Nesert

1.15

"SHIT!"

Tessa had tried to move her body as she woke and the pain had sucked the air right out of her lungs, leaving her fearful of taking another breath. When she finally opened her eyes, Dr. Frasier was standing over her.

"Are you alright?"

She clenched her teeth as her body went rigid, trying to keep from moving. "Is this how normal people feel pain?"

The truth was, Tessa had only ever experienced intense pain with Sekhmet, who had also been quick to heal her back up again. She had been fully capable of enduring the initial pain of the torture, but this...this healing pain was nearly unbearable.

"Just take some deep breaths. Would you like some meds to help with the pain?" It was amazing that Dr. Frasier could be so caring even with a possible traitor like Tessa.

"No." She smiled weakly, her eyes pressing shut again. "I would guess I'm at high risk for never wanting to stop taking them and I'd rather not add drug addiction to my ever growing list of mental health issues." She laughed at her own joke, gasping from the pain again. "On second thought, maybe just a little."

The drug worked quickly to dull the edges slicing her muscles, but Tessa still did her best to not move very much. Once the pain wasn't her main focus she began to take in her surroundings. She closed her eyes again as she recognized the room, possibly the same one Apophis had died in and she had been held in with Sekhmet.

It had seemed like the right choice at the time, deciding to be Tessa, but it was jumping off a cliff. It was that moment where you make a decision you can't take back and then have to endure the fall. But this fall just wouldn't end and she wasn't sure what lie at the bottom.

She could still be Tessa, right? She could be that laughing girl again. She could push aside Sekhmet's memories to make room for her own. She could. She wanted to be Tessa again. No more lying. No more destruction.

She could just be a girl again.

She could.

She could.

"I'm feeling a bit of deja vu. How 'bout you?"

Tessa sighed deeply as O'Neill waltzed in, realizing the enormity of the task before her. How could she possibly convince anyone she was Tessa and that she could be trusted?

"No. It may be the same room, but I was a host back then."

"And you're not now."

Tessa met his eyes before closing her own with another sigh. "No. I'm not."

"Because you're not really acting like it. You're acting like a goa'uld."

"I know." She swallowed hard. Here goes. "You have to understand, Colonel, when Sekhmet died, she left behind everything. Everything. Her memories, her knowledge, her skills--"

"And you didn't think to share any of that?"

Tessa could understand his disgust. "She also left her needs, her desires...goa'uld emotions seem stronger than human ones. I needed what she needed. I wanted what she wanted. I knew if I told you that before...I'd find myself in a nice little cell in Area 51. The crazed Butcher with useful information. I had to leave before I killed someone here."

"So you took Airman Harris hostage...again."

"Poor Ronnie." The thought of him allowed her the briefest of smiles. "He has a special talent for being in the wrong place at the wrong time." She caught the colonel's eyes again. "But it was Sekhmet who took him hostage the first time."