Summary

Near death from a deadly virus contracted at the end of "Frozen," Colonel Jack O'Neill agreed to have himself implanted with a Tok'ra symbiote that would heal him, and also through him would relay vital information about the Gou'ald. Rather than stay in an unwilling host the Tok'ra left O'Neill's body.

With the symbiote departed, O'Neill now finds himself suspended in midair — pinned against a wall in a Goa'uld outpost and being tortured to death repeatedly by a maniac system lord named Baal. Every time O'Neill dies, Baal revives him in a Goa'uld sarcophagi. Baal is convinced that O'Neill knows the secret mission of his former Tok'ra symbiote, since the symbiote and the host share traits and memories.

Eventually, the repeated resurrections will turn O'Neill into a vegetable. In between torture sessions, he is returned to an anti-gravity holding cell where he sees, impossibly, his old teammate and friend Daniel Jackson — whom everyone thought had sacrificed his life (in the fifth-season episode "Meridian").

Daniel explains how he has ascended to higher a plane of existence, but cannot interfere with human matters. He can, however, help O'Neill to ascend before Baal or the sarcophagus kill him.

O'Neill, who has already given up the name of his symbiote, Kanan, begs Daniel to kill him. One more session with Baal, and O'Neill fears he may give up Kanan's secret — that he loved Baal's slave girl, whom he had used as an informant. Kanan had come back using O'Neill's body in order to save her.

At Stargate Commanbd, Carter, Teal'c and Jonas Quinn have figured out a way to disrupt the operations of the outpost fortress long enough to give O'Neill a fighting chance to escape. They convinced a Goa'uld ally named Lord Yu to use his mothership to knock out Baal's power generators. Daniel knows about the plan to help O'Neill before they employ it, and fills O'Neill in. When the chance comes and the power to his cell is cut, O'Neill beats the guard senseless and then rescues the Goa'uld slave girl. In the end, the girl decides to stay with the Tok'ra and contribute to the cause in Kanan's name.

Back at SGC, O'Neill does some serious bedtime, with Carter, Teal'c and Jonas at his side. Daniel is there as well, visible only to O'Neill, to say goodbye to Jack one last time.