Stargate SG-1: Trial by Fire: SG1-1 by Sabine C. Bauer Page A

wasn't in the
mood for cookies."
    This response took Teal'c by surprise. It had been worthy of
O'Neill. But like O'Neill, she used flippancy to conceal her anxiety
from herself and from others.
    Major Carter was pointing the flashlight at a waxen face. The
eyes stared wide open, etched with an expression of rage and
surprise. Almost exactly between them gaped the entry wound, its
size consistent with a 9 mm round. Even without this additional
confirmation he would have been certain. The Tyreans did not
possess firearms. The Jaffa peered past gloomy tree boles and at
the ghostly shapes of men who lingered on the path, whipped by
the rain and the biting wind that had risen.
    "Priest! You requested proof that O'Neill was not aiding the
attackers," he called out. "You may wish to view this."
    A tall, white-haired figure emerged from the group and
cautiously glided into the forest. A pair of guards escorted him,
lighting the way. It was true that Kandaulo had demanded proof,
but he would not relish seeing it. Men such as he resented having
their assumptions overthrown by fact. Conceivably this and the
humiliation that went with it would heighten the priest's hostility.
    When he arrived, he regarded the corpse with disdain. "Is
this your proof? You have seen what the Phrygians do. They are
animals. His fellow bandits could have killed him."
    "They could not." Teal'c permitted himself a minute smile. It
was as he had foreseen. "Which of their weapons would cause a
wound such as this? Turn him around."
    The guards obeyed and recoiled when they beheld what the
Jaffa already knew to be there. The back of the dead man's skull
was missing, disclosing a mess of blood and brain matter. At last Kandaulo's scorn gave way to uncertainty.

    "What did this?" he rasped.
    "A small piece of metal ejected at high speed from the weapon
O'Neill used."
    "But this cannot be! You are -"
    "Dammit!"
    While they were debating, Major Carter had continued to search
the area. Clearly with some success, although she did not appear to
welcome the results. Retrieving an object from beneath a patch of
fern some ten meters to the right, she straightened up abruptly.
    "Want me to demonstrate, Kandaulo?"
    An instant later, the nature of her discovery became obvious.
She fired, and the bullet tore into a tree trunk behind the priest,
provoking a shocked outcry. It was Kandaulo's good fortune that
Major Carter's fury did not affect her marksmanship, and perhaps
it would teach him not to employ the term `woman' in a pejorative
fashion. Teal'c did not wait for this, admittedly unlikely, event to
occur. He joined his team mate.
    "It's Colonel O'Neill's Beretta, and it doesn't look like he
dropped it deliberately. The safety was off, and there are three
rounds left in the magazine, counting the one he'd chambered."
She swiped rain water from her face, and her voice sounded rough
with anxiety. "He said he didn't need backup. Why the hell did I
listen to him?"
    The Jaffa could have given several answers to this query, none of
them helpful. At this stage the evidence suggested that O'Neill had
succumbed to vastly superior numbers. Major Carter's presence
would have made no difference.
    "We should proceed," he advised, silently admitting that he
dreaded what else they might come upon.
    The ground around the ferns was trampled, footprints converging
on it and verifying Teal'c's first impression. A fight had taken place
here. Within a short time they had collected two further items: the
peculiar seating device the Professor had employed earlier in the
evening and a Bowie knife. The knife lay trodden into the soil a
few meters away from the location where Major Carter had found
the sidearm. There could be little doubt that O'Neill had been disarmed, and that Professor Kelly had indeed been with him.

    However, the near total absence of blood was encouraging.
Teal'c had seen the massacre on the ship and he had seen the
sword lying