fic: The Other Life Unlived - Part 2/9
Jun. 1st, 2008 06:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
seldearTITLE: The Other Life Unlived - Part 2
CATEGORY: AU, action-adventure, drama
RATING: PG-13
Part 1
The Other Life Unlived
Part 2
Her brain still hadn't cleared by the time SG-1 had assembled around the briefing room table to watch the video interrogation of the two men from the alternate reality.
"...Look, I've told you all this already," snapped the Colonel O'Neill on the TV screen. "Now I want to talk to someone from the SGA!"
"SGA?" The interrogator was quiet and disbelieving, the voice of the eternal sceptic. Sam could well understand why the Colonel on the videotape was losing his temper. "There's no such organisation."
The wide mouth thinned and the dark eyes narrowed. "I was on Black Ops missions back when you were still polishing shoes, mister. Believe me, there's an organisation equivalent to the SGA around here somewhere. You probably call it something else – the Stargate Project or Stargate Command – hell, for all I know, you might call it the Patty and Selma Files – but it's around here somewhere or you wouldn't have had a mirror for us to come through."
"The Stargate," said the interrogator calmly. "Tell me about this 'Stargate' – what do you know about it?"
"You know exactly what I know about it," snapped Jack O'Neill at the man. "I just told you!"
"So tell me again."
"Oh, for crying out loud." The man threw his hands in the air. "All right then. It's a big round circle of metal that can take you to other planets. It..." He paused. "It creates a subspace wormhole – like the way a worm goes straight through an apple instead of all the way around it." He appeared to think about that a minute – enough time for Sam to catch Daniel's disbelieving stare from her to the Colonel to the man on the video. She'd tried to explain subspace wormhole theory to the Colonel before and never yet managed to make any of it stick!
Maybe her equivalent in the other reality just explained it better.
The Colonel continued again. "Maybe it's the other way around – I never got that bit. Anyway, what that means in practical terms is that four years ago, Dr. Samantha Carter figured out how to get the Stargate to work, and since then, we've been going through the Stargate to explore the galaxy. Then, a week ago, Goa'uld ships descended on the planet, started bombing the living daylights out of every major city on Earth and making slaves of the population."
The general paused the tape and glanced around the table.
"Okay," the Colonel said, raising his right hand in the air. "I'm weirded out. Is anyone else weirded out?"
"It's possible, sir," Sam could only say. "If Daniel went through the mirror to another reality..."
"But that's not the Jack O'Neill I met when I went through to that other reality," Daniel said. "He's dead."
"Cheerful, Daniel," the Colonel drawled. "Lemme get this straight – this guy comes from an alternate alternate reality?"
Daniel thought about that one for a moment. "Apparently." Sam suspected that actually experiencing an alternate reality had helped Daniel deal with the instinctive reaction, which was: What the hell is going on here?
"So does anyone but me have a problem with this?"
Teal'c was the one to address the issue that appeared to be most concerning the Colonel. "Which reality is actually real?"
"Thank you!"
Almost universally, her team-mates and commanding officers looked to Sam for the answer. "Well, all of them. They're all valid universes; it's just that there's an infinite number of variations on them – each one diverging where a choice is made."
"So that means that somewhere there's a universe where I understood what you just said?" Colonel O'Neill asked, pointedly.
General Hammond appeared to decide that it was best to move the conversation back to its original purpose. "They've asked to be debriefed. I'd like you to participate."
Sam glanced over at the Colonel who shrugged, although he looked distinctly uncomfortable.
In fact, he looked about as comfortable as the other Colonel O'Neill who walked into the room, took one look at Teal'c and lunged for him, his face a mask of fury.
"What the hell is he doing here?" The SFs by the door leaped to restrain him, and the Colonel pushed his chair back, providing a very effective barrier between Teal'c and his would-be attacker.
"Hey!"
The Colonel's shout came simultaneous with General Hammond's barked, "Colonel!"
The voice of authority, combined with the restraining strength of the SF's and the equally lean bulk of Colonel O'Neill stopped the alternate Colonel short. Teal'c hadn't moved, even as the other man made for him, instead he regarded the alternate Colonel with a querying eyebrow.
"What's he doing here?" The O'Neill jerked his chin at Teal'c, restrained in body but not in spirit.
"He's a member of SG-1," Daniel said from beside Sam.
"And who the hell are you?"
"Oh, um, I'm Daniel Jackson. Also a member of SG-1."
That didn't impress O'Neill. His eyebrows went up and he glanced from Kawalsky to the Colonel.
"Have a seat, Colonel," General Hammond said, indicating the chair down the end. The one on the other side of Teal'c.
It seemed to be trusting the alternate O'Neill's ability to resist taking his anger out on Teal'c rather more than Sam would have trusted it. However, it appeared Colonel O'Neill shared Sam's misgivings, because he touched Teal'c on the shoulder and indicated that they should swap seats.
When they were all finally settled, the Colonel was opposite Sam, with his other-world equivalent beside him. Teal'c sat up near the head of the table, next to General Hammond, and Sam was flanked by Daniel on one side and Kawalsky on the other.
Sam wanted to shake her head in confusion. While she understood the principle of the situation rooted in physics concepts, the practical situation was...well, unbelievable.
And yet the evidence of her eyes – as well as the scientific proof of Janet's examinations of both men – showed two identical men, sitting side by side. The only difference was the haircut - the newcomer looked a little better groomed. Two men who were each other's might-have-been – a mere possibility to the other, a reality to themselves.
It would, she thought, be the work of a lifetime – the Colonel's lifetime! – to determine what events in their lives had been the same and which had been different. Because there had to have been differences, no matter how clear it was that some things had been the same.
The military, for example. Stargate Command. The SGC. Known as the SGA in the other world, something must have differed in their development – otherwise the other world wouldn't be under the thumb of the Goa'uld even now.
Sam stifled a shudder in her chair. It was a terrifying thought; the six billion people of Earth, exterminated, enslaved, becoming hosts to Goa'uld.
It didn't happen here.
But it happened somewhere. Somewhere from which these two men had come, seeking a better world.
"First of all," General Hammond began, "I'd like to say we know what you've been through. Dr. Jackson experienced a similar alternate reality some time ago on a mission to P3X-233."
"We found the mirror on some mission anyway," O'Neill said. "Someone stumbled across it and brought it back, and the next minute, S...Dr. Carter had a new toy to play with."
"Sounds like Carter." The Colonel quirked half a smile at her and she smiled, a little uneasy with the almost proprietal attitude he was taking towards her - to say nothing of O'Neill's look. There was something too intense about the way he was watching her - it was getting on her nerves.
"Fortunately for us," Hammond said, "Dr. Jackson was able to return with some intelligence that enabled SG-1 to stop the Goa'uld attack on Earth."
Daniel shifted in his chair, just a little uncomfortable as he became the recipient of a pair of judging gazes.
"Sweet," O'Neill commented. Then he frowned. "Jackson...Jackson...wait. You're the guy who blew off Catherine Langford about the Stargate, right?"
"That's two for two, Daniel," the Colonel murmured. "Should we be grateful for your exalted presence on this project after all?"
Daniel shot him a brief, irritated glare before he turned his attention back to O'Neill. "As a matter of fact, I didn't 'blow off' Catherine about the Stargate." He pushed his glasses back up his nose, "That was the version of me that existed in your universe."
"Assuming he exists anymore," Kawalsky muttered cynically. He looked around the table, "Our last reports before we came through indicated that about half the Earth's population is gone. The Goa'uld stayed in high orbit and bombed the living daylights out of us - and then, once we were all nice and tenderised, they put their footsoldiers down on the planet to round us up." He glared down the table at Teal'c who regarded him emotionlessly. "Guys like him."
"Teal'c's a friend," the Colonel said with a grim note of authority in his voice. "He's proven himself time and time again."
The two men weren't convinced. Both of them shot wary looks at Teal'c, but it was the other Colonel who spoke. "You'll have to excuse us for being slightly cynical." He levelled a dark steel gaze at Teal'c, as though fixing the Jaffa's face in his memory for later recall.
"And you'll have to excuse us for not sharing it," the Colonel retorted.
"Colonels."
It still never ceased to amaze Sam just how the General managed to imbue a single word with such delicate warning. The two men - two variations on the same theme of O'Neill - could argue all they want; but in this mountain, Hammond commanded.
"We've brought the mirror to the mountain," the General continued. "It's under solid guard."
"We can't go back, sir," Kawalsky said with a glance at the Colonel. "General Hammond - I mean, our General - ordered us to escape by any means possible."
"He didn't consider leaving himself?" Daniel asked, puzzled.
Sam knew the answer to that. "He was still assigned to his command, Daniel." She glanced at the General, reassuring herself that it was the path he'd have taken, and saw the truth in his eyes. He also would have stayed at his post and ordered his people to escape.
Two worlds, one man. Some things didn't change from world to world.
And nothing reinforced that more than the expression of the man who sat next to Colonel O'Neill, an odd look on his face. He regarded her with the expression of a man who'd seen something unexpected and unwelcome materialise before his eyes.
In that, he was quite a contrast to the Colonel, whose approval of her statement sent tendrils of warmth through her belly.
There was no doubt in Sam's mind that the whole situation was just a little bit eerie. They were mirror images of each other, but there had been such significant differences between their world that one now lay under the thumb of the Goa'uld, and two men of that world had escaped to the other.
She couldn't help wondering about those differences.
"So the question arises as to what we're going to do with you," General Hammond said, continuing the train of conversation he'd initially begun.
"We'll take asylum, assuming you're offering it," O'Neill a moment later. "There's nothing for us back there anymore." The savage note rung through his voice, and Sam met his gaze and saw in his eyes the loss of the world he'd failed to protect.
"That will depend on my superiors, Colonel."
"Although we can always do with more experienced officers," the Colonel offered.
General Hammond nodded, all the acknowledgement he was willing to make at this time. "In the meantime, we've assigned you temporary accommodation." He glanced at the SFs. "There'll be a guard presence at your door."
The other Colonel nodded. "Expected, sir. We'd do the same if it were the other way around."
"Dismissed. Take them to the A3 quarters."
That finished the formal debriefing quite effectively.
Informally, however...
"I know it's been a long day," Daniel began as they got up from their chairs.
"And we have no desire to make it any longer," O'Neill said shortly, rolling his shoulders slightly as he stood and looked down the table at Daniel.
Sam's team-mate was persistent. "Then maybe when you've had a chance to sit down and process it all..."
"Daniel..."
"Jack, I've only got a few questions..."
"Daniel, it's never 'a few questions' with you."
Major Kawalsky had stood at the same time as O'Neill; now he frowned, "Questions such as?"
"Well, any of the differences between your world and ours," Daniel said, with the tone of someone who felt it was perfectly obvious what he would ask. "It would help to find out what factors played a part in the Goa'uld being in a position to take over Earth..."
"Other than you?" O'Neill asked pointedly.
"Well, actually, not just me - you mentioned Sam too, but since you addressed her as 'Dr. Carter', I'm guessing she wasn't in the military."
"No," O'Neill's eyes slid from Daniel to Sam, and back to Daniel. "She wasn't."
"When Dr. Jackson decided to stick it out in the land of academia, Dr. Carter took on the job of getting the Stargate open," Kawalsky said. "She was our Stargate expert."
Not wholly surprising. In the other universe, she'd also opened the Stargate in lieu of Daniel. Sam opened her mouth to ask a question about Dr. Carter, and was interrupted by the Colonel, who'd picked up on something she hadn't noticed.
"'Was'?"
Something went very still in both men. O'Neill looked down at his hands, and Kawalsky looked to O'Neill before he said, "She died in the initial assault on the mountain. Wrong place, wrong time, and too many of them to fight." There was a quiet bitterness in his voice as he spoke, and he shot a venomous glance at Teal'c.
"She was the one who had the idea about the mirror," O'Neill said quietly, lifting his gaze to look at Sam. "Actually, she had a lot of ideas."
"Sounds like Carter," the Colonel said. He flashed her a quick almost-smile, but she didn't smile back. There was something very intense in O'Neill's gaze - something she'd never seen in her own commanding officer's eyes - and she wasn't sure what it was.
She didn't have time to identify it; O'Neill turned to Daniel. "We've just lost everything we knew, Dr. Jackson. Give us time to 'process that' and you can ask all the questions you like." Then he turned on his heel and strode out the door, the SFs following belatedly after.
Kawalsky moved to follow after O'Neill, then turned back. "He's lost a lot," he said with an odd note of apology in his voice. "This isn't easy for him."
Then he nodded at the Colonel, gave Teal'c a quick, hard look, and glanced at Sam with an odd expression on his face before he followed his friend out and down the stairs to the elevator corridor, leaving SG-1 around the briefing room table.
Colonel O'Neill leaned back in his chair, putting his hands behind his head, and shot a sardonic smile at Daniel.
"Good one, Daniel."
"I just wanted..."
"They'll be here for a long time," Sam pointed out.
"As in the rest of their lives. You can quiz them later."
"Considering Colonel O'Neill is not inclined to be friendly to Daniel Jackson, I believe that it will be much later that he will be gaining answers to his questions," Teal'c stated.
"Okay, so maybe I should have waited--"
"Yes, Daniel, you should have waited."
"--but you can't deny that the situation is one of the most unusual we've ever been in. I mean, even when I was in the other world, I wasn't looking at an alternate version of me. Just...ones of everyone else."
"Daniel, they've just lost their entire world," Sam said, reasoning with him. "Didn't you have even one moment when you thought you'd never get back home again?"
"Well, yes, but..."
"Enough!" The Colonel put his hands up. "This is making my head hurt. I'll be in the commissary if anyone has a line of conversation that isn't going to make my head hurt."
Daniel put on his best 'innocent' gaze. "So I shouldn't try to tell you about the civilisation that SG-12 located on P1M-202? They had a fascinating runic system of language…"
Colonel O'Neill stood up. "I'll be in the commissary. Teal'c. Carter. Daniel." He hotfooted his way out of the briefing room as Sam and Teal'c exchanged rueful glances.
"What?" Daniel asked, in mild and not-quite-so-innocent tones.
Sam shook her head, smiling, and went off to her lab.
*
Part 3
CATEGORY: AU, action-adventure, drama
RATING: PG-13
Part 1
Part 2
Her brain still hadn't cleared by the time SG-1 had assembled around the briefing room table to watch the video interrogation of the two men from the alternate reality.
"...Look, I've told you all this already," snapped the Colonel O'Neill on the TV screen. "Now I want to talk to someone from the SGA!"
"SGA?" The interrogator was quiet and disbelieving, the voice of the eternal sceptic. Sam could well understand why the Colonel on the videotape was losing his temper. "There's no such organisation."
The wide mouth thinned and the dark eyes narrowed. "I was on Black Ops missions back when you were still polishing shoes, mister. Believe me, there's an organisation equivalent to the SGA around here somewhere. You probably call it something else – the Stargate Project or Stargate Command – hell, for all I know, you might call it the Patty and Selma Files – but it's around here somewhere or you wouldn't have had a mirror for us to come through."
"The Stargate," said the interrogator calmly. "Tell me about this 'Stargate' – what do you know about it?"
"You know exactly what I know about it," snapped Jack O'Neill at the man. "I just told you!"
"So tell me again."
"Oh, for crying out loud." The man threw his hands in the air. "All right then. It's a big round circle of metal that can take you to other planets. It..." He paused. "It creates a subspace wormhole – like the way a worm goes straight through an apple instead of all the way around it." He appeared to think about that a minute – enough time for Sam to catch Daniel's disbelieving stare from her to the Colonel to the man on the video. She'd tried to explain subspace wormhole theory to the Colonel before and never yet managed to make any of it stick!
Maybe her equivalent in the other reality just explained it better.
The Colonel continued again. "Maybe it's the other way around – I never got that bit. Anyway, what that means in practical terms is that four years ago, Dr. Samantha Carter figured out how to get the Stargate to work, and since then, we've been going through the Stargate to explore the galaxy. Then, a week ago, Goa'uld ships descended on the planet, started bombing the living daylights out of every major city on Earth and making slaves of the population."
The general paused the tape and glanced around the table.
"Okay," the Colonel said, raising his right hand in the air. "I'm weirded out. Is anyone else weirded out?"
"It's possible, sir," Sam could only say. "If Daniel went through the mirror to another reality..."
"But that's not the Jack O'Neill I met when I went through to that other reality," Daniel said. "He's dead."
"Cheerful, Daniel," the Colonel drawled. "Lemme get this straight – this guy comes from an alternate alternate reality?"
Daniel thought about that one for a moment. "Apparently." Sam suspected that actually experiencing an alternate reality had helped Daniel deal with the instinctive reaction, which was: What the hell is going on here?
"So does anyone but me have a problem with this?"
Teal'c was the one to address the issue that appeared to be most concerning the Colonel. "Which reality is actually real?"
"Thank you!"
Almost universally, her team-mates and commanding officers looked to Sam for the answer. "Well, all of them. They're all valid universes; it's just that there's an infinite number of variations on them – each one diverging where a choice is made."
"So that means that somewhere there's a universe where I understood what you just said?" Colonel O'Neill asked, pointedly.
General Hammond appeared to decide that it was best to move the conversation back to its original purpose. "They've asked to be debriefed. I'd like you to participate."
Sam glanced over at the Colonel who shrugged, although he looked distinctly uncomfortable.
In fact, he looked about as comfortable as the other Colonel O'Neill who walked into the room, took one look at Teal'c and lunged for him, his face a mask of fury.
"What the hell is he doing here?" The SFs by the door leaped to restrain him, and the Colonel pushed his chair back, providing a very effective barrier between Teal'c and his would-be attacker.
"Hey!"
The Colonel's shout came simultaneous with General Hammond's barked, "Colonel!"
The voice of authority, combined with the restraining strength of the SF's and the equally lean bulk of Colonel O'Neill stopped the alternate Colonel short. Teal'c hadn't moved, even as the other man made for him, instead he regarded the alternate Colonel with a querying eyebrow.
"What's he doing here?" The O'Neill jerked his chin at Teal'c, restrained in body but not in spirit.
"He's a member of SG-1," Daniel said from beside Sam.
"And who the hell are you?"
"Oh, um, I'm Daniel Jackson. Also a member of SG-1."
That didn't impress O'Neill. His eyebrows went up and he glanced from Kawalsky to the Colonel.
"Have a seat, Colonel," General Hammond said, indicating the chair down the end. The one on the other side of Teal'c.
It seemed to be trusting the alternate O'Neill's ability to resist taking his anger out on Teal'c rather more than Sam would have trusted it. However, it appeared Colonel O'Neill shared Sam's misgivings, because he touched Teal'c on the shoulder and indicated that they should swap seats.
When they were all finally settled, the Colonel was opposite Sam, with his other-world equivalent beside him. Teal'c sat up near the head of the table, next to General Hammond, and Sam was flanked by Daniel on one side and Kawalsky on the other.
Sam wanted to shake her head in confusion. While she understood the principle of the situation rooted in physics concepts, the practical situation was...well, unbelievable.
And yet the evidence of her eyes – as well as the scientific proof of Janet's examinations of both men – showed two identical men, sitting side by side. The only difference was the haircut - the newcomer looked a little better groomed. Two men who were each other's might-have-been – a mere possibility to the other, a reality to themselves.
It would, she thought, be the work of a lifetime – the Colonel's lifetime! – to determine what events in their lives had been the same and which had been different. Because there had to have been differences, no matter how clear it was that some things had been the same.
The military, for example. Stargate Command. The SGC. Known as the SGA in the other world, something must have differed in their development – otherwise the other world wouldn't be under the thumb of the Goa'uld even now.
Sam stifled a shudder in her chair. It was a terrifying thought; the six billion people of Earth, exterminated, enslaved, becoming hosts to Goa'uld.
It didn't happen here.
But it happened somewhere. Somewhere from which these two men had come, seeking a better world.
"First of all," General Hammond began, "I'd like to say we know what you've been through. Dr. Jackson experienced a similar alternate reality some time ago on a mission to P3X-233."
"We found the mirror on some mission anyway," O'Neill said. "Someone stumbled across it and brought it back, and the next minute, S...Dr. Carter had a new toy to play with."
"Sounds like Carter." The Colonel quirked half a smile at her and she smiled, a little uneasy with the almost proprietal attitude he was taking towards her - to say nothing of O'Neill's look. There was something too intense about the way he was watching her - it was getting on her nerves.
"Fortunately for us," Hammond said, "Dr. Jackson was able to return with some intelligence that enabled SG-1 to stop the Goa'uld attack on Earth."
Daniel shifted in his chair, just a little uncomfortable as he became the recipient of a pair of judging gazes.
"Sweet," O'Neill commented. Then he frowned. "Jackson...Jackson...wait. You're the guy who blew off Catherine Langford about the Stargate, right?"
"That's two for two, Daniel," the Colonel murmured. "Should we be grateful for your exalted presence on this project after all?"
Daniel shot him a brief, irritated glare before he turned his attention back to O'Neill. "As a matter of fact, I didn't 'blow off' Catherine about the Stargate." He pushed his glasses back up his nose, "That was the version of me that existed in your universe."
"Assuming he exists anymore," Kawalsky muttered cynically. He looked around the table, "Our last reports before we came through indicated that about half the Earth's population is gone. The Goa'uld stayed in high orbit and bombed the living daylights out of us - and then, once we were all nice and tenderised, they put their footsoldiers down on the planet to round us up." He glared down the table at Teal'c who regarded him emotionlessly. "Guys like him."
"Teal'c's a friend," the Colonel said with a grim note of authority in his voice. "He's proven himself time and time again."
The two men weren't convinced. Both of them shot wary looks at Teal'c, but it was the other Colonel who spoke. "You'll have to excuse us for being slightly cynical." He levelled a dark steel gaze at Teal'c, as though fixing the Jaffa's face in his memory for later recall.
"And you'll have to excuse us for not sharing it," the Colonel retorted.
"Colonels."
It still never ceased to amaze Sam just how the General managed to imbue a single word with such delicate warning. The two men - two variations on the same theme of O'Neill - could argue all they want; but in this mountain, Hammond commanded.
"We've brought the mirror to the mountain," the General continued. "It's under solid guard."
"We can't go back, sir," Kawalsky said with a glance at the Colonel. "General Hammond - I mean, our General - ordered us to escape by any means possible."
"He didn't consider leaving himself?" Daniel asked, puzzled.
Sam knew the answer to that. "He was still assigned to his command, Daniel." She glanced at the General, reassuring herself that it was the path he'd have taken, and saw the truth in his eyes. He also would have stayed at his post and ordered his people to escape.
Two worlds, one man. Some things didn't change from world to world.
And nothing reinforced that more than the expression of the man who sat next to Colonel O'Neill, an odd look on his face. He regarded her with the expression of a man who'd seen something unexpected and unwelcome materialise before his eyes.
In that, he was quite a contrast to the Colonel, whose approval of her statement sent tendrils of warmth through her belly.
There was no doubt in Sam's mind that the whole situation was just a little bit eerie. They were mirror images of each other, but there had been such significant differences between their world that one now lay under the thumb of the Goa'uld, and two men of that world had escaped to the other.
She couldn't help wondering about those differences.
"So the question arises as to what we're going to do with you," General Hammond said, continuing the train of conversation he'd initially begun.
"We'll take asylum, assuming you're offering it," O'Neill a moment later. "There's nothing for us back there anymore." The savage note rung through his voice, and Sam met his gaze and saw in his eyes the loss of the world he'd failed to protect.
"That will depend on my superiors, Colonel."
"Although we can always do with more experienced officers," the Colonel offered.
General Hammond nodded, all the acknowledgement he was willing to make at this time. "In the meantime, we've assigned you temporary accommodation." He glanced at the SFs. "There'll be a guard presence at your door."
The other Colonel nodded. "Expected, sir. We'd do the same if it were the other way around."
"Dismissed. Take them to the A3 quarters."
That finished the formal debriefing quite effectively.
Informally, however...
"I know it's been a long day," Daniel began as they got up from their chairs.
"And we have no desire to make it any longer," O'Neill said shortly, rolling his shoulders slightly as he stood and looked down the table at Daniel.
Sam's team-mate was persistent. "Then maybe when you've had a chance to sit down and process it all..."
"Daniel..."
"Jack, I've only got a few questions..."
"Daniel, it's never 'a few questions' with you."
Major Kawalsky had stood at the same time as O'Neill; now he frowned, "Questions such as?"
"Well, any of the differences between your world and ours," Daniel said, with the tone of someone who felt it was perfectly obvious what he would ask. "It would help to find out what factors played a part in the Goa'uld being in a position to take over Earth..."
"Other than you?" O'Neill asked pointedly.
"Well, actually, not just me - you mentioned Sam too, but since you addressed her as 'Dr. Carter', I'm guessing she wasn't in the military."
"No," O'Neill's eyes slid from Daniel to Sam, and back to Daniel. "She wasn't."
"When Dr. Jackson decided to stick it out in the land of academia, Dr. Carter took on the job of getting the Stargate open," Kawalsky said. "She was our Stargate expert."
Not wholly surprising. In the other universe, she'd also opened the Stargate in lieu of Daniel. Sam opened her mouth to ask a question about Dr. Carter, and was interrupted by the Colonel, who'd picked up on something she hadn't noticed.
"'Was'?"
Something went very still in both men. O'Neill looked down at his hands, and Kawalsky looked to O'Neill before he said, "She died in the initial assault on the mountain. Wrong place, wrong time, and too many of them to fight." There was a quiet bitterness in his voice as he spoke, and he shot a venomous glance at Teal'c.
"She was the one who had the idea about the mirror," O'Neill said quietly, lifting his gaze to look at Sam. "Actually, she had a lot of ideas."
"Sounds like Carter," the Colonel said. He flashed her a quick almost-smile, but she didn't smile back. There was something very intense in O'Neill's gaze - something she'd never seen in her own commanding officer's eyes - and she wasn't sure what it was.
She didn't have time to identify it; O'Neill turned to Daniel. "We've just lost everything we knew, Dr. Jackson. Give us time to 'process that' and you can ask all the questions you like." Then he turned on his heel and strode out the door, the SFs following belatedly after.
Kawalsky moved to follow after O'Neill, then turned back. "He's lost a lot," he said with an odd note of apology in his voice. "This isn't easy for him."
Then he nodded at the Colonel, gave Teal'c a quick, hard look, and glanced at Sam with an odd expression on his face before he followed his friend out and down the stairs to the elevator corridor, leaving SG-1 around the briefing room table.
Colonel O'Neill leaned back in his chair, putting his hands behind his head, and shot a sardonic smile at Daniel.
"Good one, Daniel."
"I just wanted..."
"They'll be here for a long time," Sam pointed out.
"As in the rest of their lives. You can quiz them later."
"Considering Colonel O'Neill is not inclined to be friendly to Daniel Jackson, I believe that it will be much later that he will be gaining answers to his questions," Teal'c stated.
"Okay, so maybe I should have waited--"
"Yes, Daniel, you should have waited."
"--but you can't deny that the situation is one of the most unusual we've ever been in. I mean, even when I was in the other world, I wasn't looking at an alternate version of me. Just...ones of everyone else."
"Daniel, they've just lost their entire world," Sam said, reasoning with him. "Didn't you have even one moment when you thought you'd never get back home again?"
"Well, yes, but..."
"Enough!" The Colonel put his hands up. "This is making my head hurt. I'll be in the commissary if anyone has a line of conversation that isn't going to make my head hurt."
Daniel put on his best 'innocent' gaze. "So I shouldn't try to tell you about the civilisation that SG-12 located on P1M-202? They had a fascinating runic system of language…"
Colonel O'Neill stood up. "I'll be in the commissary. Teal'c. Carter. Daniel." He hotfooted his way out of the briefing room as Sam and Teal'c exchanged rueful glances.
"What?" Daniel asked, in mild and not-quite-so-innocent tones.
Sam shook her head, smiling, and went off to her lab.
*
Part 3
