Author's Note: This one I really enjoyed writing and loved how it came together. I didn't set out to write anything in particular, just came up with that first line which I liked and the rest just followed. Wish they all came so easy…
Disclaimer: Purely for fan purposes; no copyright infringement intended.
The mist that flowed around his knees slunk towards his teammates like Sandburg's cat. It swirled around them and made them appear ghostly and insubstantial. "Hey," he yelled out, "you said it would be me...I'm the one you said would be tested!" but his teammates, dissipating into the fog, stood silent and uncomplaining. The mist curled around him and climbed up him, its cool, moist taste of early morning reaching into his mouth and down into his lungs. His instincts were to fight against it, but he'd brought himself to this. He drew in a large mouthful and waited for what must come next.
Carter angrily watched him disappearing into the mist. She could almost hear him say, "Well, this isn't good," as it separated him from them and obscured him from their view. How many times, she wondered, how many times had he chosen the high road in the hopes they'd be safe on the low? He would have roundly cursed any of them for placing themselves in danger, but he was all too eager to get there himself. Why couldn't he live by the practices he demanded of them? Why did he have to sacrifice himself for them? She was afraid to glance at her teammates, afraid if she took her eyes off of him he'd be lost to her forever.
Daniel was just as unhappy with the situation. He wished Jack would learn being the commanding officer didn't make him the one ideally suited to face each challenge. Surely this was one of those times. The mist would try the heart of the one chosen they'd been told. Well, considering Jack O'Neill had hidden his heart so deeply he couldn't even find it himself, he probably was the least suited of them all. Give Jack a p-90, some C4, and a grenade or two and turn him loose, but the last place he needed to be was in an elaborate labyrinth of emotions. Daniel worried Jack's dislike of what he'd find would be enough to destroy him if he actually did meet himself in the mist.
Teal'c fought back his own feeling of dismay watching O'Neill fade into the fog. Not that he doubted him. He knew his friend's heart was true. He'd seen that seconds before saying, "Many have said that," and changing everything by following O'Neill against his god and his people. Yes, O'Neill's heart was true. However, the danger came because O'Neill himself doubted that fact. O'Neill had made choices no man could feel comfortable with just as Teal'c himself had. But Teal'c was certain his path was right. He'd seen true evil in the Goa'uld, and it was not him. O'Neill had no such certainty. The line between what he saw as evil, and what he himself would do to fight that evil was too fine. It was as obscure as O'Neill's figure in the fog. Teal'c feared O'Neill's doubts would skew the results the wrong way in the test he was now facing.
Despite their concerns for their commander and friend, his teammates were helpless to stop what was happening. He'd ordered them to stand down. They stared into the fog hiding him from them and could do nothing but wait. The aliens of p3C-836 settled onto their haunches and waited as well.
"How long will this take?" Daniel asked them.
They shrugged in answer. "Only your colonel can determine that," they said calmly. Everything they did was in unison as though they were separate parts of one whole. They had fascinated him when they'd first met them, but now he no longer cared if they were somehow joined telepathically or otherwise. He wanted them to just go away and let them all off their planet. He'd gladly tell the general to lock the dialing coordinates out of the computer. They appeared benign, but the clutching in his gut insisted their 'Trial by Mist' was malignant and carried great harm with it.
"What will happen?" Sam asked them.
Again they shrugged. "That, too, is up to your colonel. He will prove his heart is true and survive the mist or he will die. And then so will you." They looked directly at her, "Do you not believe his heart is true?"
She didn't flinch before answering, "He won't fail."
"Then we will have much to offer you in your fight against the Goa'uld," they said, shrugging again. And then, though to the travelers from Earth nothing seemed to be happening, they said "The test begins."
O'Neill waited impatiently for something to happen but nothing did. He stared angrily into the mist for a moment longer, striving to make out the dim outlines of his teammates but failing. "Teal'c, Carter, Daniel?" he called out, but there was no answer. He began to step towards where they had stood, but the farther he moved away the more he lost himself as though he'd become ungrounded and parts of him were drifting away. His awareness of himself as Colonel Jack O'Neill, commander of SG-1; as Colonel Jack O'Neill of the United States Air Force; as Jack O'Neill, husband and father; as Jack O'Neill, a raw recruit in the Armed Forces; as the youth he'd been before signing up; as the child he'd been back in Minnesota, slipped away until he was a man with no knowledge of himself at all. His feet continued to carry him forward through nothing more than the first law of motion: a moving object will continue to move until an outside force acts upon it.
The outside force rose up out of the mist like a giant warrior of old. A large black man in full battle dress with a sword to match and a fierce scowl on his face. The man in the mist automatically reached for his weapon and found a sharp dagger in his hand. He glanced at it curiously, it hadn't been there seconds before, but it was heavy and solid in his grasp. He moved his hand to send it hurtling through the air to cut down the enemy, but he didn't release the weapon. The warrior met his gaze without flinching and raised his weapon menacingly, and still the man hesitated. Here was danger, he could see it and taste it in the thin, early morning air. Yet here was friendship and loyalty, faithfulness and truth; it wasn't visible, but he knew it was there. He lowered his weapon. The warrior nodded his head and thrust out his sword: it was an outstretched hand of friendship before it reached him. The man who had been O'Neill grasped it like a lifeline, his mind tumbling in confusion. Then he was once again alone in the mist.
He stood rooted there his hand empty of weapon and friendship. Then he began to walk again though he didn't know why. The way before him was obscured by the mist, and he had no idea where he was going or if there was even any reason to be going. He walked for a long time and then he wasn't walking alone any longer. A beautiful, blond woman walked by his side. He glanced her way and she smiled at him. He knew that smile...a wave of contentment and joy washed over him like sunlight on a warm day. He thought he could walk forever as long as she walked alongside him. But, then another wave burst over him, one of great longing and sadness. The two emotions ebbed over him and through him mixing into deep waters in his soul, swirling about and nearly drowning him in their intensity.
The woman came to a stop and turned towards him. He realized she held a newborn child in her arms. "Will you carry her for me?" she asked him. He drew back in fear. The child was too small, too fragile. He thought she'd break in his big hands.
"Do you really trust me to hold her?" he asked with a voice he didn't recognize as his own.
"Always," she said as she carefully shifted the infant into his arms. He gazed into the perfect, little face and knew he held not just a child but the hope of all she would become...he held the future in his hands. Hands that had killed. Hands that were stained with the blood of the enemy and the blood of good men who'd fought beside him and bled out their life in his hands. The baby gazed unblinking into his eyes unaware she was not in good hands. He looked away to find the woman moving away from them, already almost lost in the fog.
"Wait. Where are you going?" he called after her.
She looked back over her shoulder and answered, "I have to keep walking. And so do you."
"But...but what about the baby?" he asked, but she was gone. He felt the loss like an ache through his whole body. The baby squirmed in his arms and began to fuss. He knew she was uncomfortable held against the stiffness of his bulletproof vest. He was afraid to lay her down even for the minute it would take to remove it; the mist might carry her away as well. He squatted with her and balanced her on his knees while he worked the vest off. He stripped off his field jacket as well. The baby snuggled against his soft, green undershirt. He shivered in the chill of the day but not because he was cold. He was vulnerable without the protection of his vest, exposed to the dangers of a world he did not know or understand.
Holding her tightly, he awkwardly struggled to stand up. The baby was tiny, no more than 7 or so pounds, yet his arms felt as though they would snap under her weight. He'd dropped his pack to take off the vest, and he eyed it with regret. He could not take it back up again and hope to carry the baby. He didn't have the strength for both. He fumbled through it for water, rations, and an extra undershirt to wrap the baby in if the blanket she wore wasn't enough in the damp. He also dropped what he could out of his belt. The p-90 on his shoulder, the pistol at his hip, the extra ammo, and the knife in his belt he kept. The baby was defenseless and totally dependent on him; he wouldn't leave his weapons behind. With resoluteness he moved forward into the mist.
The baby snuggled into the hollow of his neck. He could feel her small mouth nuzzling around on his neck. Her soft, round head in his hand filled him with an unaccustomed gentleness. He breathed in her new baby smell and knew he would do whatever it took to keep her safe and well.
The problem was he didn't know what it would take or if he could manage it. The baby's weight pressed heavily on him with each step, and he grew more and more afraid he'd drop her. He almost stumbled into a figure emerging from the fog right in front of him. The figure was a man, shorter, stouter, and older than he saw himself, with a bald head which glistened in the air's moisture. An aura of authority and power seemed to emanate from him, and the man who had been O'Neill instinctively drew up.
"Be careful, Colonel," the figure told him, his voice weighty and commanding.
"Yes, Sir," he heaved out in answer, straining against the heaviness of his burden. He waited expectantly for orders, but the figure stood silent before him.
"What should I do, Sir?" he finally asked.
The man raised an arm and pointed off into the mist, "Carry on, Colonel." The mist swallowed him up before he could answer, "Yes, Sir." He blinked into the emptiness. The baby mewed in his arms and he staggered on. The bald man had given him an identity, and he rolled it over and over again in his mind: Colonel. It held no meaning for him, but it seemed important to hold it tight.
The way seemed harder and harder. He stopped a moment, sipped the water, and ate part of the rations. He peered into the fog as though the answers of the universe were out there for him to see. But, it was a tall, lanky man who appeared out of it instead. His eyes were bright and blue, happily excited and dreadfully sad at the same time. There was a nervous energy and a deep weariness warring in the way he held his body, but he spoke cheerfully enough, "Hi, Jack. Where are you going?" The colonel rolled the name 'Jack' around in his mind. It rang no bells.
"I don't know," he answered truthfully.
"Then how will you know when you've arrived?" the man asked, his face alight with curiosity. The colonel merely shrugged. The man laughed, but when Jack didn't join him he grew serious. "Why don't you ask the Asgard? He's your safety net after all," he asked. He stepped close to Jack and laid his hand briefly on the baby's back. "She's beautiful," he said. "Don't drop her."
The colonel swallowed. "No," he said, "I won't." But the baby was the only one there to hear him. He moved off once again into the mist. He was almost at the end of his endurance. Twice he had stumbled to his knees and found it almost impossible to stand back up. The cold had eaten into his joints. His fingers and ears ached with it. The baby seemed unaffected. He'd wrapped his extra shirt over her blanket just in case, but cuddled against his chest even her little nose seemed warm. He thought he had been stumbling through the fog blind for hours if not days, but she'd never cried to be fed or changed.
He drank the last of his water and left the canteen behind, along with his p-90, handgun, and extra ammo. His hands were numb, and he didn't think he'd be able to fire a weapon if he needed to. He could barely stand, how could he fight off an attack if one came?
Fortunately, it wasn't an enemy that came out of the mist like a figment of his imagination. Without knowing how, he knew as soon as he saw the small, grey figure emerge that this was the Asgard the other had mentioned. His safety net. He looked at him hopefully. Maybe he had finally arrived wherever it was he was going. A slim, awkward body and large, black eyes in a misshapen, oversized head gave the Asgard the appearance of frailty, even weakness; but he knew that was wrong. It might appear easily broken, but it was anything but.
"Let me carry her. You are weak and tired, and I will not harm her," the Asgard told him. Relief flooded through him. His job was done. He raised her soft forehead to his lips and kissed her. Then he held her out to the alien. For a second, she lay between the two of them, looking at him with eyes full of trust. And reproach.
He pulled her close to him again and sadly shook his head to the offer. "I can't. I know you mean well, and I wish I could, but this is something I have to do myself. I can't let her go." Even he could hear the discouragement in his voice.
The Asgard inclined its too-large head at him. "Very well." It turned from him and began its journey into the mist.
"How much farther?" he asked desperately after it. "How will I know when I am there?"
The Asgard looked back over its shoulder at him, blinked its black eyes, and shrugged its long, skinny arms, "When you reach your destination, of course."
"When is that?" he asked, but not surprisingly, the Asgard was not there to answer. He let himself sag to the ground and cradled the baby on his lap. She made newborn noises, and he smiled at her. She looked at him with her wide, blue eyes, and he kissed her soft forehead again. She began to fuss and squirm. He knew she was trying to work up a cry. He had nothing to offer her, but his trembling arms and his determination.
"Just for a minute," he told her, "we'll rest just for a minute, and then we'll go on." But, she succeeded in working up a cry, a weak little sound at first which grew louder and more insistent the longer he sat. He forced himself up and began to walk. Her cries quieted as she nuzzled once more into his chest. "Ok," he said with resignation, "we'll keep moving." They stumbled on an indeterminate amount of time longer. Minutes, hours, or even days, he couldn't tell. He was numb to everything but the baby's nuzzling at the base of his neck which tickled and assured him she was still with him. His rations were long gone. Hunger and exhaustion wore on him, the cold ate through him, and the mist stretched unbroken before them.
Somewhere along the way, he began to understand: the baby wasn't a baby at all, but a manifestation of something else entirely. He didn't hold a living, breathing child in his arms. The little bundle wrapped in his undershirt wasn't what was weighing him down and crushing the very life out of him. When he looked into her blue eyes, he wasn't looking into the eyes of a child trusting him to meet her needs and protect her but at a responsibility he had a duty to fulfill. At some point, he thought he'd have an epiphany of sorts, then he'd know who he was and why he was there, and he would understand whatever he was supposed to be learning. He would understand what it was he had to struggle on for, what was so important he dare not do anything but see it through to the end.
The baby did not magically disappear from his arms when he reached his conclusion. She still nuzzled at his neck and made soft baby noises against his chest. Her head was still just as soft to his touch, and her smell just as sweet. He clutched her in his weary arms and though he knew so little, he did know she, or what she represented, was too precious to let slip from his arms. Whoever he was, it was his job to hold her/it close, and he would not fail in it.