Broken Armour
A J/J fic written especially for Annie
By Numnut
Nov 2003

The door slammed.

Aniko managed to keep her footing as she stumbled to a halt, having been thrown roughly into the room. She looked around, peering into the dark, attempting to see into the place she was liable to be stuck in for the unforeseeable future.

Curse Connors, he had betrayed her. The information she had sought was crucial. He had promised her the knowledge, and then sold her to the local thugs like a sack of old melons.

He would pay if her friend died.

She would make sure of it.

Suddenly from the recessed corners of room came a voice.

"Annie?"

She no longer had her gun, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t defend herself. She tensed, staring into the dark attempting to locate shapes, features.

The face that moved out from the gloom, was familiar, but it was completely unexpected.

Liquid brown eyes, almost black in the poor light, stared at her in disbelief. "Annie?"

"Jack?"

"What are you doing here?"

"I came for Janet."

"You shouldn't have come."

"I had too."

Aniko turned her back to him, and started her own reconnaissance of the cell. There had to be a way out of this, Janet was depending upon her.

"Annie, I'm sorry."

"I'm sure you are, Jack, but let’s just focus on getting Janet out alive, shall we."

Her hands combed the concrete, looking for some crack, some possibility of escape she may have missed in the dark.

She came up with nothing.

That left her to turn to the one man she least wanted to see.

At any point in time.

The man that haunted her dreams stood in the middle of the cell. His shoulders slumped with exhaustion, his features bruised and defeated. Her heart lurched.

"Jack, what happened?"

"They took her, Annie. They took her from my arms. They took her bleeding. And I....I couldn't do a thing."

Aniko's heart hardened. She knew this man, knew his strengths. "There is always something you can do, Jack."

The eyes looked at her in almost horror, denial painting the stark planes of his face.

And she realised that it had happened. Someone had finally cracked that suit of armour. Someone had finally found their way into the stark and broken heart of Jack O'Neill.

And it was crippling him.

She had to admit she was jealous. She had tried, and failed, countless times. Her heart had been smashed against the rocky exterior of Colonel O’Neill one too many times. And it had almost broken her.

But out there, somewhere in this complex, was a woman who had succeeded.

Succeeded where she had failed, and for that reason, that reason alone, she knew she had to save her best friend.

Or die trying.

**********

Jack O'Neill shivered.

Not from the cold.

But from the chill emanating from the woman glaring at him from across the room.

He had been in the wrong, he knew. Their history spanned years of stormy arguments and encounters both would rather forget. But through all of it he knew, and she knew, that they were a pair. But they were just too alike to coexist.

And now he had Janet

His heart lurched at his memory of his last sight of her.

Bloody.

Broken.

Limp in his arms.

Aniko may be glaring at him, but he now knew that his chances of getting himself, and Janet, out of this hellhole alive had just doubled.

**********

For the following hours, the two of them circled each other like a pair of lions trapped in a cage, neither wanting to get too close, but neither finding an immediate method of escape, they were stuck with each other

There was nothing to say that hadn't already been said.

So it was quiet.

Their captors came eventually.

They sneered and jeered as most captors do. Throwing out threats, listing recriminations, but all their high talk was suddenly cut off.

Like their air.

Jack was efficient.

And Aniko wasn’t far behind him.

A flick of her wrist, and the tiny piece of fishing line she had secreted in her underwear, took the flesh, and the life, beneath her hands.

The cell was silent once again

There was no time for small talk. No time for recriminations. They were out the door and down the hall, side by side.

Death in their wake.

They went from room to room in the complex. Those who stood in their way no longer stood.

Aniko was a whirlwind of destruction, her hands dishing out death, her mind foremost, reaching, longing to find her friend.

And hoping.

Hoping.

She wasn't too late.

Beside her, Jack was the efficient killer he had always been. They may not have made it together, but she could not ignore his capabilities.

He was lethal.

Lithe.

Deadly.

A man you did not want to have as an enemy.

And he was desperate. She could hear it in his breathing. Smell it in his sweat.

Janet had better survive this, or there would be hell to pay.

Finally they came to a door, locked, but no hindrance. It was a cell not unlike their own had been, but in the centre of this room was a bed.

And strapped to it lay their target. Limp, dried blood staining the coarse weave cloth covering her, Janet lay almost serene in repose.

Aniko's heart lurched.

Jack flung himself into the room, a moan his only word.

Aniko found she couldn't move. She watched the tableau, the facade of Jack O'Neill tearing at the seams, falling apart in front of her. She could almost see the pieces as they hit the floor. Janet, what have you done to this man?

There was a gasp, and Aniko was seriously snapped back to reality.

Jack's voice was harsh. “Janet?"

The soft moan from the bed had Aniko across the room in moments, her own cry of "Janet?' echoing the Colonel’s.

The small doctor was pale, her face almost transparent in the poor light. A smear of blood contrasted with the white skin on her cheek

But her eyes were open, looking at Jack, tears too numerous to shed.

O'Neill's voice was soft, its harsh edge, broken by moisture. "Janet."

Aniko could hardly hear the voice that answered him, her own breathing hoarse in her ears, but the emotion behind it amplified it so it could be heard regardless.

"Jack, I'm sorry."

"No, no." He tried to shush her, tried to reassure her, but she refused, her brow wrinkling in despair.

He placed a finger across her lips. "Janet, live that is all I ask."

Aniko could not believe his honesty. She had never heard him speak like this, never seen the Jack that dwelt within.

She had been blind.

And she had missed out.

The look in his eyes told her that if Janet did not recover, neither would he, and the world of Jack O'Neill would collapse.

She didn't like him, but she couldn't let that happen, time for some action.

She reached out and touched his shoulder, snapping him from the hell his mind had fallen into. "Jack, we have to hurry."

His reaction was immediate.

"Janet, hang on, we're getting you out of here." He reached under the covers, his arms coming up to support her body as he lifted. She groaned, pain an obvious companion.

The expression on Jack's face crumpled in reaction, his mouth unable to express his sorrow at causing her hurt, but there was no other way. His arms were full of Janet, and his eyes were full of tears, but he was moving.

Aniko took point.

Nothing that got in their way survived

She gathered weapons from the fallen enemy, slinging guns from her body, knives from her hands. Janet's life depended upon her, and she didn't intend to fail.

Failure was not an option, for this life would take two.

Their target was the Stargate.

Aniko operated out from the Alpha site, Jack from Earth, but they both knew where they were going.

They were going home.

They managed to flee the building, creeping through the dark, avoiding the patrols, and killing silently those they could not.

The city was dank and smelly, and Aniko wondered why the SGC had given it enough thought to send in the mercy mission that led to so much death and pain.

Janet had always been such a giving soul. The sight of anyone in pain, much less the hundreds of children this planet’s government had paraded in front of her in it’s plea for assistance, had the Doctor running for her equipment. She was born to heal.

And that was the dichotomy. She glanced at her companion, carrying his precious burden. Jack. Jack was born to kill. He had said so, many times, his head in his hands, the sweat of a barely gone nightmare dripping on her carpet as he sat on the edge of her bed.

And he was so terribly good at it.

Much like she.

It was no wonder they were so good together, and yet so incompatible. Both their nightmares in one place led to little sleep for either of them.

Her eyes darted the length of the alleyway, scanning the dark recesses of doorways and corners hidden by dented garbage cans. A lone animal scampered about in the dark, this planet’s excuse for a feral cat, its eyes reflecting the poor streetlights. She signalled to Jack and they moved like a pair of cats themselves, slinking down the alley.

They had no warning.

There never is warning when death approaches.

Jack yelled, but pain exploded in her leg before she could respond, and it crumpled beneath her, flinging her forward. The pavement came rushing up, and her world disintegrated in a wave of painful stars.

**********

Jack O’Neill picked up the whistle of the bullet as it penetrated the air, and was yelling, throwing himself to the ground before the soft impact sound of metal entering flesh ended its flight.

He didn’t hear it partner.

But he felt it.

Agony flared at his waist, catching him moving, tearing through his side. He felt the wet warmth of blood splatter on his arms, the bullet exiting the left side of his belly, as he desperately tried to hold both Janet and his balance.

He failed.

Falling sideways he clutched her to him, turning himself so he would take the impact. He hit hard, landing on his right side, his ribcage taking the brunt of it, and giving under the pressure. At his strangled gasp, Janet moved in his arms, shuddering with her own waves of pain.

“Jack?!” Her voice trembled, and as he managed to roll himself on the ground bringing her to an almost gentle rest beside him.

“Shh, shh.” His voice trembled as much as hers.

Flat on the ground he turned and stared down the length of the alley, desperately attempting to assess the source of the danger, the location of the enemy. Aniko lay face down on the other side, her face turned away. She didn’t move, but a small pool of blood underneath her thigh gleamed dimly in the glow of the street lamps.

Footsteps.

They echoed long before they appeared in his vision. Four armed men, their heels clicking on the pavement, stepped out of the shadows at the other end of the small laneway. Their arrogant walk towards him spoke of confidence, a knowledge of their superiority, and, to the experienced Jack, a possible weakness. He only had to wait for the mistake.

“Colonel O’Neill, I thought we had a deal. You enjoy my guest quarters while your people arrange to get me what I want.”

“And what exactly is it that you want, Turdo?” The confidence in his own tone defied the shake in his voice. He found it hard to get a decent breath, and his gut was a mass of burning agony.

“Turgo, Colonel, or do we need to teach you that lesson once again.” The son-of-a-bitch nudged his belly with his foot. Jack struggled to breathe as suddenly his breath was taken away.

“I….never was…a…fast…learner.” He coughed, and the pavement was spattered with blood. Damn, he couldn’t afford this.

He assessed the situation. Four bad guys, all with guns. Three good guys, all wounded, one unconscious, one dy….no, Jack, don’t go there. He felt the warm puddle forming beneath his body where he lay. Time was short. If he was going to make any attempt it would have to be soon, or he would be joining Aniko in oblivion.

He looked up at Turdo, and played weak. “Okay, Turgo, what is it that you want?” He threw in a couple of gasps for effect that weren’t truly fake, and lowered his head closer to the ground.

Turdo took the bait, crouching down to maintain their eyeline. Bad move, bad guy.

The moment Turdo’s neck was within reach, Jack had it, wrapping his arm around it, yanking downwards with everything he had. The knife he had had up his sleeve now at Turdo’s throat, trembling faintly in the poor light, threatening to puncture the soft skin beneath it. His whole body was tense with the urge to kill this son of a bitch, regardless of the guns now pointed at his own head. He had dared to take so much from him, and he wanted to take the same back.

For a moment Jack O'Neill's eyes glinted black with what he could do.

But something held him back.

A soft moan behind him. “Jack, no.”

Janet.

He spat blood in frustration, and the red fluid mingled with the sweat on his face, running down his jaw to stain the sodden fabric of his shirt.

He held his lips close to the ear of his captive, his voice hoarse with pain. “Plead for your life, Turdo, before I take it.”

The criminal refused to capitulate, his voice, mocking. “You have little left to live, Colonel. I need only wait for you to die.” His eyes drifted across to Janet. “Or her.”

The knife twitched, on the verge of ending everything, but again that soft voice came from behind him. “Jack?”

Jack didn’t respond, his eyes turning to the other three men in his audience. “I suggest you put the guns down now, or your boss buys it.” The knife in his hand gestured enough to cause a thin trickle of blood to run down Turdo’s neck.

The goons all looked askance at their boss, who spat at them, cursing. “Stay exactly where you are. O’Neill can’t last much longer.”

Jack had to hold himself back again. Turdo walked a fine line.

But the guns continued to point at him.

And spots were beginning to dance in front of his eyes.

But he couldn’t give up….couldn’t.

And then the decision was taken away from him.

A figure appeared out of nowhere. A knife whistled through the air sinking deeply into Goon Number One, a bullet took Goon Number Two, and Number Three had his neck twisted from his shoulders. It all happened so quickly, Jack hadn’t blinked between deaths.

But his grip still held Turdo, as a staggering Aniko stood amongst her kill. “Need a hand, Jack?”

He looked up at her, and couldn’t resist a quip. “Now what has given you that idea?”

She shrugged. “Oh, nothing much, just the number of guns that were pointed at your head.” She gestured at Turdo. “Want me to finish him for you?”

Turdo began to struggle in his grip, a grip that wasn’t as strong as it usually could be counted on to be. “No, this one’s mine, but you can hold him for me for a moment.”

She relieved a goon of his heavy duty weaponry, and pointed it directly between Turdo’s eyeball’s. “You have a choice, Turgo. Do or die. And I wouldn’t hesitate if I were you, I am quite willing to make the decision for you.” She gestured slightly with the gun. “Now get up and move out of the way.”

Jack was relieved to finally have the weight off his chest, and he attempted to draw in a good breath. Pain was his answer. Not a bright move, O’Neill.

He squeezed his eyes shut against the agony of moving, and managed to turn himself over, and drag himself the short distance to Janet, who was lying on her side staring at him.

“Doc?”

She smiled slightly up at him. “Jack.” The smile trembled as pain rippled across her face. It still came down to time.

Time, Jack, to play the hero.

He had two good legs, but a busted gut and broken ribcage. Aniko was down one leg and hobbling. Janet couldn’t walk at all. This was going to have to be a team effort to get them all out of here.

With a grunt of agony that took his breath away and made his head spin, he managed to get to his knees. It took all he had to get to his feet. A hand reached out to steady him and he looked up to see Aniko, concern on her face. “You going to be able to make it?”

Her eyes had always fascinated him, their depths so mysterious, so calm, and yet so passionate.

“Jack?”

Reality, Jack, you are dying in a dank alley on some god forsaken rock. Move your ass, or die.

He blinked, returning her gaze. “I always make it, Annie, you know that.”

She handed him one of the small weapons, her fingertips brushing his in the exchange, and he caught her eyes again, and she answered him. “I know, Jack, it was usually the number of pieces you arrived in that concerned me the most.”

He smiled slightly, taking the weapon and tucking it in the waistband of his pants as far away from his injury as possible. Turning towards Janet, he made the first painful moves towards getting both himself and her mobile. Aniko assisted him from the other side of the prone Doctor.

“You won’t get off this planet alive, O’Neill. You and your pretty little girlfriends will die. My men will see to that.”

O’Neill ignored him, his arm reaching around Janet to leaver her upright.

The criminal chuckled in his own slimy manner. “Do you realise how easy it was to obtain her? She walked up to us asking how we were, how we felt? Several of my men wanted to show her.”

O’Neill’s eyes flickered up at the criminal, but he refused to engage himself in what was obviously a ploy to anger him into making a mistake.

“They wanted to show her such a good time. But I’m afraid she resisted, so we had to….teach her a lesson.”

His hand caressed the handle sticking out of his waistband, but Janet’s eyes were on him, and they pleaded to him silently through both his and her pain. His arm wrapped around her and she clung weakly to him. Her weight was slight, but his ribs blossomed in agony regardless.

“Have you ever heard her scream, Colonel? It was such a sweet sound, it made me want to dig deeper.”

The gun had a life of its own. It was in his hand and pointed directly at the source of his annoyance. Turdo’s eyes were crafty as he stared back at him. “Come on, Colonel, you know you want to do it. Think of her lovely screams. Even if you kill me those screams will still be there.”

“Jack.” Aniko. “You ready to go?” They had Janet strung between them, and she had continued to try and maintain her footing, but finally her reserves had given out, either from pain or exhaustion, and she had gone limp, her full weight taken by the two of them. The three of them, huddled together in one mass of pain, began to make their way down the alley. The Stargate awaited.

They made it to the end of the alley, either one of them training a weapon on Turdo at all times. There was an unspoken agreement as they stepped up to the corner. Aniko took Janet’s weight, easing her around the corner.

Jack turned and walked back down the alley.

Turdo still stood arrogantly where they had left him. Jack ignored the various pains in his body, stood as upright as he could, and marched slowly up to the man who had done so much to one he cared for. He nailed him with his stare, seeing the reflection of his expression in the man’s eyes.

“Now it is your turn to scream.”

**********

Aniko heard the first gunshot, heard the screams, but expected no less.

Janet shuddered under her hands, and she hoped for both the doctor’s sake, as well as Jack’s, that she was still unconscious. Another scream, another shudder.

And suddenly Jack was there, his arm once again wrapped around Janet, his expression blank. She said nothing as they made their way up the street.

The screams still echoed in the distance.

**********

They made it to the gate.

They made it home.

Jack O’Neill used the last of his failing energy to take that last step through the wormhole. His first step on the other side collapsed beneath him and he, Aniko, and Janet found themselves face down on the gate ramp, their blood mingling as it splattered through the metal grating onto the concrete floor below.

Both Jack and Janet were taken away on gurneys, Aniko refused and stood, limping to face General Hammond.

“Major, you are in need of medical attention.”

“Sir, my report-“

“Your report can wait, Aniko, you are bleeding all over my gateroom.”

“Sir, I fully recommend we break off relations with the inhabitants of PXY-362. Their political system is unstable, and the majority of the capital city seems to be run by a series of thugs. The request for help was literally a way to gather hostages in order to bargain for technology and resources. I believe Doctor Fraiser was the first of many planned.”

“Aniko-“

“Sir, they tortured her for her information-“

“Major!”

She stopped startled. “Sir?”

“Diplomatic relations were severed the moment you, Colonel O’Neill, and Doctor Fraiser made it back. No-one ever needs to go back there.”

“Oh.”

He brought a fatherly hand to her shoulder. “Now, Annie, please let the doctors help you.”

She turned with him as he moved, but the room began to spin. “General, I-“

She saw his eyes meet hers, felt his hands clamp around her arms, but for a while there the world just went away.

**********

For the third time that day, she woke to arguing.

Two voices.

One male.

One female.

She rolled her eyes and grabbed a pillow and shoved on her head. If only the two of them would shut up.

He, as always when incapacitated, was whining, whinging, complaining, literally driving every person within hearing range, including herself, absolutely insane.

Now you would think Janet would make an ideal patient, but no. Doctors always make the worst patients, and in this case, worst included worse than Jack O’Neill. She didn’t complain, but she did second guess, she did try to run the infirmary from her own bed, and she did attempt to drive the Colonel crazy, which also made him worse.

And caught in the middle was her.

Maybe she should request a transfer back to the Alpha site. Doctor Benny was such a nice and quiet, mild mannered man, and his infirmary was always as quiet as he was.

The truth was, though, that despite the continual rangling and spats from her neighbour patients, she had had enough of quiet.

Those first few days after they had returned when it had been touch and go as to whether either of them would live, had left enough silence in her soul to last a lifetime.

She had seen SG-1 floating in and out of the infirmary hovering like they always had. Daniel had even stopped to play a game of chess with her, but the silence had remained in all of them.

Jack had awoken first. His sudden movement, an attempt to sit straight up in bed, had only been thwarted by a quick movement from Teal’c and an urgent call to Doctor Warner. His usual panic upon awakening amplified by the absence of Janet. Only multiple reassurances from his team had calmed him down.

It had gotten worse when Janet awoke.

She woke gently, surrounded by her staff, SG-1, even the General had been there this time, having been visiting Jack. She been reassured of everyone’s health and had drifted back to sleep.

Later that night, Aniko had been awake when Janet woke for the second time.

“Jack?” Her soft voice could be heard clearly in the dark and quiet infirmary.

“Janet?” Jack’s voice was firm and hopeful. “How are you feeling?”

She ignored his question, and asked him one of her own. “You killed him, didn’t you?”

The silence was long, but eventually Jack answered softly. “Yes, I did.”

“You didn’t have to.”

“Yes, I did.”

“No, you didn’t.”

“I did, Janet, for my sanity.”

The silence stretched out for a long time, and Aniko thought that perhaps the two of them had drifted off to sleep, but the quiet was once more broken by Janet’s soft voice. “At the risk of mine.”

Nothing more was said that night, and once both were awake the next day everything seemed normal between them, complete with the occasional ribbing, sarcastic comment, and incorrigible spate of grumbling.

But that late night conversation had left Aniko thinking that perhaps it wasn’t only Jack’s armour that had been broken, but Janet’s too.

They had broken each other, and now needed each other to be whole. Two halves to make one.

Aniko sighed into the pillow, and the voices continued to argue, but she found she wouldn’t have had it any other way.

Anything that could be broken could also be fixed, even though it may never be quite the same, it could sometimes be even better..

**********
FIN.