He hadn't slept a night through in a week, every potential restful moment punctuated by another bad dream. A remembrance. The first night he had laid awake in his own bed his mind alert, replaying every moment of their mission. The second night, and every night since, he had woken at 3am, his light bed clothes wet with sweat, sheets knotted around him in some crazy form of nocturnal self-torture.
Tonight the only difference was location. An overnight camp on a habitable moon in a corner of the galaxy so far from home even NASA couldn't locate it. The night was cool; he should have been chilly in his sleeping bad, not drenched in his own perspiration with greying hair clinging damply to his face, legs bound together by his twisted bedding.
Beside him, not as oblivious to the situation as O'Neill would have wished, Daniel Jackson lent up on one elbow, placing a reassuring hand on his friends arm.
"Jack? You okay?" he asked, sleepy concern crossing his face with a frown.
O'Neill sat up and nodded curtly, "Yeah, fine Daniel. Freaking loose threads in this sleeping bag crawling all over me. Dreamt I was being eaten by spiders." He lied easily. Bad dreams were, after all, an occupational hazard and talking about them with the boys was, generally, not done. "I'm going to get some air," he added, "Go back to sleep."
Crawling out of the tent O'Neill made his way to the small fire that still burnt at the centre of their camp. Carter, two hours into her watch, looked up, surprised to see her CO looking decidedly uneasy as he wandered over to take a seat on a rock near her.
"Sir?" she ventured a tentative question of concern in her voice.
O'Neill seemed unable to look at her for a moment, dragging his command face back into action. A forced smile, a nod, which morphed into an uncomfortable shake of the head and a second of eye contact before he found himself staring at his hands, which hung loosely between his knees. He squeezed his eyes shut and sat silently.
Carter had served in the Air Force long enough to read the signs of a bad night and four years of working with O'Neill gave her sufficient insight into his demeanour to realise this was an unusually difficult one. The colonel was rarely this close to expressing his discomfort, and despite her desire to aid a friend she hung back, unsure of the protocol for dealing with this particular situation.
Retrieving her canteen from the floor Carter took a swig of water herself and offered the open bottle to O'Neill. Grateful, he dank slowly, his gaze firmly set on the orange flames that licked the darkness. Their hands touched as O'Neill returned the canteen to her, her fingers brushing his for a moment longer than necessary as she asked, "Rough night, sir?"
"No, Carter," he replied quietly, "Just a little restless."
An exasperated look crossed Carter's face as she ducked her chin to the floor in an attempt to conceal her frustrated concern. Her CO was an uncommon mixture of paradoxes. A supportive and strong commander who frequently crossed the line of insubordination with his superiors, a tactile and empathetic friend and thoroughly emotionally repressed when it came to disclosing anything about himself. At times Carter thought the man must have endured so much heartache in his life that he was no longer able to acknowledge its presence. Other times, like tonight, she had the impression that it would take only one kind word, a gesture, and he would lose control of his pain and become something other than Colonel O'Neill, the good airman, and be Jack O'Neill, the man who carried enough guilt and grief for ten.
Double moons rose over the forest illuminating the camp in an eerie two directional light. Carter kept her eyes on the trees retaining her duties and extending the silence that had fallen between them. An uncomfortable sensation of being watched trickled into the Major's subconscious and it was a few moments before she realised it was the Colonel's stare that was making her feel ill at ease.
O'Neill, deep in his own thoughts, found his gaze fixed on Carter's face which seemed, under the moons' light, to separate her from reality. In his mind he saw the other Carter, the robotic duplicate, face torn, eyes shut, dead on the floor of the Ha'tak. In his dreams the two Carters switched. The real Carter, his Carter, lay in a pool of dark red blood, her pale skin pealing from her face, her hand scorched from battling the force-field. The mind played too many tricks after all his years of service, his subconscious needed no assistance to create nightmares. Lack of sleep frayed the edges of reality still further, especially in the early hours.
She must have been speaking to him because, he realised belatedly, her lips had been moving. He blinked a couple of times and cleared his throat self-consciously.
"Did you say something, Major?" he asked a casually as he could manage.
"I asked if you were alright," Carter responded patiently, "You've been staring at me for the last five minutes like I've grown a second head, or another arm."
"Well that would be a first for us," he joked with a façade of a grin, "We've not written that in a report yet."
Carter, guided by her instincts, bit the bullet and replied, "No, just seen every member of SG1 die at least once, twice if you include our duplicate selves." Seeing O'Neill wince a fraction she knew her aim was true. "And I don't want to hear how you're fine, sir," she continued, cutting off his attempt at a dismissive response, "Because, quite frankly, that kind of crap is never going to get old."
O'Neill returned Carter's challenging look with a dark, unforgiving expression. "That's enough," he barked roughly, instantly regretting his rebuke but in the midst of his anger found his voice failed to cease as he reached the limit of his personal tolerance, "I don't have to tell you squat, Major, and if you don't want to wind up on a charge for insubordination you better quit right there. I don't need any dime store psycho babble from anyone, least of all you. Everything we go through is part of the job, we handle it, or we quit. And I can tell you now, Carter, that ain't ever going to happen. It's out duty to accept that every mission has its risks. No different to any other day of our military lives. There are days when everyone lives, there are days when people die. You suck it up and you move on."
Carter fought the impulse to look down, holding her stare for long enough to see a glimpse of shame flash across his hazel eyes. Steeling herself against any telling twitch of emotion she turned her attention back to her watch, scanning the perimeter for any infringements, breathing steadily despite the hammering of her heart. Over-stepping the mark was not something Carter did often, or easily. Guilt nagged her conscience in the awkward silence that hung thickly between them and despite her set jaw and gritted teeth a muscle jumped involuntarily in her neck which she hoped O'Neill could not see.
"Carter," O'Neill's voice was quiet now, bordering on gentle, "Sam, I'm sorry. I had no right to chew you out like that."
Carter glanced in his direction and saw contrition sitting, uncharacteristically, on her CO's face.
"I over stepped, sir," she replied, "But I don't retract what I said, I am concerned."
The colonel pulled a face, "Nothing I can't handle."
"I have no doubts about that, Colonel," Carter searched his face for answers, "It's just, the duplicate SG-1, I know you had your concerns about them even before this… and it's surreal seeing yourself dying, lying dead on the floor, even when you know they are actually robots."
Seeing yourself dead. O'Neill felt his eyes widen a fraction as he realised, if a little late, that Carter mistook his disquiet as deliberations over his own mortality. An escape plan from a difficult conversation had materialised and the colonel was not about to let the opportunity slip away.
"Yes, well," he shifted his position on the rock, "Watching yourself die doesn't do a lot for ones sense of self belief. I mean, those guys were meant to be bet-ter, fast-er, strong-er. So how come they wound up dead?"
"I hadn't thought of it like that, sir," Carter said, her tone indicating she was considering his question carefully in her huge, scientific, brain.
"See?" O'Neill grinned crookedly, "It's not sweating the small stuff. It's the big questions. Philosophical nightmares."
"Nightmares, sir?"
"Figuratively speaking, Carter." He responded, quickly covering his six.
If Carter saw through his tactical manoeuvres she did not let on immediately.
"I think, sir, our doubles might have survived if they hadn't been running out of power. The other, robotic, you would have recovered if his power source had lasted another hour. If we'd got him back to Harlan I'm sure he could have been fixed."
"Not much point being fast and stronger if you're running on a Duracell with no recharge facility," O'Neill quipped.
"Should have built in an energy converter, "Carter added, "That would probably have been enough to reboot the duplicate me as well. Although I don't know how much the fluid loss would have impaired gross motor control."
Fluid loss. Blood. The dream image flashed in his mind and he must have winced because Carter was wearing the concerned comrade look again.
"I never thanked you," she said quietly.
"For what?" O'Neill asked, curious and glad that she had chosen not to pursue her line of questioning.
"For having someone move your duplicate's body before we ringed back down. I'm glad I didn't have to see you lying there. The other you, I mean."
Her eyes caught his and a moment of mutual respect and understanding passed between them. O'Neill smiled and patted her arm, reassuring them both of their continued existence. She placed her hand on top of his momentarily before they both broke contact, hearing Teal'c extricate himself from the tent behind them.
"Any time, Major," O'Neill said.
"I guess that's the end of my watch," Carter yawned and hauled herself to her feet. "Time for some shut eye for me."
O'Neill raised himself from the floor and stretched dramatically, "Good night, Carter," he said, "Thanks for the chat."
"Anytime, sir," she replied, "Sweet dreams, sir."
O'Neill smiled ruefully as he crawled back into his tent, "You too, Carter. You too."