By Biltong.

JJ awoke to heat, darkness and pain and didn’t know why.

"What the - ?" He quickly stifled his voice, not wanting to speak aloud until he could figure out precisely why he was lying on his back staring up into darkness.

What the hell had just happened?

Drawing desperately on the echoes of his military training, he lay completely still, using just his senses to try to ascertain where he was.

There was meager light, and slowly his eyes adjusted until he finally realized that he was in a shed of some kind, a small stuffy wooden shed.

Huh?

Licking dry lips, his eyes mindlessly followed a beam of sunlight that impacted against the far wall whilst his brain struggled to comprehend what had happened.

He had been –

He hadn’t a clue.

Trying not to feel sorry for himself, JJ shakily levered himself upright only to sink back with a moan as the world danced around him in sickening pain filled waves.

This was not good.

"No shit Sherlock," he whispered, suddenly desperate to hear a voice, any voice, even if it was his own.

Taking a deep breath, and having nothing better to do, JJ slowly took an inventory of the injuries that had made themselves known as soon as he tried to sit upright.

Okay. Head, wrist and leg, with the head the most worrisome. That definitely was not good.

Raising a hand to his temple he cautiously investigated, only to gasp audibly when his fingers felt a sponginess that could mean only one thing – he had a fractured skull.

"Dammit," he whispered, fighting to stay conscious. "What in the hell just happened?"

He still drew a blank.

Trying and failing to focus, JJ felt his wrist, breath hissing through his teeth when he felt the unusual movement of shattered bones.

Oh Damn.

"Okay, busted skull," he whispered, keeping the pain at bay, "and a busted wrist. What’s the guess I have a busted leg as well?"

Grimacing at the lack of any answer, JJ slowly curled in on himself, blindly feeling for the other hurt, his lips tight against his teeth as grazed skin stretched and protested, sending waves of a different kind of pain along his small frame.

He would do this, he told himself. And as for the pain? He had worse, right?

He ignored the small voice that told him that he hadn’t, that he was the copy, one that perhaps wasn’t as strong as the original. Copy or not, he was still an O’Neill, and O’Neill’s never gave up.

"Yep", he said aloud, he trembling fingers finally encountering bone. "Definitely broken as well." He glared at where he considered the door to be, waiting for someone to enter having heard his voice, but no one arrived.

"Okay then," he muttered. "If no one comes to me, then I will have to get to you." Gritting his teeth, he resolutely began to crawl towards the door.

The sun was definitely lower in the sky the next time JJ jerked awake, its rays now a copper color as opposed to the brilliant gold of earlier.

"This is not good," JJ said, ignoring the catch in his voice, "you have to do better than that." The problem was, with three vital parts of his body broken, he was in deep trouble.

OOO

"General O’Neill?"

Jack threw down his pen, annoyed at the disturbance. The senate appropriations committee was looking to have a complete rundown on the SGC’s last disastrous mission and he really needed the time to complete it. Interruptions he didn’t need.

"Come," he sighed, wondering what the problem was this time. Since taking command of the SGC, he had no idea just how much work Hammond had done. No wonder no one had ever seen the man, and when they had, he had invariably had a file of some kind in his hand.

"General?" A young Airman was leading an imposing woman into the room, a woman Jack immediately pegged as lesbian despite her wispy blonde hair and large blue eyes. Either that or she was a cop.

"General O’Neill? I’m Detective Sergeant Miller."

Cop.

"Should I worry?" he asked facetiously.

Her expression didn’t change. "Only if you have a son called JJ O’Neill."

Mini Jack. What did one call a junior version of oneself? Brother perhaps? But then there was the thirty year old age gap, and besides, he was actually liking beating up those mothers and occasional fathers that attended those stupid PTA meetings…

"What’s he done now?" he asked, neither denying nor confirming his question.

She was having none of it.

"Is he your son?" she reiterated.

"Yes," he said harshly, getting the answer out fast, feeling like it was a lie despite being the truth – kinda.

Flesh of your flesh is your son, right? Besides, the fly boys he had lectured were mostly dead or on the alpha site, such was the danger of their profession, and the people who had seen him on base had just assumed he was an obnoxious kid.

His obnoxious kid.

"Do you know of his whereabouts?"

He hadn’t done until recently, but now he knew JJ quite well, and approved what he was doing to Jack O’Neill the second. It was a work in progress, JJ had told him before removing and eating what seemed like the entire contents of his refrigerator.

Jack had taken to keeping everything healthy he could think of in there, convinced that JJ just wasn’t getting enough food, but Carter had assured him it was normal for a teenager.

Charlie would have done that too, had he been alive, he thought, pleased that the thought didn’t hurt so badly anymore.

JJ would never be Charlie, but he was a close second now, and somehow having a person around that knew all your likes and dislikes wasn’t as hard as he thought it would be.

Of course, being Jack O’Neill, even in miniature, still had its down side, and occasionally attracted the cops.

Jack glared at Miller, she matching his stare. "Lessee," he mused. "High school first, and then straight to the Air Force Academy for further studies. He is an extremely bright kid."

He couldn’t help the hint of pride that leaked into his voice. JJ may have been literally a chip off the old block, but with the library of the ancients in his brain and accessible-

Oh God.

"What’s happened?" he snapped. If someone had snatched JJ he was never going to forgive himself. Yes, he was him, but in a 17 year old body.

Miller shook her head.

"We don’t know yet," she said cautiously. "We found his motorbike on the outskirts of Colorado Springs. It was badly damaged and there was blood evident. The ownership papers indicate you as the rightful owner of the bike, but all other evidence indicates that a Jack Junior O’Neill was the actual rider, also known as JJ. Figuring out that he and you must be related, I came here hoping that young JJ has made his way here."

"No." Jack lifted the phone anyway, just to make sure, soon confirming what he already suspected. No, no young man had been seen at the gate, but they would let the General know the instant anyone did.

Miller had found herself a chair whilst he had been on the phone and was now looking at him gravely.

"Any family problems we should know about?" she asked. "Any reasons why JJ would pull a stunt like this?"

"I don’t think it’s a stunt," Jack said hollowly, the full awfulness of the situation rearing its ugly head for the first time. If the NID had him JJ could be in some serious trouble. On the other hand, no one but the President really knew all the facts, and he had assured Jack that JJ’s file had been sealed for 50 years, which meant that as far as the rest of the world was concerned, JJ was his son, which meant –

Crap.

"I think that my son has been kidnapped," he said, straightening in his chair. "So do you."

Miller nodded, her mouth a thin line. "The FBI has been notified," she said, "and will get moving on this as soon as I confirm the fact that he isn’t here."

"So confirm already," Jack snapped. He knew as well as she did that every second counted now. He reached for the base internal phone as she reached for her cell phone. Most of SG1 were off world, but not Daniel, and right now he needed a friend.

Miller was still on her phone when Daniel clomped in, the dirty plaster on his foot telling the world that it was soon to be removed.

"Jack?" His quick eyes took in the blonde woman before finding his. "What’s happened to JJ?"

"We believe he’s been kidnapped," Miller said, snapping her phone shut in a decisive manner. "We can now confirm that he neither made it to school nor to the Academy."

"We, meaning the police?" Daniel asked cautiously, sinking into the last available chair. From the look on Jack’s face, Daniel knew that he had better take over the conversation, and quickly.

Despite their vehement denials, Jack and JJ had rapidly become a family unit, and his disappearance was obviously hitting Jack hard.

Miller nodded, grateful to be talking to someone else at last. She had dealt with quite a few kidnappings in her life, but this was the first time that the parent looked as if he was just about to leap over the desk and take her by her throat.

It was scary.

"Yes sir," she said crisply, not knowing who this serious man in olive military clothing was, but figuring that if he referred to O’Neill by his first name he had to be someone important. "Us and the FBI. It’s in the early stages so far, but we have everyone moving on this."

"I know you do," Daniel said, watching Jack carefully. His pale features now had blotches of red coloring his cheeks, denoting extreme cold or absolute fury.

"Have you tried his cell phone?" Daniel asked, trying desperately to defuse the situation before Jack said something he would later regret.

"What?" Jack looked at him as if he were mad. "If he’s been abducted I hardly think-"

""Have you even tried?" Daniel asked gently. "Besides," he said optimistically, "that thing is so small that perhaps they missed it."

"What are you talking about?" Miller asked, mystified.

"JJ has a cell phone," Daniel said, rounding on her.

"So?" She asked. "If he’s been kidnapped I scarcely think that his captors would have let him keep it."

"It’s the size of a credit card and JJ keeps it on a cord around his neck," Jack said, reaching for the phone again. "It also cost an arm and a leg," he said reflectively, "but if it allows me to reach him, then it’s worth every cent."

OOO

The cell phone vibrating against his chest woke JJ.

It was a tiny thing that Jack had found and given to him, much to his delight, not that he would ever tell Jack that. Of course, being an older version of himself, Jack already knew how delighted he would be, and that’s why he bought it in the first place.

Sheesh, sometimes life was complicated.

Jack had always had a problem. His was a young soul trapped in an old body, and when cell phones had first been invented he had been enraptured by them. The problem was, he was a senior Air Force officer by then, and senior officers were not to be seen speaking into the latest fancy gizmo that pretends to be a phone, so he had to content himself with a boring Motorola and leave the toys to the teenagers.

And then he, JJ had come along. His soul, his temperament, in a young body. Now at last Jack could indulge his pleasures, and JJ?

JJ wasn’t going to complain. Hell no.

Take the cell phone for instance.

It was minute – which instantly put his cool factor up at school – and was fitted with an even cooler silver chain which allowed him to keep it under his shirt and leave his hands free for other things. Like food and, well, food.

Of course, he also had a suspicion that Jack wanted him within reach at all times, as he had gotten to the stage that he ignored most messages left on his phone. Most were from – surprise, surprise, Jack. Jack senior had taken this parenting thing like a duck to water, damn him.

And so he had started ignoring his voice mail, figuring that if it was important enough, they would phone back

Of course Jack had, usually with some choice expletives that even JJ didn’t know.

And then, when JJ had his phone avoidance down to a fine art, Jack had bought him the new phone – a cool item yes, but also one on which Jack could reach him 24/7.

Clever bastard.

It was understandable in a way. Jack senior had never really known his parents that well and had left home at an early age, and he was determined that JJ know that this would not be repeated twice, and despite his protestations, and their shaky start, JJ was comforted to know that he now had rock solid backup, should he ever need it.

Not that Jack was his real father of course.

No, that was wrong. Seeing as he was cloned from him, Jack actually was his father.

Kinda.

Cool. Wait until Jack heard that one. He would explode. Or not. Jack was getting really weird lately.

The phone was still vibrating.

It had rung once, when he had first gotten it, and the loud trill had almost made him hit the roof in shock. Since then he had set it to vibrate, not a bad thing to have done considering his currant situation.

Yes, the phone. Answer the phone.

Gritting his teeth against the pain, JJ pulled his tee-shirt away from his grazed chest and reached for it.

"Jack?" His voice sounded shaky and young, but he was beyond caring.

"JJ?" Jack’s voice was almost a shout, and JJ flinched.

"Softer," he mumbled. "Fractured skull."

"Oh God," Jack moaned. He sounded strained to breaking point and JJ felt treacherous tears. He had never had someone who cared for him as fiercely as Jack did. Okay, it went both ways, and the arguments had to be heard to be believed, but they had somehow become a family, something they had both craved and had never thought possible.

"Where are you?"

"In an empty shed," JJ mumbled, trying to look around without moving an inch. "Solid slats, but I can see sunlight streaming through the gaps. I guess its late afternoon now."

"Your captors?" Jack was sounder more in control now.

"I haven’t seen a soul," JJ whispered. "I was trying to make it to the door, but -."

"You’re hurt." Jack’s voice was soft, concerned. "Give it to me straight."

Jack knew him. Knew him like no one else did, and as a consequence knew that he had a habit of making light of his injuries. This time he was begging for the truth.

"Broken skull, wrist and leg," JJ said, staring up at the dark shed roof. "It makes it difficult to escape."

"Impossible to escape," Jack said. "If I had had those injuries in Iraq, I -."

"Would have died, and I wouldn’t have existed," JJ finished for him.

"Quite," Jack said, a hint of strained laughter in his voice.

His voice turned serious again. "Now, I want you to hold on. Miller is coordinating with the FBI and they’re almost certain that you’re still in Colorado.

"Miller?" Forgive him for being picky, but he liked to know who he was relying on rescuing him.

Jack voice held that hint of a laugh again. "Detective Sergeant Miller. She’s working with the FBI and the phone company to triangulate this call. "She-," his voice sounded distracted before returning strongly. "She says to stay strong."

"I’ll do that, but sooner or later my kidna -." He couldn’t bring himself to say it.

"But you are a kid," Jack said firmly. "And the son of a General. Big newsworthy stuff that. Do you know how many news people who, at this moment, must be congregated outside the mountain, desperate to talk to me?"

"Oh God," JJ said, trying not to smile. "I hadn’t thought of that.

"And if your kidnappers do return," Jack said. "Just play it cool. I believe they want information from me in return for your release."

"You sure?" JJ needed reassurance, something new for him. Perhaps he wasn’t as independent as he had first thought.

"You know nothing." Jack’s voice was adamant, and JJ could imagine Jack staring at the cop, trying to give him information without tipping his hand. "You are merely my son, and I have no money to speak of, so that leaves information."

"NID?" JJ asked.

"Not their MO," Jack said quickly. "You know that."

"Then -," JJ hesitated, his hyper sensitive ears picking up voices from outside the shed. "Oh crap," he said softly.

"We’ll get you," Jack said soothingly. "We may not know who your abductors are, but we’re closing in fast."

"Jack, my abductors are Arab Iraqi’s" JJ said, suddenly feeling very tired

"What?" Jacks voice was back to a shout. "What did you say?"

"I think that perhaps Mustafa Kahn is behind this," JJ said slowly, staring at movement behind his tiny shed.

"Kahn?" Jack’s voice sounded harsh, and JJ knew why.

Kahn had been in charge of Jacks interrogation, way back when, and finally, when Jack had managed to escape, he had taken great delight in emasculating the bastard before setting off towards American lines.

Strangely enough, from JJ’s point of view, it was looking at someone’s life from another perspective, but from Jack’s sharp tone of voice, JJ realized that for Jack the wound was still raw.

"Intel has it that Kahn as dead," he said gruffly.

"It might account for him missing the cell phone," JJ insisted.

"What makes you so fixated on the idea that Kahn is still alive?" Jack asked.

"Oh, just the fact that that I can hear his voice outside," JJ said, clicking the phone off before Jack could reply.

OOO

"Mustafa Kahn."

Jack said the name with such venom that both Daniel and Miller stopped what they were doing at stared at him in confusion.

"What about him?" Daniel asked. He had heard the name before but had no idea where.

"He has JJ."

Miller’s eyes narrowed. "Who is he?"

"An Iraqi," Jack said, his eyes dark. He leaned back in his chair, unwilling to face them. "We met before, in Operation Desert Storm. He held me captive. I escaped."

Said like that, it seemed so simple.

"Christ." Miller said, reaching for her phone again. "This complicates things somewhat." She hesitated. "Any idea what he wants?"

Jack bent his head to stare at his phone. "Me to suffer," he said quietly. "Nothing more than that."

OOO

"Is the child still living?" JJ gritted his teeth at the familiar voice feeling the blood drain from his face. It had been years and a lifetime ago, but there was no mistaking that accent.

Mustafa Kahn.

"No." There was a rustle of fabric and the sound of water gurgling into a cup, the sound making JJ unconsciously lick his lips. "Leave him for tonight. Tomorrow, when the sun once more rises, his father will be more receptive to our demands."

"And they are?" The other voice asked, sounding intrigued.

"Give me time," Kahn said. "I’m sure that I will think of something."

The first voice sounded pensive. "Perhaps he could be worth something to the Ba’arth party. He is, after all, someone important to O’Neill."

Kahn wasn’t convinced. "O’Neill is burnt out." He said disgustedly. "He works underground, in an office now. No, I want nothing more from him apart from what I already possess." His voice took on a sinister tone. "He took my manhood, and now I take the life of his son. It is only fair."

The other voice was still pleading, and JJ rooted for him. He had no illusions that come sun up, Kahn would kill him and send some part of his body to Jack as proof. His penis perhaps. He also knew that this would break Jack, just like Kahn wanted.

Determined to go down fighting, JJ once more raised his head and scanned his new home. There was nothing, just bare walls.

"Bare wooden walls," he muttered, a germ of an idea occurring. If he could only drag himself to one, he perhaps could loosen a plank. It made a crude weapon but it was better than nothing.

His ruminations were interrupted when the door rattled and suddenly opened, allowing a wall of cool evening air in, along with a swarthy man JJ had never seen before in his life.

"He is but a child." The voice was soft and sad. "No son should stand responsible for his father’s sins."

JJ forced himself to look uncomprehending.

"Please," he asked in a cracked voice, something he realized in shock wasn’t an act. "Please, I want to go home."

The other man’s voice sounded different when he struggled to speak English.

"You, O’Neill son?"

JJ nodded, his eyes round. Meanwhile he was desperately looking for some sort of landmark, something to tell Jack. There was nothing, merely a field with a solitary tree in the far distance.

"Poor child," the man said reverting to his own language, his face sympathetic. "Perhaps you will die before morning."

Suddenly JJ realized that his best chance of escape stood in front of him, if only he could communicate. This man actually seemed to want to help him, whereas Kahn just wanted him dead.

"I don’t want to die," he said in pure Arabic, watching as the man started in shock. "I want to grow old, have children of my own. Please, what my father did he did in a time of war in retaliation for sins inflicted on his own body." He patted his chest, mindful of his cell phone. "I am not Jack O’Neill. I never was."

No truer word said, JJ thought, finding it ironic. He was Jack, but he wasn’t.

"You speak the language of Allah, blessed be his name?" The man looked shocked.

"My father taught me," JJ said, looking innocent. "He said it is a magnificent language to learn, and that not all people are evil. I hope someday to visit." He stopped there, not wanting to lay it on too thick.

"Perhaps you will visit someday," the man said. "I will not allow Mustafa to kill you."

Then, just as JJ was going to thank the man, he suddenly stiffened with a cry before collapsing face forwards, a knife sticking out his back.

"Oh God," JJ said. He had seen violence before, but never as a 17-year-old boy. The smell of freshly spilt blood was sickening, as sickening as the fact that his last chance of seeing freedom was gone.

"So, the pig dog taught his son our language hmm?" Kahn was on him before he could even blink, kneeling on his chest; the knife at his throat. "You are as dangerous as your father," he hissed. "Here you lie, in pain and unable to much but die, but what do you do? You twist Ali’s thoughts, just like your father did to others so many years ago."

JJ couldn’t breathe. Kahn’s knee was crushing his throat and preventing him from drawing oxygen, and thus he was helpless to do much but claw at the ground as the sparkles multiplied in front of his vision.

Kahn’s voice was a purr, and with a thrill of horror, JJ realized that he knew what was happening. "Yes, die, young pup." He grabbed one of JJ’s flailing hands, pinning it to the ground holding it there as the sparkles became a rushing roaring river that eventually swept him away into blackness.

OOO

Things had progressed since Jack had first been informed of JJ’s abduction, and he had had nothing to do with it. The staff – his staff whom he had taken for granted for months and months had rallied around him and taken the strain off of him.

Someone, he suspected his aide, had set up the secondary briefing room on the 21^st floor as a control room, and had invited the FBI in.

This they had done in spades, so much so that Jack doubted the legality of everything, not that anyone was listening to him. In fact, he was being treated with kid gloves. Even SG 2’s commander, Colonel Reynolds, who having arrived offworld and having promptly taken over, was doing things without any authorization from him whatsoever. It was as if they were frightened that he would snap at any moment, and in that perhaps they were correct.

"Danny, if anything happens to JJ -," Jack said, staring at Daniel who hadn’t left his side for an instant. "It would be like losing Charlie all over again."

He could see from Daniel’s set face that that had already occurred to him.

"I know," he said harshly. "I should never have allowed myself to get so attached."

He straightened with an effort, staring around the transformed briefing room, noting the equipment with a kind of unreality. "I should never have allowed JJ to breach my armor."

"Why in the hell not?" Daniel said equally as harshly. "He is your flesh and blood, and despite everything that’s happened, you need each other." He took a deep breath. "That’s what families do, help love and support each other."

"And when someone goes missing?" Jack turned to Daniel, allowing him to see the absolute hopelessness he felt. "What then?"

"Then the FBI takes over, with the Air Force’s assistance of course," a familiar voice said.

"Agent Darren." Daniel said, shaking the hand of a tall blonde haired man with a smile. "Long time no see."

"And that was a good thing," Darren said, his quick eyes taking in the haunted face of the man he last knew as Colonel O’Neill.

"We’ll get him back," he said softly.

"Mustafa Kahn won’t go quietly," Jack said. "Even now he may be-." He looked at Darren with dark eyes. "JJ is very like me," he said. "He’s unlikely to keep his mouth shut, and I scarcely think that the intervening years will have mellowed Kahn any."

"What did you do to him?" Darren asked.

"It was during Operation Desert Storm," Jack said, his eyes wandering around the busy operations room, all geared up for just one word from Kahn, damn him.

"It’s no secret now that I was held prisoner for a couple of months," he continued. "What most people don’t know is what I did in order to escape. The precise details I still can’t tell you, but I will tell you the end result, and that was that I emasculated Kahn." His eyes turned hard and Darren involuntary shivered. "He deserved it."

"How?" Darren whispered.

O’Neill looked amused for a fleeting second. "I didn’t remove them with a knife, if that’s what you’re asking. I merely held a gun to his groin and fired." His face turned as hard as his eyes. At least I had the satisfaction of knowing that Kahn would never touch another prisoner, woman or – man."

That last word was said almost as a whisper, and Agent Darren knew when to back off.

"According to Detective Sergeant Miller you managed to contact JJ?" he asked.

Jack nodded. "He has a tiny cell phone, almost a gimmick really, that is attached to a chain around his neck. Kahn, unused to such tiny technology, must have missed it."

"It was he who that identified Mustafa Kahn?" Darren asked skeptically.

Jack knew that he was stepping on treacherous territory now, and took his time in answering.

"Yes, he said slowly. "He already knows about Iraq." He gave a small smile to Darren. "It’s kinda hard to keep secrets when you still scream at night, you know?"

Darren also knew when to ignore a comment.

"So he recognized Kahn just from your descriptions?"

"No," Jack said, lying through his teeth. "Kahn told him who he was."

"And he passed on that knowledge to you?" Darren said. "Did it ever occur to you that Kahn may have deliberately left the phone in your son’s possession, knowing that he would contact you?"

Jack nodded. "That is why I haven’t phoned him back," he said softly. "That and the fear that if Kahn has genuinely missed the phone, my calling him could get him further into trouble."

"Good thinking," Darren said approvingly. "If –."

He was interrupted by a young Airman who stared at O’Neill with wide eyes before saluting crisply.

"Begging your pardon, General, sirs, but this just came for you." He held out a small white envelope.

Darren fairly snatched the envelope from the unfortunate mans hand even as Colonel Reynolds peeled off from a group of technicians and approached at a fast trot.

"Airman, where did you get that letter?" he fairly yelled.

"Err, Colonel, DHL, someone from DHL. You know, the courier firm? They delivered it to the gate." He looked at Reynolds with frightened eyes. "Sergeant Ellis said I should get it to you immediately."

Jack stirred, cutting off the marine before he could make a meal out of the young man.

"Gary, let’s read the letter before leaping to any conclusions," he said tiredly. "Perhaps it’s only my renewal to Homes and Gardens."

"No it’s not," Agent Darren said, his words suddenly loud in the silent room. He held out the carefully extracted piece of paper for the others to read. It consisted of one word, a word constructed out of carefully spliced newspaper letters.

The note merely said "SUFFER."

OOO

It was pitch dark when JJ next awoke, and unlike the last times he had awoken, this time the pain was back.

"Oh God," he choked, trying to breathe through a swollen throat. "I can’t take much more of this."

It was then that he remembered where Kahn had been kneeling, and with a gasp of horror JJ felt around his neck.

At first, he couldn’t find anything at all, and then his trembling fingers found the chain. The tiny phone had ended up against his armpit, and looked fine.

"Thank God," he whispered, and began to dial.

The phone was answered immediately. In fact, the line was so clear that JJ wondered if someone wasn’t assisting the signal.

"Jack?"

"JJ?" Jack’s voice was almost a sob, and JJ was hard pressed not to dissolve into his own tears.

"He’s going to kill me," he said softly.

Jack’s breathing was harsh. "Then don’t antagonize him," was his advice.

"He killed someone in front of me," JJ said. "His colleague. I had managed to convince him that I was no threat, that I meant nothing to the Ba-arth party and Kahn overheard and he killed him."

"He left you alone?" Jack’s voice sounded hollow, as if he knew what JJ’s answer was going to be.

"Yes, once he had strangled me into unconsciousness," he said.

Jack’s voice was tight. "Hang on JJ," he said. "It’s only been eight hours, and the FBI are assuring me that they are moving in. In fact, I have been asked to tell you to stay on the line now."

"Eight hours?" JJ whispered, his brain not comprehending everything Jack was telling him. "Is that all?"

"That’s all," Jack said.

"How in the hell did Jack O’Neill survive months of this?" he wondered aloud.

Jack’s voice was like velvet. "It was different situation JJ. You know as well as I do that each situation is unique. You will survive this." His voice turned fierce. "You will survive this, you hear me?"

"I can’t even see my leg." JJ said, his voice small. "Each time I sit up higher than shoulder height I lose consciousness."

Jack’s voice was choked. "Oh God. Not again. I can’t lose-." There was a clatter, and suddenly Daniel was on the line, his voice loud.

"JJ?"

"Danny?" he had gotten to calling Daniel that and surprisingly Daniel had never objected.

"You okay kid?" Danny had called him the kid at first just to annoy him, but eventually it had come into common use. Even Teal’c now called him the kid.

"Nothing a doctor can’t fix," JJ said with a small laugh. "How’s Jack doing?"

"Okay until that last comment," Danny said with his own strained laugh. "That one more or less sent him over the edge."

"You heard?" JJ asked, blinking up drowsily. For some reason, there seemed to be very little oxygen left to breathe and there were faint popping noises in the far distance.

"We have everyone from the Police to the FBI to Colonel Reynolds and his team listening in," Danny said smoothly. "In fact, Agent Darren says that you should see someone real soon."

"Or not," JJ said, feeling calmer than he had been for a long time. He now knew why there was so little oxygen in the shed. "Kahn has set the shed alight."

He stared up at the roof, noting tiny flames that seemed to dance for him like they were there just for his personal amusement.

"Danny?"

"Yes?" Daniel was sounding like Jack now, and JJ suddenly had this overwhelming feeling that he should reassure him.

"Tis okay," he said. "If I die now tis okay."

"Not to Jack it isn’t," Daniel said. "If you die now nothing will ever be okay for him ever again."

"Then I won’t die," JJ said, the distant popping noises finally making sense. "If for nothing more than just to annoy the crap out of him."

He stared towards the far wall where someone was hard at work with an axe. "Tell him that."

Daniel’s voice was choked. "I’ll tell him."

"Scratch that," JJ said, blinking up at two masked men dressed in black. "I’ll tell him myself."

OOO

Jack had thought himself to be a tough bastard, Teflon coated in all the right spots, but when JJ had told him that he couldn’t move, it had been like a knife to his heart.

He dropped the phone with a clatter and buried his head in his arms, uncaring as to who saw him. He could not, no, he refused to listen to another child die, and he thought of JJ as a child, even if he did have a fifty-year-old soul behind those wise eyes. JJ was his child now, and he was dying. Right now, somewhere else in the state, his flesh and blood was struggling to survive, and it was all his fault.

"I should have killed the bastard," he whispered, raising his head and staring at Darren with such ferocity that the Agent literally took a step backwards. "I should have moved the gun two inches to the left and disemboweled him."

"You don’t need to worry about him anymore," Darren said after a shocked pause. "That’s what I have come to tell you." He tapped the radio he was holding. "He’s safe."

"What?" Jack was disbelieving. "What?"

Jack turned to Daniel, who was looking at him with a huge smile.

"Daniel?"

Daniel laid a hand on his shoulder and squeezed, feeling the stiff shoulder start to shake under his hand. "He’s safe Jack. I heard him. He’s safe."

The shaking became more pronounced, and Daniel, Jacks friend for many years, knew that Jack, more than anything else right now, didn’t want anyone to see him break down.

"Now, I don’t know about you, but I’ve gotta go pee."

Jack nodded, his face now carefully impassive.

"Tell me about it."

"I’d rather not," Daniel said with a laugh, and pulled Jack O’Neill Senior to his feet.

EINDE