Major Carter stared at herself in the mirror. She was white, deathly white. Of course, when one spent two weeks in the infirmary after four consecutive days with a concussion on an abandoned ship, one tended to be a bit pale.

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"Alright, Carter, on your feet, let's go."

Well, he finally showed up. Carter wondered when he'd come to give her her "pep talk". Of course, Daniel and Teal'c had sucked, both only increasing her headache. "You MUST stay awake." "Well, I'm not so much me as I am YOU." – God, was she really that bad? She would remember to loosen up and chill if – WHEN she got out of this.

"I was wondering when you were gonna show up," she said, freely ignoring his order and not feeling one bit guilty about it. And there wasn't so much as a "sir" in there – she was glad this was, well – HER she was talking to, and not Real O'Neill. Oh, headache…

"You just going to sit there?" the dark form of her CO asked, hands in his pocket nonchalantly. He was in civvies – how was it possible that he – or at least the REAL Colonel O'Neill – did NOT know how hot he was in civvies?

"Too tired, sir."

The…Unreal O'Neill – hey, cool, that rhymed! – erm… - walked over and sat down tantalizingly slowly. "Samaaaantha," he growled slowly, a smirk on his lips. "I'm a figment of your imagination; you're gonna call me SIR?"

"Sorry, force of habit…"

"So, you gonna save yourself or what?" he asked.

"I've tried."

"So you just giving up?"

"I don't know what else to do." If she weren't about to fall into an endless abyss of eternal slumber – in Jack-talk, fall asleep and die – she'd be more irritated.

"You'll think of something" O'Neill said confidently. He had that grin, that full smile of confidence in his eyes that spoke volumes more than a simple twist of the lips. The smile that warmed her heart…whoa, focus, Carter!

"Came to give me a pep talk?" she asked bitterly.

"That's what friends are for," he said

Major Carter snorted softly. "Friends."

"Hey, this is YOU talkin' here, might as well be honest."

She sighed. They were more than friends – much more. And in her own little fantasy world – and she hoped in his, too – there wasn't a damned thing stopping them from being WAY way more than friends.

"What if I quit the Air Force?" she asked. "Would that change anything? Or is that just an excuse?"

"I would never ask you to give up your career," the Unreal O'Neill had said next.

"Because you don't feel anything for me?"

"Carter…" he said lowly.

She briefly debated replying snidely, "You're a figment of my imagination and you're gonna call me Carter?" but thought against it. "I'd let you go right now if I knew," she declared boldly, a sickly little bundle of fear and sadness forming in her stomach. What if he said he didn't? Even an Unreal O'Neill had to have something in common with Real O'Neill, right? …

"That easy?" Unreal O'Neill asked…sadly, definitely sadly.

Sam felt a tear prickle at the corner of each eye. "I never said it would be easy." And it wouldn't. Because it would hurt like hell…

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How did she get caught up in this madness? She, Major Carter, afraid of her own heart? Or, at least that's what Unreal Dad had told her. And she was very good at picturing his criticism, even after all these years of newfound closeness between them. The scar of his disapproval and of her whole family in general was just too vivid, too easy to spot among all her other emotional scars. That particular scar was second-biggest only to Hansen…

…Hansen. That bastard. As she knew she would, she was no longer scared of him, or of the nightmares he had provoked. She would have a repeat of the nightmare every once in a while, but it was maybe…one night out of a few years of nightmare-less nights? At least that nightmare, anyway. But even on the rare occasion she did have a repeat, when the nightmare dwindled away, she didn't wake up screaming at 0220, and certainly didn't wake up at 0220 at all. It was like everything about him was simply a blank slate; the memory was there, the scar was there, but she felt nothing for it, except a twinge of regret.

If she'd just gone and killed him, just hunted him down instead of getting distracted by Colonel O'Neill, he wouldn't have killed Franks. He wouldn't have been able to hurt the cave dwellers or his team. Franks was dead and Connor was still very much angry at the loss of his friend – they learned long ago to never say Hansen's name in his presence; after all these years, she assumed the pain had numbed for him as it had for her, but even old nightmares could be reborn, as she had learned when Hansen joined the SGC.

Major Carter continued to stare at herself in the mirror. Could she even trust her own mind? Unreal Dad was telling her she had to let go of what was holding her back from love, that by setting her sights on what was unattainable, she was keeping herself from ever getting hurt. How true had he…she? …been?

Sure, she hadn't exactly been introduced to many successful relationships, what with the broken family she'd had after her mom's death, the violent relationship she'd had with Hansen…was she really just too scared to give having a life a second shot? She thought briefly about Pete, the cop her brother had recently told her about in his last phone call, just before she'd set off on the Prometheus. There was something fishy about the way Mark had hinted at him; it was a setup. She, Major Carter, did NOT like being set up. Not in anything, especially relationships.

Sure, Pete sounded like a nice guy, but…would he be anywhere near as…there were too many adjectives she could use to describe how she felt…inappropriately…for her CO.

Carter sighed and leaned against the sink, now glaring at the mirror. "Isn't it bad enough that I have the craziest, most insane, dangerous – okay, so it's still great – wild job in the world? Does my love life have to be just as complicated?" Give her a naquadah reactor and 70 seconds to disarm it before the entire mountain and she'd do it – give her a puzzle involving romantic relationships and she'd take months to finish it.

Tossed between wishing she could use the Stargate to travel back in time to be a Captain again, and wanting to stay firmly where she was, Carter could see no fairness in anything. Either she'd be a petrified Captain or an emotionally drained Major, with the world's fate meanwhile resting in the sole hands of SG-1 and the SGC.

Carter slammed her fist on the sink and turned to go back into her bedroom to get some shuteye, throwing one last glare at her reflection in the mirror. Somehow, she felt as though her reflection were mocking her, as though to say, "Ha, ha! You have a crappy life and I DON'T!"

Maybe she was insane; the reflection was nothing but an image of herself. It had no brain, heart, or feelings.

So why did it feel like it got the better end of the bargain?