Cruel and Unusual Punishment
Before "Ascension" and "Meridian"
Major Samantha Carter stood before the large consul, her hands full of various diagnostic equipment. "Sir, this looks Ancient.' She said, barely looking up from the "keyboard" of the device.
"That's impossible!" Daniel said, whirling around from where he stood, studying the written language on the walls.
"Why?" She asked, not understanding.
"The symbols here have no connection to medieval Latin." He said, as if that explained everything.
"But the altar is similar to the Ancient consuls that we've run into before."
"Daniel…isn't it possible that the Ancients came first, but decided to leave their really cool toy here?" Jack asked, walking between the two scientists with his hands on his P-90.
"Possible, but not likely."
"Why?"
"If the Ancients had come first, unless they had been entirely annihilated, I would have, should have, seen elements of Latin in this language."
"Perhaps the Ancients were unable to communicate with those who eventually inhabited this planet." Teal'c said, observing the surroundings.
"Or maybe the Ancients came later." Sam said, leaning on the edge of the consul.
"They're Ancie…" Jack began as the altar sprang to life, the buttons moving up and down. Sam jumped back just before a beam of light came from a device on the opposite wall, catching her in its grasp. She stood, in suspended animation for a few moments as the beam consumed her.
"Carter!" Jack yelled.
The beam dropped her almost immediately and she collapsed onto the ground with a large groan. The rapidly moving buttons immediately ceased operation and the beam retreated to the device it had come from.
Jack raced up to the altar. "Carter!"
She took a deep breath; it was obviously painful. "I'll be okay, sir." She gasped.
She rolled over and attempted to stand up, but fell in her endeavor.
"Teal'c!" Jack commanded as he got her arm around his shoulder. Teal'c did the same on the opposite side and together, they helped her to stumble the thirty or forty yards from the temple to the Stargate.
"Daniel! Dial it up!"
Within a few minutes, they walked through the Gate. "We need a medic!" Daniel shouted, getting through the Gate before any of the other members of his team. "Sam's been hurt!"
Jack, Teal'c, and Sam arrived a few seconds later, Sam falling backward with another attack of pain. Now, she was without even the strength to stand with the support of Jack and Teal'c. Jack anticipated her weakness and fell to his knees, catching her as she crumpled to the ground.
"Sir, your knee…" She whispered.
"Damn my knee, Carter!"
She took a deep breath, seemingly choking on the air. "Don't you dare die, Carter!" He said, as she struggled to breathe. "That's an order!"
She almost immediately began breathing more steadily, but before he could offer a tiny prayer of thanks, she began convulsing. Janet Fraiser arrived with her team of medics and began treating Sam. However, Jack's grasp was firm on her body.
"Sir, you're going to have to let go of her." She commanded Jack.
Without thinking, he let go of her body, and the medics took her to the infirmary as Jack stood up to join Teal'c, Daniel, and General Hammond at the bottom of the ramp.
"Colonel, what happened?" General Hammond asked.
"She was caught in the beam of an alien device, sir. Shortly after it released her, she began experiencing a high level of pain and overall weakness, and then, she was unable to breathe. You saw the rest, sir." He said, clearly on auto-pilot.
"SG-1, we'll debrief when we know more of what's going on with Major Carter." Hammond said, when he noticed Jack's absent expression.
"Thank you, sir."
--
When they arrived in the infirmary, they found Sam lying on a bed with a respirator tube in her mouth and an IV in her arm. It was obvious to them all that she was resting. Dr. Janet Fraiser scurried around, trying to see to her friend's comfort.
"Doc! How is she?" Jack asked, coming up behind her.
Janet stopped and turned to find the three men looking at her for information. "Not good, Colonel."
"What is it?" Daniel asked.
"To be honest, I don't know. It's as if all of her internal organs are shutting down, but while that's killing her, it wouldn't cause the amount of pain that she's been experiencing." Janet sighed. "At this rate, I'm not even sure she'll make it through the night."
Jack's heart sank. "She's in pain?"
She nodded. "I'm doing everything I can with painkillers and other medications, but…it doesn't seem to be helping much."
"At least she's resting."
She nodded, wearily. "It's going to be a long night."
"We should probably take turns. If something happens, we're on the base and can be here at a moment's notice." Daniel said, logically.
Janet nodded in agreement.
"Go ahead." Jack said, taking a seat next to Sam. "I'll take first watch."
Daniel and Janet shared a look, and they both shrugged.
"I will remain with O'Neill as I do not require sleep."
Janet gently placed one hand on his arm, wordlessly indicating for him to leave and allow Jack to sit alone with Sam. As he did so, he permitted the memories to wash over him.
"I'm an Air Force officer just like you are, Colonel. And just because my reproductive organs are on the inside instead of the outside, doesn't mean I can't handle whatever you can handle."
"Oh, this has nothing to do with you being a woman. I like women. I just have a little problem with scientists."
"I logged over a hundred hours in enemy air space during the Gulf. Is that tough enough for ya? Or are we gonna have to arm wrestle?"
He reached for her hand. It laid weakly against the skin of his own hand, not responding to the human contact. What he wouldn't give to arm wrestle with her now. At least then, he wouldn't be thinking that she was going to die.
He laughed half-heartedly to himself inwardly at the irony of his situation- the cliché was that a person who was about to die would have their life pass before them. However, it was he who was remembering events from her life. Her utter astonishment at the visibility of the fluctuations of the event horizon. Her completely wide-eyed curiosity about all of the technologies that she studied. Her poised, yet commanding, presence. All of the things that Dr. Fraiser had suggested would only live on in his memory.
A little over a year ago, he had finally admitted aloud his feelings for her. It had been a lot longer since she had been just another one of the guys. Just another team member. Sure, he had familial relationships with both Daniel and Teal'c, but this was different. And not exactly different in a good way.
"I'd rather die myself than lose Carter."
"Why?"
"Because I care about her…a lot more than I'm supposed to."
She stirred in pain. It wasn't long before her eyes opened in panic as she registered the respirator tube going down her throat. She almost started choking as she tried to breathe in through her mouth.
"Carter! It's okay!" Jack said, raising off of his chair enough to put his hand on her shoulder to help her calm down.
He could see the trust in her eyes as she saw his face. As she quieted and relaxed, her breathing became easier, allowing herself to learn quickly how to adapt to the ventilator.
"I didn't think you'd wake up."
She grimaced as a wave of pain flooded over her.
"You probably wish you hadn't." He said, troubled by her expression.
She closed her eyes in agreement. He mindlessly began gliding his thumb over the top of her hand in a tender caress. She looked confused at her hand, now encompassed in his own, and then at him. He shrugged in response.
"Do you remember when we were stranded in Antarctica?" He asked, pensively as he watched his thumb circulate on the top of her hand.
She moved her head so slightly that he wasn't sure that she had nodded, but ultimately, he decided that if he remembered anything from Antarctica, that she would remember more. After all, he had been the one closest to death in that instance.
"I shouldn't have survived the trip home. But you wouldn't let me die."
"Couldn't." She managed, hoarsely.
"Well, I'm not sure I ever really thanked you for that."
"It's been an honor…"
"Sir, I want you to hold that thought…"
She raised her arm and mimed writing. She closed her eyes against the excruciating pain as her arm received a reverberating shock wave shoot through it.
"Carter, you don't have to…"
She looked at him with the look of determination that he would never forget. He stood and went to retrieve a small pad of paper and a pen.
She struggled as she wrote: You stayed.
"It's no use, sir! Just go!"
"NO!"
"What else could I have done? Lose you like I lost Sara and Charlie?"
A few tears managed to find their way down her cheeks as she squeezed his hand to let him know how much she had appreciated his sentiment. They spent the next few moments, quietly sitting and observing one another before Sam felt what little strength she had left leave. Her eyelids began sliding shut as if she was falling asleep, but she knew that she would probably never wake up from this sleep. She willed herself to make one last attempt at speaking. "I 'ov oo." She managed.
Jack could sense what she did. He stood and kissed her forehead. "Me too."
As the heart monitor began to signal that it had lost her pulse, Jack still stood there, holding her hand, and tenderly caressing her face. No tears came, but his heart was as broken as it had been when he had lost Charlie and then, Sara. However, there was a slight difference. He would never get over Sam as he had managed to do with Sara. His relationship with Sam had been completely different, as though they both had decided that they would wait for the impossible to occur. So, in a way, this journey would be no different. Death was just another layer to the impossibility of their relationship.
Within seconds, there were nurses pushing him out of the way as Dr. Fraiser arrived on scene. They began attempts at reviving her, but ultimately they were unsuccessful. A few minutes later, Janet walked over to where Jack stood. "Colonel…"
"I know."
She looked as though she was about ready to cry. "I'm sorry."
He nodded as Daniel and Teal'c arrived. "What…?" Daniel began.
"She's gone, Daniel." Jack said before the archaeologist could say anything else.
"Jack…" Daniel began as Jack walked out of the room.
"Daniel." Janet warned.
He turned. "You're probably right."
She nodded, tears welling up in her eyes. "I guess I have to inform the General. Her father's going to want know…"
Daniel nodded, while Teal'c merely stood there, a sorrowful variation of his stoic expression on his face. Janet brushed past them as Daniel looked at the lifeless body of his friend- the closest person to a sister he could ever claim to have.
"Do you know if she was in pain at the end?" He asked one of the nurses.
She shook her head, compassionately. "She wasn't convulsing, if that answers your question."
"Thanks." He said, a brave smile on his lips.
She nodded, acknowledging briefly his thanks.
"Well, at least she's…" He began before he choked on a sob trapped in his throat.
"She has passed on to a better existence, Daniel Jackson." Teal'c said, mournfully.
Daniel tried to regain his composure by swallowing the lump that had lodged in his throat. "I wish I could say that that made me feel any better." Daniel said, as they looked at the corpse on the bed.
"Indeed."