Disclaimer: I don't own Stargate SG-1 or Stargate Atlantis or any of the characters or plots therefrom. Shadowy PTBs like Gekko Film Corp., Double Secret Productions, MGM, Paramount, and SciFi Channel do. Plus others that I can't remember now. I'm just playing with them and I'll put them back just the way I got them, I promise. Mostly. So, um, don't sue, okay?
Summary: Sam vanishes on vacation in mid-Season 6, and her team has to figure out what the heck happened and how/if they can fix it. Her adventures take her beyond anything they imagine or expect. If she were to return four years later, what would she and her friends recognize of each other and their experiences?
Rating: PG-13 for language and some nastiness later
Category: General/Action/Adventure (so far)
Note: I have been a fanfic junky for a while now and I've read quite a bit of material, but this is the first I've written. I haven't intentionally taken anything from any other author, but I've posted some inspiration credits on my profile. If you think something/one is yours, PLEASE let me know. Also, this is the tiplet of the iceburg – I have four years to cover for our intrepid hero(ine)s and there's a whole big honkin' story to come. Eventually.
Feedback: Heck yeah! It's my first fic, and I haven't seen further than Season 5, so please let me know if there are any glaring errors. Constructive criticism is welcomed and I'd love to hear what you think of the story. So review, baybee!
From Here to Alternity: I Spy with My Little Eye…
Stargate Command
Spring 2007
"I spy with my little eye… something gray and cold." The slap of combat boots on concrete echoed through the mostly empty room. "Hey, Rogers! I spy with my little eye –"
"Concrete walls. Would you quit that?" the seated soldier gritted out past his clenched teeth.
The pacer never stopped. Ten steps, pause, about face. Ten steps, pause, about face. Ten steps, pause, about face. Lather, rinse, repeat. "Quit what? I'm not doin' anything."
"I swear to God, Jablon, I'm on the verge of justifiable moronicide here. Sit down and shuddup."
Of course Lieutenant Alex Jablon didn't. Boredom had set in early that morning, and pacing and playing "I Spy" was only slightly above "10,000 Bottles of Beer on the Wall" on the time wasting taxonomy. Plus the annoyance factor for his partner? Always a bonus. Four steps he later took a spectacular tumble and sprawled at his partner's feet. He snapped up to a white-knuckled boxing stance and advanced on Lieutenant Matthew Rogers' immobile form.
"Damnit, Rogers, you tripped me!"
"Self-defense."
"Bull! I'm going crazy stuck in this closet on the shittiest duty Captain Hailey could think of with the most ignorant recruit to ever get into the SGC and the only way I can keep from exploding is to pace. I'm trying to keep myself from strangling you for getting us into this and then you trip me!"
Rogers spun up to stand eye to eye with his enraged co-punishee. His dark brown hair and olive complexion should have made it impossible for a flush of rage to stand out, but Rogers had been at the SGC long enough to know that anything was possible. "ME? Getting us into this was all you, genius, and don't you forget it! And it's gonna be self-defense 'cuz if you don't stop stomping all over this room I'm gonna explode. You'll be a dead man and I'll be stuck in the brig for the rest of my frickin' life!"
Jablon ignored the legalesque argument and went straight for the heart of the tension that had torqued the easy friendship between the two buddies. "This is Not. My. Fault! You were the one whining and moaning that we had nothing to do on our downtime. You were the one that got us kicked out of the infirmary while the rest of the team is stranded there. Cap's got a broken leg and Mitchell's in traction and you're short sheeting the beds? Yeah, they'll be up and around in four to six weeks and where are we supposed to hang out in the meantime?"
"Oh, yeah? Which one of us wanted to go snoop in Captain Hailey's office in the first place?" Rogers' grip on his temper slipped another notch as his blondish ex-linebacker friend glared right back.
"Hey! You were the one who picked up the picture frame and started making comments about the team photos. And it wasn't snooping," he mumbled. "We were just stopping in to say hello and see if any of the scientists needed anything." Jablon blushed as red from embarrassment as anger. So he thought Capt. Jennifer Hailey was cute. That wasn't a crime. At least it hadn't been until yesterday.
"And, you, Mr. Sensitive, you were the one who said it was too bad Major Carter was dead. That's what set Hailey off and you know it." Jablon didn't realize he'd just admitted the intense interest he had in all things Hailey. But Rogers did and it took the tiniest slice off his anger. This would be good for many, many days of torment and they had at least another week stuck here together.
"Yeah, but you were the one who asked about the 'blonde looker' in the middle picture. I can't believe you said that about her legs! I was just trying to set you straight." Jablon snapped at Rogers, who had come to the SGC after Major Carter had… left.
"Fine, so I started it. But you set her off!"
"Fine." Jablon pouted. Hailey was probably still upset with him.
"Fine!" Rogers hated this. He hated to feel like a rookie, and not knowing the story of the late, great Samantha Carter had more than embarrassed him. He felt like there was one more part of the SGC's story that he hadn't even known he didn't know. He was… disappointed.
Jablon hadn't even fully explained before Captain Hailey swooped in and sentenced them to two weeks of the worst duty the mountain had to offer. A fuming silence slowly bled tension off into the super secure storage area. It was no secret why the airmen were piled into the nearly empty isolation room on one of the deepest levels of Cheyenne Mountain. The flat gray sheet of the mirror hung in oddly shaped quiescence on the only non-bare wall. This was the infamous quantum mirror that had taken Dr. Daniel Jackson to an alternate reality that helped him save this world. And sent another Samantha Carter and the late, lamented Major Jay Kawalsky here from a reality that the original SG-1 had, in turn, been able to rescue. General Hammond had ordered it destroyed after that adventure, but some NID minion had gotten word to his bosses before it could actually be carried out. What with politics and power plays, the mirror had been hidden away in Area 51 until it became blatantly obvious that the SGC had the better claim. Some poor shmoe had pulled the duty of guarding this empty piece of naquadah 24/7/52 for the last three and a half years. And now it was their turn.
Jablon sighed. "Look, I know why you said it. And you were right, she was… is… was…" Jablon shook his head and started again. "Major Carter was pretty, and bright and as cool as any member of the original SG-1. Total warrior scientist and all that stuff. I think Colonel O'Neill and Dr. Jackson would head off to Chulak with Teal'c if she were ever declared KIA. And it sucks that nobody really knows what happened to her. Most of us have finally admitted that it's been four years and she's probably never coming back. There's nothing wrong with asking about her picture."
Jablon's pale face shifted from uncomfortable to abjectly miserable. "It's just that Hailey walked in right in time to hear it. Major Carter was like … the patron saint of the tech people. Sgt. Siler spent the first couple months afterwards refusing to fix anything non-crucial because 'Major Carter would come up with a better way'. I think Simmons finally made that bulletin board into a shrine when they did the last dialing computer upgrade. Hell, Rodney McKay all but genuflected before they went off to Atlantis, and you know what he was like."
Rogers snorted sadly. The best thing to come from Atlantis so far was the absence of some of the more colorful personnel.
"You didn't get here until after all the unspoken don't-mention-it rules went down. Some NID guy made a crack about Major Carter when SG-1 went to close down that freaky hybrid cloning lab – long story, it was a year before you came – and it took 10 Marines to pull Teal'c and Hailey and O'Neill off him. One of the guys that held Dr. Jackson back still swears he feels that break in his collarbone every time it rains. It's always been that way for the SG teams – you fight one, you fight all of them – but SG-1 has been here since the very beginning. Dr. Jackson and O'Neill have been here since before the beginning and they'd all been through some serious shit in the six years Major Carter was with them."
"Yeah, I'd heard about the Tok'ra and the particle accelerator and Apophis and all that stuff. I'd even read some of Major Carter's mission reports in training. But I don't get why Hailey was all upset. It wasn't like I'd said anything bad about her. I just wondered who the gorgeous blond with the legs up to here was. Why was that so bad?"
Jablon sighed. Rogers wasn't cruel, he was just a second year recruit who stumbled onto one of the painful pockets of Stargate history. "Okay, I'll tell you what I know if you promise never to mention it on base or within a 100 yards of any member of SG-1 ever again. Deal?"
"Deal." Rogers settled back in his chair and waited for the tale to begin.
"Well, you know about Dr. Jackson's year with the ascended glowy people, right?" Jablon waited for confirmation, then began the tale. "This happened about halfway through that…"
