A/N: Merry Christmas! I do, indeed, live! I have a chapter as a Christmas present for you all, even! I really am sorry about the wait. Real life's been kicking my butt lately. That, plus moving...yeah. Brain no worky even when I do have time. Anyway, here's the chapter. Enjoy!

Part 3

Chapter 12: Reading the Signs

Doctor Carolyn Lam sat in the small security room, watching the fuzzy black-haloed-in-blue-surrounded-by-white shape on the monitors in front of her. He—and she couldn't quite shake the subconscious feeling that she knew it was a he no matter how she tried to maintain her doctor's objectivity—was, as far as she could tell, breathing steadily. It frustrated those same doctor-instincts more than a little that she couldn't directly see or touch him in order to check on his well-being. She knew her father and many of the military personnel around saw him as a potential threat, but she couldn't help thinking of him as a patient first. A patient she wasn't able to treat.

The IR footage of the boy's—entity's, she harshly corrected herself—reaction to the force field cage he—it'd been caught in replayed in horrific Technicolor in her mind. The clear panic and disregard for injury had been jarring enough, but her subconscious kept overlaying the face of a pale, wide-eyed teenager with bright blue irises almost invisible from blown pupils and a shock of white hair, making the scene all the more horrific in a deep-seated child's-primal-fear way. She had no idea where her brain had dredged up such odd details, but ruled it as unimportant in the current scheme of things.

She was brought back to the present by a noticeable twitch in the b—entity's hand coupled with a barely noticeable hitch in the steady rise and fall of his chest. "Waking up are we?" she said softly, allowing herself a small smile.

She paid no heed to the nearby Airman calling Col. Carter in her lab. She found her eyes glued to the screen, watching in blurred thermographic detail the classic signs of a person awakening from the effects of a zat'nik'tel. Fine tremors, inferred from the increased blurring of the image's edges were starting to take over the b—screw it—boy's limbs. Of course…right then is when her father decided to burst in the room.

"Report!" barked Gen. Landry with Col. Carter in tow. She suppressed a wince at his brusque manner, forcing herself to acknowledge that it was his base, after all. She settled for leveling him an even glare.

"He's showing classic signs of regaining consciousness after a zat stun. I'd guess we've got less than a minute."

Her father raised an eyebrow as Col. Carter gave her an odd look. "He?" they asked in unison, "What makes you say that?" The Colonel followed up, curiously.

Carolyn shrugged and opened her mouth to answer, but was abruptly cut off by the figure on the screen shooting upright, leaving a blue streak after-image in its wake.

"Whoa!" exclaimed Col. Carter as she took a step back in surprise from the monitors. The image resolved itself after a few seconds into what Carolyn recognized as the classic posture of someone hyperventilating.

"Crap!" She said, grabbing the intercom microphone on pure instinct and using her "doctor voice" to try and start talking the boy down to a more regular breathing rhythm.

"What the hell?" Her father demanded.

She shot him a glare over her shoulder and took her finger off of the microphone button for a moment. "That," she snapped, stabbing her finger at the screen, "is a classic panic attack. Now, if you want to be able to communicate with him anytime soon, you'll let me do my job before he passes out from hypoxia." With that, she turned back to the microphone and continued her calming guidance.

It took a full five minutes for the boy to calm down, sending a thankful wave before levering himself up on the vague stick-like-object he carried. Carolyn sighed, knowing that she was in for a bit of interrogation, herself, before the boy was questioned. She stood and squared her shoulders, facing the General.

To his credit, all he did was quirk an eyebrow, that familiar gesture he'd used on her since she was little. "Look, I don't know why, but everything about him screams 'teenage boy' to me. The form is consistent with a thin one, and his actions as we were able to record since coming on base are consistent with a curious, if somewhat mischievous child. I have little doubt that if he were human, what we would've seen right there would've been a hyperventilating boy, pupils dilated from panic." She shifted uncomfortably and pulled back on the hostility and harshness in her tone that usually came out when addressing her father. "I wish I could explain better, but that's my gut instinct, and nothing in my concrete knowledge as a doctor has contradicted it yet."

He studied her for a moment before answering. "Very well. In your medical opinion, do you think –he– is capable of answering a few questions now?"

She turned and studied the figure hobblingly exploring the confines of his cell, a little mollified by her father's acknowledgement of her male classification of the boy. "I think so. From that little episode a few minutes ago, he may even understand English." She shrugged, "but I don't know how or if he'd be able to answer back."

"We'll cross that bridge when we come to it." Col. Carter said with a soft smile. "We've got microphone feeds that can pick up most frequencies, including a bit of ancient tech for hopefully detecting phased frequencies. Unfortunately we won't know until we try."

"Let's get started, then." Landry said before leaning over the intercom microphone and pressing the button. "I am General Landry. Who are you and what are your intentions towards my base?"

"Right to the point, I see." Snarked Carolyn with a raised eyebrow.

"I find it expedites matters." He replied blandly.

The three watched as the boy's head snapped up in reaction to the query, leaving a faint blue motion trail behind it as it swiveled around, attempting to find the source of the sound before settling on the camera in the upper corner of the room. Hesitantly, he shifted his stick to one arm and made some difficult-to-follow gestures with his hands.

Col. Carter caught the General's eye with a shake small shake of her head. None of the audio feeds she was studying on her computer had detected anything.

Carolyn, in the meantime, couldn't help but think that those gestures seemed somehow familiar.

"I'm sorry, I didn't catch that." Landry said to the boy, clearly hoping to give the Colonel more to work with.

More gestures, wider and more agitated this time followed this statement. "General," Dr. Lam said, voicing her growing suspicion, "I don't think you're going to pick up anything on the microphones. I think those gestures are how he communicates."

"Hmm…" He mused, but before he could say anything else to either her or the imprisoned boy, the Airman everyone had all but forgotten about piped up with a surprised, "Wait….is that ASL!?"

A/N: Well, there ya go. Not much plot advancement, but a good fill-in for those of you wondering just who talked him down. For those that aren't familiar with the latter part of Stargate, Dr. Carolyn Lam is the replacement head medic. She also happens to be the daughter of the current head of Stargate Command. She also doesn't like her father all that much because she resents how he put his career before her mother and her. Hope that clears it up for you guys.

Some people have commented to me that I shouldn't put review responses here. I know that I, personally, like seeing someone acknowledge my constructive and information-seeking questions/critiques right out in public. I will, however, try to keep it to the ones that either answer a question that I believe many would want the answer to or which would take only a few words to answer. I'll leave all the ones that are just "thanks, appreciate it" out.

Review responses:

PascalDragon: Those two episodes seemed like the best examples of ways the two worlds would've interacted before. As I said in the AN for the Solitudes, portion. I used Jack to fill in plothole bits that always bugged me. Touchstone...not my favorite episode in general, and I love NID bashing. Plus, it gave me a perfect opportunity to play with the Furlings a bit. I also hope my description answers your question about the IR cameras. I did a chunk of research on the resolution and required temperature differential for them.

That's it for now,

Tzapporah Signing off!