For a long time, Aral and the stranger stared at one another, saying nothing. They could have served as mirror images: sitting ramrod straight in their chairs, eyes level, lips pressed tightly together.

"You serve your country well, sir," Aral said at last, breaking a silence that had stretched for nearly an hour.

"I don't appreciate being drugged," the man said, his voice tight with restrained anger.

Aral inclined his head in acknowledgment. "The fast-penta was necessary, Colonel," he said, his tone courteous but unapologetic. "I am bound to serve my Emperor and protect him."

Colonel O'Neill folded his arms and allowed his scowl to deepen. "And how much danger do you think a single man, separated from his time and his team, can be?"

Aral paused for a moment, hearing the underlying dread between that bitter recognition of the baring of the colonel's soul. This man was truly cast adrift, exiled from his people, his era, his charge. He remembered a time when he, too, had lost everything, including his honor. Did Colonel O'Neill think that the fast-penta had taken that, too?

"The drug is infallible," he repeated. "It may only be cheated by death."

O'Neill gave a half-shrug. "I've tried that option before. There are worse things."

I wanted to mention green silk rooms and Shades of Grey, but you got this instead. :)