STARGATE SG-1: Do No Harm by Karen Miller Read Free Book Online Page B

“Yes.”
    “Can I ask why? I mean, I get the feeling it’s not just because General Hammond’s a good man.”
    Again, McCreary’s gaze shifted to the window. “You’re right. It’s not.” He sighed. “Dave, this fine country of ours has been cursed with politicians who’ll do the wrong thing,
knowing
it’s the wrong thing, just to damage an opponent. Or to further their personal agendas. Or both. Now you and I will die for the bastards if we have to because that’s the game we signed on for. But there’s no fine print in the contract saying we can’t stick a spoke in their slimy, self-centered, self-serving wheels when the chance is offered.”
    “And this is a chance, sir?”
    “It’s a very big chance. Earth needs the SGC, Dave. And right now the SGC needs you.” McCreary shook his head. “I know. I sound like a military recruiting poster. But it’s true.”
    Dixon sat in silence, considering. If he closed his eyes he’d see his wife’s face. Lainie. The love of his life, the prize he’d never thought to win. If he stepped through the Stargate he might never step back again. He could die out there, in space, on an alien rock a million light years from home.
    So mehow that’s different from dying on Earth. Dying is dying, but still… it’s not the same. Right now I don’t tell her things, but that’s not the same as lying. If I do this I’ll be lying every day. And I could die out there, at the ass-end of the universe, and they might have to leave me behind. Lainie would bury an empty coffin.
    The thought was horrifying. To put her through that… how could any man who loved his wife put her through that?
    But I put her through the chance of my death every day as it is. I co uld be deployed to the Middle East or some other disaster zone tomorrow and get killed the day after. She knows that. She knew what she was getting into when she said ‘I do’. If I start cherry-picking assignments now, where will it stop? I owe McCreary. An d I owe Frank. When he found out Jack O’Neill was in trouble he broke landspeed records to get to him. He threw his life down that black hole because Jack O’Neill was prepared to throw his own life down there first.
    Frank thought he owed Jack O’Neill… and I know I owe Frank.
    “Sir,” he said. “I’ll go.”
     
    George Hammond replaced his telephone receiver and spent a moment staring at the pile of completed mission reports O’Neill had delivered to him at 1058. Now it was 1127 and possibly, hopefully, life had just taken a turn for the better.
    Or at least the not so bad.
    So it’s yes for Dixon. Maybe for his whole team if we’re lucky. We’ve plugged our thumb in the dyke, at least for a while. Provided I don’t lose anyone else. Please God, don’t let me lose anyone else
…
    Even as he throttled the fear, the base alarm sounded and Harriman’s calm voice boomed through the speakers.
    “
Unscheduled incoming wormhole. Unscheduled incoming wormhole
.”
    Jack beat him to the control room. He nearly always did. Almost as though he had some kind of sixth sense that alerted him to the gate’s activation a split second before it chevronned to life.
    “It’s all right, General,” said Harriman, glancing round. “We’ve got SG-1’s code.”
    He nodded. “Open the door then, Sergeant.” Not that Harriman needed telling, of course. It was just their little ritual, the comfortable commonplace that was their touchstone in a strange and often outrageously unpredictable world.
    Harriman flashed him a smile and hit the iris control.
    Jack, standing silently, couldn’t quite mask his tension. He wasn’t the only one. Until SG-1 emerged unscathed through the wormhole there was still the chance — the gut-twisting chance — that here was another mission ended in gloom and doom.
    They came through the wormhole unscathed, arguing… and soaking wet.
    “Daniel, I don’t want to hear it!” Sam Carter, unusually short-tempered. Almost, dare he