Title: Lost And Found
Characters: Jack, Sam, Daniel, Hammond.
Summary: AU from SG-1 3.03 "Fair Game". Instead of Nirrti, Morrigan was a delegate to the Protected Planets Treaty negotiation. What-if ficlet. ONE-SHOT.
Category: Gen.
Rating: K.

SG-1 stood in the gateroom, the active stargate casting its distinctive blue light over the scene. The three System Lords who had negotiated Earth's inclusion in the Asgard Protected Planets Treaty were leaving and every human watching them had a bitter taste in their mouth.

Cronus, Yu and Morrigan did not hesitate, and with the arrogant confidence that had characterised all their time at the SGC, they strode up the ramp and disappeared.

The gate shut down… and was enveloped in the shimmer of an Asgard beam. A moment later it was gone.

Teal'c solemnly turned to his friends and bowed slightly. They'd said good bye earlier; there were no words left. A few seconds later, he too vanished, beamed to Thor's ship. Thor had agreed to transport Teal'c to a safe world since, as soon as Earth had agreed to give up it's stargates to be protected, the System Lords had demanded that there by no dial-outs except for theirs.

Earth's Stargate Program was over.

***brrrrrrrring***

Jack pulled the pillow over his head and tried to ignore the noise.

***brrrrrrrring***

Whoever was on the line wasn't giving up. Giving in to the inevitable, Jack reached out and grabbed the phone. "O'Neill."

"Jack!"

"Daniel." Jack squinted at the clock. "For crying out loud, it's 3:42am. Why are you calling me?"

"You don't want to wait to hear this." Daniel was almost tripping over his words in excitement.

"It can't be that big."

"Yes, Jack, it can be. There's another stargate on earth!"

Silence reigned for 19.2 seconds.

"OK, that's big."

"It's a project in Australia, they were investigating what they thought were some meteor impacts. They uncovered part of it and being unable to recognize it, they took some photos and posted them to one of the international archaeology email lists I subscribe to. As in, they sent those messages about two minutes ago. Jack, we've got to act fast!"

Jack gave up on any more sleep and as soon as Daniel had forwarded the photos to him and Sam, he phoned Sam.

… "Sir, its 3:44am. What's wrong?"

"Carter, what's wrong is that you and Daniel are both awake at this hour of the morning. Check your email."

Sam did. "Oh. My. God."

"Since I'm retired and you're not, tell me who I need to wake up next."

The sender of that fateful email had not expected to see any replies before morning; she was well aware that the vast majority of recipients were the other side of the world from her. Having a stranger arrive on her doorstep a little over an hour after she clicked send was more than a little unnerving.

Sergeant Siler was decidedly uncomfortable himself – and almost wishing he'd picked somewhere else to have a vacation. But he had picked Australia and, given the geographic size of the country, had somehow had the luck to be close enough to get delegated to handle the situation until some more former SGC personnel could get out here.

In the end, they even managed to avoid explaining it to anyone. The email-sender sent a follow-up apology saying they'd discovered the thing they'd photographed was a hoax and the Australian government was persuaded the matter fell under their existing (and extensive) agreements they already had with the Americans.

The newly found stargate was soon on its way to Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado.

Only Teal'c was missing from SG-1 as they watched the stargate being lowered into position in the newly reformed SGC's "embarkation room". They all hoped that he was alive and well out there, and that he would consider re-joining them. Right now, hope was all they had.

"Did you figure out where this gate came from?"

Sam glanced at her newly reactivated CO and smiled slightly. "Current theory is that it's from Apophis."

"Apophis!?"

Daniel was a little quicker to remember. "The stargate from Klorel's ha'tak! The one we blew up two years ago, after I came back from the other reality, when Kinsey had shut the program down!"

"Ah…" Jack reminded himself that Daniel had good reason for his eagerness. Sha're was still out there. "Didn't you say that it would have been destroyed in the explosion, Carter?"

"I did, sir. But that was before we understood just how hard they are to destroy."

Hammond joined them in briefing room, a little smile of hope on his face. "Colonel, Major, Doctor Jackson." When he had their attention, he smiled properly. "The first missions once we have the new stargate calibrated will be to re-establish contact with our friends, and I have Teal'c at the top of the list. Unless you'd prefer to go looking for the Tok'ra, the briefing will be at 0800 tomorrow."

They all looked at Sam, who hadn't heard from her father since the system lords had taken Earth's previous two stargates. She shook her head, a rueful expression on her face. "We don't' have a current address for the Tok'ra, sir, and I'm sure my dad will show up when they have a chance. I think we're better off looking for Teal'c."

The rest of the day was filled with mundane tasks. Jack worked with Hammond on how to modify their operations to keep the goa'uld from discovering that the Tau'ri were back in the game, Daniel reconnected with his colleagues and took on the task of getting his teammates' offices ready for use along with his own. Sam, of course, spent the day in the control room, running diagnostics and tweaking parameters on the dialling computer.

SG-1 reported promptly at 0800 the next morning with all the hope in the world.

Author Note: Yes, I know it could be expanded and I could write more. But I don't plan to, and I doubt that will change.