Epilogue

Yoshika had dragged herself away from the crash site. Fortunately, she had landed shield first, but that hadn't meant that she wasn't hurt at all. As best as she could figure, her right leg was broken, her left had a shattered knee, shin and ankle, her left shoulder was dislocated, and she suspected that she had some internal bleeding and a concussion. And she thought that the reason she wasn't that worried was due to shock, that's what made the most sense to her.

"You need to get well away from here," her father told her.

She looked up to see her father, with his hands in his coat pockets. "Dad…?"

"Sshh, don't talk," he said warmly, putting a finger over her lips, "Don't waste any energy you don't have to." He pointed at her legs, "better fix that before you bleed out."

Yoshika looked at her legs which were dragging along the ground behind, leaving quite a trail of blood between her and the crash site. It turned out that her right leg wasn't broken, but mangled with several jagged parts of her Striker sticking out. "Oh." She looked back up at her father, "What should I do, there aren't any bandages?"

"Tear your shirt and use that as a tourniquet," he suggested.

Yoshika's eyes widened, "Of course!" She tore her shirt from the bottom, careful to make it into an inch and a half thick strip about two metres long. She wrapped it around the top her leg twice, tightly, and tied it off. It was tight enough to just about cut off circulation, or at least that's what she thought.

"What now?" Yoshika asked her father, looking around at the surrounding trees.

"You need to find some sort of shelter," he said with a reassuring smile, "one of the Goa'uld death gliders crashed nearby, it might be able to provide some cover."

"That's right," she smiled, "Um, I don't know where that is."

"I'll show you," he said with that same reassuring smile.

"Thank you, dad."

He walked off and she followed him, dragging her legs across the ground. Soon she could see a trail of smoke billowing up into the air, soon after that, she saw the wreckage of the Goa'uld death glider, a wing sticking out of the ground enough to provide some shelter.

Yoshika's father helped her get under the wing and then went to get some firewood, saying, "It will be night soon, we'd better get a fire started and find you something to eat."

She smiled and curled up under the wing and closed her eyes. She was happy to see her father again.

Before she could fall asleep properly, someone tapped her on the cheek. She opened her eyes and saw her father, a concerned look on his face, "Hey, hey, don't go to sleep, you've got a concussion."

"That's right…"

He grabbed both her shoulders and knelt down to look her in the eye, "Promise me you'll stay awake."

"I promise." Even though she was tired, she wouldn't go to sleep.

He father left and she sat there, looking at the broken trees around her. There were a few small dead or wounded animals around the place too, but there was nothing she could do for them, there was barely anything she could do for herself. It was a good thing that her father was there to help her.

Yoshika didn't know how long it took for her father to return, but the sun had nearly set. "I'm sorry, but I couldn't find any food," he said, piling up some sticks and trying to start a fire.

"That's okay," she said, "I'm not hungry, anyway." It was a lie, she was quite hungry, but she didn't want to make her father feel bad.

Finally, he got the fire started and then sat next to Yoshika, putting his arm over her shoulders. "I missed you so much," she said, snuggling into his chest.

"I know," he replied, putting his other arm around her head and holding her tight, "I know."

The air was surprisingly calm considering the events of the previous day. Shirley was doing her third sweep of the area, along with every other able bodied Witch in the region. None of them were going to give up the search for Yoshika, even if the chances of her having survived were slim at best. They would find her, of that she was certain.

"I found her!" Lynette squealed with glee, "I found her!"

"Give me your location," Shirley ordered.

Yoshika blinked several times and noticed it was morning, and that the fire was just a pile of smouldering ashes.

"Dad?" she said, looking around for her father, "Dad, where are you?" The roar of magical engines echoed in the distance and overhead, but Yoshika didn't care about any of that, she wanted to know where her father was. "Dad?!"

"How is she?" Shirley asked as she landed at the crashed Goa'uld death glider that Lynette said Yoshika was at and dismounted her Strikers. Barkhorn was there too, along with Major Sakamoto, both of whom were seeing to Yoshika's wounds. Lynette on the other hand was distraught, Shirley suspected at seeing her best friend in such a condition.

"It's not looking good," Barkhorn said with little emotion in her voice, "Unless we can get a medical here, she's going to lose her leg, and the other one smells infected, and that's only if she survives. I don't even know how she managed to survive the night."

"Shirley, see to Lynette, if you can't calm her down, get her out of here," Major Sakamoto ordered, before saying a in a voice Shirley thought no one was meant to hear, "I can't concentrate with that crying."

"Dad…" Yoshika got out as Shirley walked over to the sobbing Lynette and put a reassuring arm over her shoulders, "hey, cone on, let's leave them be, okay?"

Lynette nodded and Shirley led her away from the death glider.

"I think we've done all we can for this leg," Major Sakamoto said, talking about Yoshika's mangled leg as she threw away an empty packet of field dressing. Gertrude nodded and moved over slightly so that Major Sakamoto could get in a better position to help with the merely broken leg. Neither had much medical training or experience, but they were all that was available at the moment, however the chances of that mattering much were slim. Gertrude hadn't told Shirley about the Fuso girl's other injuries; she was in shock, dehydrated, and had countless cuts and bruises.

"Okay, Yoshika," Major Sakamoto said calmly but firmly, "This is going to hurt, I need you to bite down on this," she put a thick bit of stick wrapped equally thickly in cloth in her mouth.

"Ready?" Gertrude asked, her hands ready to push the broken bits of leg back together so that the Major could apply a makeshift splint.

Major Sakamoto nodded.

Gertrude took a deep breath and realigned the bones, and the Major began tying a stick to it.

Yoshika bit down on the stick for a moment and then screamed out in pain.

Pain shot through Yoshika's entire body, bringing her crashing back down to reality. "GARGH! Fffuu… urgh!"

Gertrude reached into her trauma kit and got the syrette of morphine. She pulled the cap off with her teeth and stabbed it into Yoshika's leg. Major Sakamoto had done the same.

Shirley pulled Lynette's head into her chest and wrapped her arms around her head so that her ears were covered. That scream… Shirley had to bite her lip, that scream was horrible.

After a moment, it died down a little and Shirley released Lynette and looked her in the eye, "Now, Lynette, I need you to wait here until someone gets you, okay? Can you do that?"

Lynette managed a nod.

Shirley pulled the pin on her one smoke grenade and dropped it at her feet as she walked away, talking over the radio, "I need someone to come a get Lynette out of here. She's within ten feet of the red smoke."

"I'm on it," Sanya replied.

Shirley let out a sigh of relief; it was for the best that Sanya be the one to take Lynette away. Sanya would likely have the same reaction at seeing Yoshika as Lynette had.

Snapping back to reality, Shirley ran back to the wounded Yoshika, sliding on her knees to Barkhorn's side and pulling up her sleeves, "What do you need me to do?"

"Morphine," the Major answered, "right leg."

"We've already given her two shots," Barkhorn said.

"Listen to the girl!" Major Sakamoto growled, flinging her arm at Yoshika, "Give her the damn morphine."

Wordlessly, Shirley got her morphine Syrette out of her trauma kit and plunged it into Yoshika's leg, who was biting down on a thick stick wrapped in fabric that looked like it was about to break, and she was still managing to scream. Jesus Christ, how much pain could she possibly be in?

Suddenly, Yoshika stopped screaming and she slumped.

"Her pulse is slowing!" a frantic Barkhorn said, holding two fingers on Yoshika's jugular.

"Where the hell is that medic!?" Major Sakamoto shouted into her radio, "We're losing her!"

"Keep her alive for two more minutes," Shirley heard the Colonel reply.

"Come on, stay with us," Shirley said to Yoshika, tapping her on the cheek and then pulling open her eyelid to see if the pupil dilated, "Don't you give up now, come on, stay with us."

"Colonel, send the truck our way" Minna said over the radio to Jack who was in the CIC. Both Minna and Hartmann had been the closest Witches to the base with some level of medical experience, so they had returned to gather what medical supplies they could carry before seeing to Sergeant Miyafuji.

"Copy that, I'll send Daniel right away," he replied before going to the wall mounted phone and dialling 04 for the hanger, "Daniel, take Juutilainen and Clostermann with you."

"Yes, sir," was the reply a moment later.

Jack walked over to the radio and put the headset back on, "Daniel, Clostermann and Juutilainen are en route. ETA thirty five minutes."

"That's fine," Minna replied, "I think we can keep her stable for that long."

Everyone waited outside the hastily erected surgery. It had been several hours since Sergeant Miyafuji had been rescued, and the infirmary had been turned into a surgical room the moment the field surgeons had arrived. Jack was surprised that it had only taken an hour for them to arrive once called.

"So," Jack said to Minna, finally breaking the silence, every person in the room looking up and staring at him, "Your governments are none the wiser about the bomb?"

Minna looked back down at her hands, "No. As far as they know, while we were conducting an operation and the Neuroi Hive... it just went kaput."

Major Sakamoto smiled slightly, though Jack could tell it was a fake smile, "Rumours are already spreading, something about the Neuroi Hive being like a battleship inside, and that something went wrong. Another says it was a secret group of Witches who infiltrated it, destroying it from the inside. And then there's one that we're housing people from a different time, people with advanced technology capable of swiftly dispatching Neuroi." She laughed, but Jack knew the laugh to be as fake as her smile, "I find that last one to be a preposterous."

"Is this humour, Major Sakamoto?" Teal'c asked. He was still trying to get to grips with human nature.

Minna sighed and stood up. "Come on. Lynette may stay, but the rest of us have work to do."

Just as the others were reluctantly getting up to leave, the door to the makeshift surgery burst open, the medical Witch and the surgeon coming out, pulling down their masks. "She'll live," he said, "won't be able to walk for some weeks and will need a number of months in rehab, but she'll live."

"She barely didn't make," the medical Witch said angrily, "if we hadn't gotten here when we did, you idiots probably would have given her another unit of morphine, wouldn't you? That alone nearly bloody killed her." She shook her finger, "there is a reason there's only one syrette in your trauma kits."

"Thank you, Manon," Minna said to the medical Witch, "remember…"

"Yeah, yeah," Manon said, raising her hand with a teasing smile, "We didn't see or hear anything."

"Thank you," Minna replied.

"Okay everyone," Major Sakamoto barked loudly, "Miyafuji will survive, you can all go back to work."