’t moved to open the kit. She tilted her head forward so she could see passed her husband to the doctor. "Something wrong?"

Janet suddenly had five pairs of concerned eyes focused on her. "You should get a medic to do that."

Daniel’s blue eyes blinked at her over his glasses. "Why?"

The honest bewilderment in that one word caused a lump in her throat. "Because," was all she managed to lamely get out.

The team exchanged glances. Read from each other what the problem was in a second and decided on a course of action to fix it in the only way they knew how.

"Because," Jack teed off, "Balls sucked out that hippopotamus oath when he zanax-ed you?"

"Because you’ve suddenly developed a thing about treating friends?" Sam suggested.

"I know what it is!" Daniel clicked his fingers as though he’d had an epiphany. "It’s because you don’t want to share your stash of superb coffee as per our agreement whenever I’m your patient."

"Because I’m the zatarc." She could barely speak.

"Which means piddly-squat." Annika waved the ‘excuse’ away.

"Agreed. That situation shall be rectified soon enough," Teal’c said. "Anise’s treatment from what we can discern has potential."

Janet gazed at the earnest faces around the table, reading worry and concern beneath the teasing masks, but none of the wariness she was sure they had been hiding at being around her. "Me being the zatarc really doesn’t faze you, does it?"

They knew she was talking in terms of how they viewed her.

"Not in the least." Jack spoke for all of them. "Doc, we’ve all been through some freaky crap over the years. Your perception of us didn’t change then, why should ours change towards you now?"

It was the rarely used serious tone of the colonel that finally convinced Janet. She felt a tiny lessening of the knot in her stomach. Didn’t feel quite as alone as she had a minute ago. Before she could respond, the general entered the room with Anise who was carrying what looked like a naquadah generator.

"All personnel have been recalled. They should be here within the hour," Hammond informed them.

The Tok’ra placed the large cube on the table. "This should create a large enough electromagnetic pulse to render the nanite useless." She spoke without preamble. "I trust this fulfills my part of our agreement. I would like all the information you have on the zatarc now."

"Whoa, back up there, sunshine." Jack flapped the handwritten notes under the woman’s nose. "We haven’t decoded your chicken scratch yet."

"The procedure is simple."

"Um…yeah, flick a switch and the EMP goes off, we’ve got that." Daniel finished the last page of the notes. "It’s the column you’ve labeled ‘possible outcomes’ that has us concerned." He took a deep breath and began reciting the list. "Possible loss of any and all brain activity. Cardiac failure. Temporary or permanent loss of memory. Temporary or permanent loss of motor functions. Paralysis-"

"They are all potential side effects of the treatment."

Teal’c fixed his dark eyes on the Tok’ra. "I would not call kek a side effect."

"Kek?" Annika whispered to Daniel, not recognizing the word.

"Death," he supplied absently, most of his attention still on the notes and the Tok’ra.

"I did also list the positive outcomes," the scientist pointed out.

"So you did," Daniel confirmed dryly. "All one of them." The second last bullet point was, ‘Nanite short circuits, dissolves into blood stream without incident’.

"There is another," Anise contradicted.

"Hmmm…yes, well, ‘symbiote possibly may reverse side effects if it survives’ doesn’t really help us in this instance."

The Tok’ra was completely serious when she counteracted with, "The zatarc could submit to a blending before the procedure."

"Oh, you’d just love that, wouldn’t you?" Jack rolled his eyes.

"Changing the victim into a Tok’ra so you could have free rein to run those extra tests."

The woman stiffened, though if it was because she was offended by Sam’s suggestion of the sneaky ploy or because the major had hit the bull's eye, was anybody’s guess. "I assure you I am only concerned with the zatarc’s health. There is a higher probability of survival if they were blended."

"A blending is out of the question," Janet declared firmly.

"You pride yourselves on respecting the individual’s choice," Anise persisted. "Present the zatarc with the risk assessment and let them choose for themselves."

"You did." Janet raised her chin defiantly at the Tok’ra. "And I have."

It took a moment for the significance of her words to sink in. "You are the zatarc?"

The doctor gave a single nod.

"That is most interesting. I would have thought there would be a fail safe program to prevent you from conducting any detection tests."

"We’ve put it down to good old fashioned snake arrogance." Jack deliberately refrained from saying ‘Goa’uld’, making it clear that he considered the Tok’ra were cut of the same cloth. "Never would have crossed its mind that we’d figure it out."

"Do we have to use the EMP?" Annika asked. "Can’t we just remove the nanite?"

"Being able to locate a single nanite is highly improbable."

"Why is that?" Hammond was not at all happy by the long list of possible repercussions of the EMP.

Because the question came from the Tau’ri leader, Anise held back the condescending tone she was tempted to use. "The electromagnetic field surrounding a single nanite is indistinguishable from the natural electrical impulses in the brain."

"Is there any way to reduce the risks?" Hammond directed the question more at his people than at Anise. The Tok’ra had already made it clear that this was a science experiment. To everyone else in the room it was much more personal. If there were a safer way to neutralize the nanite they would find it.

"Need the electromagnetic pulse be at such a high calibration?" Teal’c reread the specifics of the estimated power outage of the generator. Translating the figures into the Tau’ri numerical system, it was well over quadruple the strength of the EMP the major had used when she had tried to disable the being Urgo. "Would not a lesser strength decrease the negative effect?"

"Decreasing the strength increases the chance that some part of the nanite remains functional." Sam was frowning in thought. "It only took a few days for Urgo to regenerate. And as much as I hate to admit it, this nanite technology is more advanced." She sorted through the pile of research papers and produced the scans of Martouf’s body from the week after he’d been implanted. "The Tok’ra scanning equipment is much more sophisticated than ours and even they weren’t able to detect it."

"So, that would be a ‘no’ on a smaller zap," Jack clarified.

"That’s correct, sir." Janet’s voice was soft.

"In that case, let’s focus on ways to reverse the possible consequences," Hammond moved on.

"The main one we should concentrate on is cardiac failure." Janet tried to stay objective, not an easy task considering it was her own cardiac failure they were discussing. "Motor functions can be relearned, and paralysis and memory loss is…livable." She drew in a deep breath. "As for brain activity…We have no way of restoring the neural pathways if they have been destroyed. However, if the EMP doesn’t disrupt my…if the neural pathways are intact then it becomes a moot point if there is no heartbeat to pump oxygen to the brain. The brain can only survive a few minutes without oxygen."

"How many minutes, Doc?"

"General rule of thumb is between five and ten minutes. Any longer than that, if the patient is resuscitated," Janet paused needing to clear her throat. "Let’s just say that it’s rare that they don’t suffer from brain damage. If CPR is performed, the chance of brain damage is reduced, but not by much."

"So what do you suggest, Doctor?"

"Administering epinephrine as soon as possible. If that doesn’t work, using the defibrillator. That has the highest success rate." Janet looked at the serious faces sitting before her. "The epi shot should be injected straight into the heart. It requires quite a lot of strength to pierce the breast bone…"

"I can do that, Doc." Jack volunteered. "I’ve done that before."

No one asked where the colonel had gained that experience, they took him at his word.

"The defibrillator is easy enough to use-"

"I’ll do it." Daniel spoke up. "You’ve saved me often enough. It’s about time I returned the favor."

"Should we not consider the Goa’uld healing device?" Teal’c put forward.

"Absolutely!"

The exclamation was out of Annika’s mouth before anyone else could respond. Warning bells had started ringing in her head from the moment the Tok’ra had returned with the generator. She had kept quiet, trying to determine what was freaking out her sixth sense. At first, she thought it was the Tok’ra herself. Her cold and calculating demeanor rubbed the emotive psychic the wrong way at the best of times, and today hadn’t exactly been a calming experience. She’d attempted to tamper down her personal dislike, just to have the bells grow louder. At Teal’c’s idea, they immediately dropped a decibel.

"Major Carter, do you feel confident to use the healing device?" Hammond asked. He’d much prefer Sam use it, however given the emphatic declaration of their resident seer, he’d give the responsibility to Anise if he had to.

"Yes, sir." The blonde nodded. She’d become quite adept with the device, though she hated using it. Accessing the memories of Jolinar to control the tool, sent her mind into a state of unbalance afterwards, with Sam not knowing if she was feeling her own or the Tok’ra’s emotions.

"Is there anything else you sense we need?" Hammond prompted Annika.

She hesitated before answering. The bells were still ting-a-ling-ing away, so there was something, however her mind refused to reveal what. "Not at the moment, sir."

He nodded. "Okay. So where shall we do this?"

"The isolation rooms on twenty-one and nineteen are shielded," Sam suggested. "It won’t block the EMP completely, but what filters out to the rest of the base will be no different than static electricity, if they feel anything at all." She considered the strength of the pulse. "To be on the safe side we should evacuate that floor and the floors directly above and below."

The general considered which of the surrounding levels would be easier to clear of personnel. Above the science level were offices, which as Hammond had come to accept, the SG team leaders tended to avoid like the plague. Colonel O’Neill may be the worst, (or best depending on whose point of view,) at forgetting the level where his mission reports and memos piled up on his desk, existed, however the other officers in command spent as little as humanly possible in the tiny rooms assigned to them. In all likelihood there would be very few people on that level. Beneath the infirmary was the mess hall. It was probably the busiest room in the SGC regardless of what shift was on, and given that within the hour the entire staff would be on base, it would be the natural congregation hub. "Let’s make it nineteen."

"Doh!" Jack pretended to be put out. "And there I was hoping to catch up on some paperwork."

"Oh," Sam bit back her smile, keeping on track. "And we’ll have to turn off every computer terminal and anything that requires electricity. Even a low grade EMP will fry the circuits."

"I’ll have the iris switched to manual override," the general said. "As soon as it’s confirmed that all personnel have arrived, the base will be in lockdown for the duration of the procedure."

A hesitant knock on the door broke off further conversation. They looked up to see the general’s assistant poke his head in.

"General, sorry to interrupt…"

Before he could finish the door was flung all the way open and Cassie flew across the room.

"Mom!"

"…Cassandra is here for Doctor Fraiser," the Lieutenant completed unnecessarily with an apologetic grimace.

"Thank you, Lieutenant. Please arrange quarters for Miss Fraiser for the next few days." Hammond dismissed him. He tried to be discreet, giving mother and daughter what privacy he could in a room full of people. He saw all of SG-1 were doing the same, averting their eyes to whatever reports they had in front of them. Anise however was blatantly staring, no doubt analyzing the zatarc’s interaction. "Annika, please escort Anise to the isolation room to set up the generator. Colonel, Doctor Jackson, begin evac on eighteen and twenty."

The three rose and hustled the Tok’ra from the room before she could protest.

"I’ll organize the shut down," he spoke to the major.

"How much do we reveal?" Sam motioned with her head to her goddaughter.

"She already knows the worst of it. Has probably guessed the rest. Leave it to Doctor Fraiser to determine how much she’s comfortable with."

Sam gave a nod and the general left.

"Mom, what’s going on? Annika said a Goa’uld-"

"Honey, why don’t we sit down?" Janet guided her to the chair vacated by Daniel. She took a deep breath. "Ba’al has been using me to gain SGC information for at least the last eight months.

"But you wouldn’t do that!" Cassie shook her head vehemently, not a trace of doubt in her voice.

"He implanted a device in me that makes me do as he wills, with no recollection of ever doing it." The horror on her daughter’s face echoed what Janet herself was feeling.

"We believe he’s been beaming into your home at night while you were sleeping," Sam added softly.

Cassie looked from her mom to Sam to Teal’c, pleading silently for them to say that this was just a horrible practical joke. Knew from their solemn expressions that it wasn’t, had in fact known that something was seriously wrong the moment Annika had astral traveled to her.

"I’m so sorry," Janet said, hating that she had put that look of fear on her daughter’s face. "I put you in danger-"

"Mom, you’ve got nothing to apologize for," Cassie burst out, grasping the woman’s trembling hand and squeezing tightly. "If I had told you about my dreams sooner-"

This time it was Janet who interrupted. "Honey, there was nothing you could have done."

Sam also rushed into to assure the girl. "We wouldn’t have made the connection. We only found out a few days ago that someone was being used as an informant." She figured the white lie didn’t count. Until yesterday they had thought there was a willing traitor not an unknowing pawn.

Recognition dawned within Cassandra. "The emergency at Daniel and Annika’s wedding."

Janet nodded. "We only found out today that it was me."

"You’re going to get that thing out of you, right?"

"We are currently devising a procedure," Teal’c assured.

"But it’s risky, Cass."

"How risky?" Cassie asked shrilly.

Janet reached out with her free hand to gently caress her daughter’s cheek. "Very."

Cassandra’s hand shot up to cover the hand of the woman who had loved and cared for her for years. "Can I be there?"

"I don’t think that would be a good idea." Janet ached for the anguish reflected in her daughter’s eyes.

"Cassie, we’re going to do everything we can to make sure things go smoothly." Sam tried to sound confident.

"You guys and Jack and Daniel and Annika will be doing whatever it is to help Mom?" The Hankan girl looked to the major and Teal’c for confirmation. "It won’t be her?" Her head jerked in the direction of the door.

"You mean Anise?" Sam raised an eyebrow.

She nodded.

"Anise has provided the technology that will hopefully render the nanite inside your mom useless, but the rest of us will be controlling the procedure."

Cassie relaxed a smidgen. "That’s good. SG-1 always gets the job done."

The three adults in the room prayed that Cassandra’s blind trust in them wouldn’t be shattered by the end of the day. They were all too aware that there had been some monumental failures between the successful missions.

The speaker system crackled to life and Walter announced that the base was in lockdown mode until further notice.

"That’s our cue." Janet reluctantly got to her feet and the others followed. "We need to get the equipment from the infirmary."

As the four of them walked down the hall, the general’s voice replaced the sergeant’s and he recited the carefully worded explanation of the recall and lockdown, hastily penned by Daniel. They hoped that the anxiousness, that they were doing their best to hide, wouldn’t be noticed by the personnel suddenly buoyed by the CO’s announcement.

Annika tried to ease her growing anxiety at the upcoming procedure by pacing the length of the room. The bells were still ringing in her ears and grew louder each time she passed the cube generator. She wasn’t a scientist and was the first to admit she knew nothing of EMPs, and everyone agreed that using this device was the only surefire way to neutralize the nanite. So why was her sixth sense sending her deaf with the infernal jangling? "Are you sure there is no other way to disable the nanite?"

"Theoretically this procedure has the greatest probability of success." The Tok’ra was sedately standing to one side of the room, waiting for the others to join them.

"Theoretically? Jeez, does everything have to be so damned scientific with you?" Annika grumbled. "Haven’t you ever gone with what your gut tells you?"

"Gastric activity is not a reliable factor to take into consideration." When she saw the redhead’s exasperated eye roll, Freya took control of her body. "You do not like us, do you?"

In the spirit of maintaining goodwill with the ally, Annika was tempted to lie. Screw it. Daniel was the diplomat, not her. "Not particularly."

"May I ask why?"

She stalled her answer. "There’s no rule that says I have to like every Tok’ra, is there?"

"Is it because you feel threatened by Anise’s feelings for Doctor Jackson?" Freya asked her head tilted in curiosity.

Annika couldn’t stop the snort of laughter. "Even if I was doubtful of Daniel’s love for me, I would not consider you a threat to his affections."

Freya felt Anise was insulted and struggled to retain control. "And why is that?"

"Because Daniel could never love Anise."

The matter-of-fact response, the firm confidence, intrigued her. "Because Anise is Tok’ra?" The Tau’ri, especially the male members of SG-1, had made quite clear their aversion to the host/symbiote existence.

"Yes," Annika answered simply, then realized just how offensive it sounded. "But not for why you think. He respects the Tok’ra and what you are trying to achieve. But he could never love Anise because that would mean having to accept you, Freya, as a third person in the relationship. Daniel is a one woman man, morally he wouldn’t let himself become involved."

"So where does your dislike stem from?"

If it had been any other time, Annika would have tried to recant her animosity, putting it down to the stress of the day. As it stood she really didn’t give a rat’s ass if the woman was offended by her honesty. She had bigger worries than trying to appease the Tok’ra, namely trying to work out the warning her sixth sense was trying to tell her. "You are so obsessed with proving your theories correct that you don’t give consideration to the people your experiments effect."

"Everything I do is in the interest of defeating the Goa’uld."

"And that’s an honorable life mission. However your methods are unscrupulous, especially where SG-1 are concerned."

"I have always been honest in my dealings with all the Tau’ri."

"In the actual experiments you have asked them to participate in, yes, you eventually gave all the details," she conceded. "But you manipulated them. Playing on their good natures, their instinctive desire to help. Those armbands you brought, you could have used any one of the humans who are dedicated to your cause, but instead you risked the lives of SG-1."

"We approached the Tau’ri because of our alliance, honestly believing that the armbands would be of use to them," she defended her past actions.

"No, you didn’t want to risk a potential host body. You considered them dispensable because there was no way any of them would consider becoming a host."

The Tok’ra’s back stiffened. "I do not know where you obtained such a ludicrous notion."

"From your own damned head, sweet-pea," the psychic said. "I read the mission report and bam suddenly I got a flash of your dual thoughts. Now I can understand the reasoning, you have a host shortage, yadda yadda, but I am going to do everything I can to make sure that you won’t use them in such a way again."

"Everything alright in here?"

The glaring women spun around to see Daniel in the doorway.

"Yep." Annika forced herself to relax and walked over to him. "We were just discussing mission statements."

He raised an eyebrow, sensing the determination and annoyance from his wife through their bond, seeing the defiance on the Tok’ra’s face. "Oh, okay." Clearly he was missing something, but now wasn’t the time to go into it. "The others should be down soon." He tucked an automatic arm around Annika’s waist.

"Good." She rested her head on his shoulder. "The sooner we get this over with the happier I’ll be."

A  A  A  A  A  A

SG-2 had decided the mess hall was getting far too crowded for their liking and retreated to the infirmary where Dodger had the place to himself. With the reason for the recall revealed, the men were enjoying the first truly relaxing moments they’d had since Daniel and Annika’s wedding. They had full confidence that this EMP theory would pan out and the whole affair with the spy would be over. Then things could get back to business as usual. And what better way to while away the time until the lockdown was over, than with a clandestine game of poker?

"Read ’em and weep! Full house!" Ferretti slapped down his hand of cards onto the tray-table positioned over Dodger’s bed.

Brooklyn and Dodger let out a groan, throwing down their cards onto the plastic chips in the middle, a clear indication that their cards didn't trump the major’s.

Nyan however was looking thoughtful. "Does that beat two pairs?"

"Yep." Ferretti was scooping the chips towards him.

"Hang on a sec," Brooklyn had caught sight of the Bedrosian’s hand. "Nyan, give us a look."

He turned the cards over.

Ferretti blinked at what was revealed then pushed the winnings back across the table towards his teammate. "Nyan, two jacks and two jacks are four of a kind, not two pair."

"Oh, so I win?" His face lit up.

"Yes, you win." Ferretti rolled his eyes. "Ya’ know you have the best poker face because you have no idea what cards you’re holding. There should be a law!"

Dodger caught the sly look on the archaeologist’s face and stifled a grin. Neither man mentioned that Dodger had been teaching the Bedrosian the art of poker over the last couple of months. "Don’t worry, Nyan, we’ll make a poker player out of you yet," he falsely commiserated.

Ferretti was shuffling the cards for another round when the infirmary doors swung open. "Well, if it isn’t our favorite off-worlder!" he exclaimed, catching sight of Cassie, Janet and Sam. Teal’c was the last to enter. "No offence, Teal’c."

"None taken, Major Ferretti."

"Hi, guys." Cassie did her best to put on a cheerful face.

"What brings you down into our little hole in the ground?" Dodger flashed a smile at the young woman.

"Cassie’s just here for a routine check up," Sam explained, unhooking the portable defibrillator like it was the most natural thing in the world.

SG-2 eyed the major’s actions and Teal’c’s, who was already wheeling out the EEG machine out into the corridor.

"Damn, Doc, what kinda tests you running?" Brooklyn’s brow crinkled in concern, his expression reflecting his teammates’.

"Oh, they’re not for me," Cassie replied, gesturing to the machines.

"We’re MacGyver-ing the zatarc neutralizer," Sam hastily added. With General Hammond having made the announcement they didn’t have to hide this part of the plan.

"In all the commotion I forgot about Cassie’s annual." Janet hoped that she didn’t sound as anxious as she thought she did. She tried to be casual as she picked up a handful of epinephrine vials and tucked a few of the large syringes into her lab coat pocket. "Cassie’s at loose ends for a couple of hours."

"Oh, well, pull up a patch of mattress," Ferretti patted the bed beside him, the perplexed look still on his face. "We need some fresh meat…er…a new fifth. Siler chickened out after the second hand."

"Oh…um…"

"Go ahead, honey," Janet squeezed her daughter’s hand reassuringly. "We’ll let you know when we’re finished."

The girl returned the squeeze, conveying her love and worry through the simple contact. "Okay."

Sam opened the cabinet housing the Goa’uld healing device and quickly shoved it into her pocket. "Don’t you guys go corrupting my goddaughter," she warned with a grin, pushing the trolley holding the ECG equipment and heading out into the corridor. Janet was close on her heels, under the guise of helping to guide the machine.

"Who us?" Ferretti quipped. "Never!"

The men exchanged concerned glances over Cassie’s head at the bizarre acts of their colleagues. The leader gave a barely discernable shrug then turned to the teenager trying her damnedest to look like nothing was wrong. "So, Cass, you ever played seven card stud, with deuces the wild card?"