STARGATE SG-1: Do No Harm Read Online Free PDF Page A

picnic.
    SG-1 had gated through to PX8-050 just after 1600 Earth time to arrive shortly after dawn local time. That meant it would more than likely be midnight or later in the base before a peep was heard from them. Assuming they didn’t run into trouble, of course.
    O’Neill, slogging his way through his belated mission reports, kept slapping that thought away like it was a persistent mosquito.
    Damn. They went wit hout me. They shouldn’t do that.
    He was prepared to stay on base all night if he had to, until he knew his people were okay. God knew he had the paperwork to keep him going for that long. But Janet Fraiser tracked him down to his corner of the almost empty commissary, gave his half-eaten piece of pie a pointed look and damn well pulled rank on him. Again.
    “Colonel, it’s really very simple,” she said, hands thrust into her lab coat pockets. “We can’t afford you getting over-tired. It’s bad enough that Washington politics means SG-1 had to cut short their mandatory post-mission downtime to cover SG-4’s slate. But if you don’t use this chance to fully recover from your last two missions there
will
be physical repercussions and the SGC can’t afford to lose another team leader. You
know
that. So why are you giving me a hard time?”
    “Because all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy,” he said, promptly. “Come on, Doc. Everybody needs a hobby.”
    With an impatient sigh Fraiser pulled out the chair opposite and shoved herself into it. “Colonel, please. Don’t argue with me.
Go home
. Sit in front of the tv for an hour or two, eat something with more to recommend it than calories and food coloring and forget about this place for one damned night.”
    He raised an eyebrow at her. “Forget my team?”
    “No, of course not,” she said, with another look. “But that doesn’t mean you need to sit around here convincing yourself they’re coming back on stretchers just because you’re not with them.”
    Hell. What did I do, hang a sign around my neck?
    She tapped her discreetly manicured fingernails on the table between them. “And you need to forget about the rest of it too, Colonel. The dead are beyond our help and the survivors have to find their own way back or they’ll end up diminished and doubting themselves. Nobody knows that better than you.”
    When the mood was on her, Janet Fraiser wielded words like a scalpel. He scowled. “Thought you were a paid-up member of the Touchy Feely brigade?”
    “My dues go to the Tough Love Club, of which you’re the cuddly mascot, I believe,” she retorted. “Right now we don’t have the luxury of worrying ourselves sick. We’ve got a base commander who needs us to keep it together. And if you don’t rest your mind, Colonel, even for a lousy twelve hours, sooner or later you’re going to burn out.”
    Crap. She was seriously worried about him. He hated it when she seriously worried about him. Nobody did worry like Janet Fraiser.
    She looked up. “Please, Jack,” she said, very softly. “Go home and get some rest.”
    And why was it worse when she
didn’t
pull medical rank on him?
    Defiant, he forked up what was left of his cherry pie — his third piece but he wasn’t telling her that — and shoved it into his mouth.
    “Fine,” he said, around the sticky pink goodness. Letting her know he felt put-upon and was only doing her a favor because he was such a good guy. The fact that he was so tired his eyeballs had turned into lumps of burning coal had
nothing
to do with it. “I’ll go.”
    Her face lit up, briefly. “Excellent.” She stood, brisk and professional, as though she hadn’t just let the human Janet off her strict military leash for a moment. “Don’t let me see you back here before — ” She checked her watch. “It’s 2115 now. So — 0900 tomorrow. Better yet, 0930. Clear?”
    He gave her a mock salute. “Ma’am, yes ma’am.”
    She gave him yet another pointed look, turned to go, then turned back.