"When In Rome"
Chapter one
It had been Daniel's idea to go back to P3E-233 to see what other wonderful discoveries were stored there by the people who had once occupied the planet. The quantum mirror had been just one of many things they had found the day that SG-1 had first set foot there. But because of time constraints and budgetary concerns, no one from the SGC had ever gone back to the planet to investigate any of them...until now.
"Look at this, Sir. It looks like some kind of hand gun, but I don't think it fires bullets like our guns do," Carter commented, handing the device to her CO. General Jack O'Neill took it and turned it over in his hands. Then he tried the grip, holding it and pointing it toward the back wall of the room where the treasures were stored.
'God it feels great to be on an off-world mission again!' Jack told himself.
"Don't fire it, Sir. We have no way of knowing how powerful it is," she warned him. Lt. Col. Samantha Carter knew her CO well enough to know that he could do some pretty immature things at times. She recalled feeling like a mother hen watching over her brood of one when they'd gone on missions together in the past. And even though it might mean more responsibility for her, it felt really good to have him along on this mission, she thought as she watched him take the weapon out of the room.
Dr. Daniel Jackson, and the fourth member of their team, Teal'c, didn't need nearly the supervision that the General did. And therefore the past seven months of gate travel without Jack had been different for Sam, but not necessarily in a good way. Truth was she missed watching out for her CO.
"Here, Teal'c. Put this in the container. We'll take it back with us," Jack said, handing the weapon to their Jaffa teammate. "I think Carter's afraid I'm gonna shoot somebody with it," he remarked, grinning. He was really glad he'd come along, even if Carter was determined to treat him like a rookie.
"I can understand her apprehension," Teal'c responded critically.
"Oh, you can, can you? That's no way to talk to your old friend, T. You know I'd never do anything so stupid. You and Carter should keep an eye on Daniel. He's the one who got sucked into that mirror the last time we were here, you know," Jack reminded the big man.
"I am aware. But I believe that Daniel Jackson has learned from his mistakes."
"Meaning I haven't?" Jack asked, putting a hand over his heart as though wounded by Teal'c's words.
"I did not say that, O'Neill."
Meanwhile Daniel was weaving in and out of boxes and crates, until he made his way to the back of the room. With a careful hand he reached out and touched what appeared to be gray colored grill work, separating the room from another smaller room. He could see through the barrier which seemed to be made up of many parts...parts that appeared to be connected like giant Tinker Toys or Replicator blocks. He hoped they weren't the latter.
Suddenly there was a whooshing sound that seemed to come from the back of the room. Sam, Jack and Teal'c looked in that direction.
"Hey, guys! I think I found something!" Daniel called out as a large section of the connected gray pieces slid sideways, leaving a large hole in the wall.
"See! I told yah Daniel is the one you should be keeping your eye on," Jack said to Teal'c, as the two men hurried into the room, going directly to the far end where Sam now stood behind Daniel.
"What'd you do, Daniel?" Sam asked somewhat nervously.
"I just touched it here, and this door opened. See there's another room," he said stepping through the opening.
"Daniel!" Jack yelled. Jack watched as Sam scanned the area beyond the doorway for life form signs, metal content and radiation.
"I can't identify what it's made of, Sir. But there's no naquadah present in the room and no radiation. I think it's safe to go inside," Sam said as she slowly stepped through the opening. Wondering why no one seemed to recall that he was the highest ranking officer present, Jack followed her, shining his flashlight around the interior as he went. Teal'c followed, albeit with one eyebrow arched.
"Well, Daniel, your room seems to be empty," Jack commented, looking around at the four walls. They were rough and bumpy just like on the outside, and they were each thinking it was more like an empty box than anything else, when the walls, ceiling and the floor began to shake at the same time. Jack turned to see Sam's index finger pressing on one of the bumps, and that was when the door whooshed shut.
"Hey, now who's touching things they shouldn't?" Jack yelled at her.
"I'm sorry, Sir! Maybe if I touch it again..." she reached out to touch the bump again, but Jack swatted her hand away.
"Ack! Carter, if you touch that again, the door had better open!" Jack yelled again.
They all stood and watched as Sam touched the spot again. But the door did not open. At the same time they noticed that they could no longer see through the openings in the wall where the door had been. Instead everything on the other side seemed to be a blur.
And then the entire room began to shake even harder, throwing them all to the floor. The vibrations got so intense that they couldn't stand up, so they remained on the floor until the shaking stopped several minutes later.
Sam sat up, but she was feeling very dizzy. Daniel got up on his knees and then bent over, retching violently in one corner. Teal'c, who was already standing, stood over Daniel, while Jack got up and began touching the bumps on the walls, obviously trying to get the door to open again.
"Ah, Sir," Sam said, pointing to a different section of wall that now had a hole in it big enough for them to step through.
Daniel looked around and held up one arm, which Teal'c used to pull him up to his feet. Everyone gawked in the direction where the other room and been, but now they could see through the wall as well as the doorway, and the small treasure room was no longer there. The artifacts were no longer there either, nor was anything resembling the room they had been in before. What they saw instead appeared to be man-made but on a very large scale. The walls were smooth and cold to the touch and appeared to be made of marble or something resembling it. The floor was mostly covered by fine sand and huge chunks of stone and marble that seemed to have fallen there. The ceiling was apparently somewhere above their heads, but it was too dark to tell how high it was.
Jack signaled Carter to stay behind him as he stepped out of the small room in which they'd been trapped. The rest of SG-1 followed him slowly, looking all around as they walked carefully around the debris.
"Hey, guys, look! The room was not a room after all," Daniel said as he stood looking back the way they had come. And when they looked behind them they saw he was correct. The small square room was actually a box that was totally separate from the surrounding walls.
"It's a cube," Sam said studying the shape. "And I think I know what it might be," she said, her voice quiet yet not revealing the horror she was feeling. If she was right, this thing had just transported them to another place. Once again they had stumbled upon a portal or doorway. But this time it wasn't just Daniel; they were all stuck in a parallel universe!
TBC