Sam finally made it home at about 5 o'clock. Usually she stayed late for the required office hours, but today she couldn't bring herself to stay. Instead she stuck a note on her door, jumped in her car and drove home as fast as she could. Placing her bag on the hallway table, she walked straight to the kitchen. Opening the fridge, she found exactly what she needed – a nice cold bottle of vodka. She opened the bottle on her way back to the living room, sat down, took a long sip and shut her eyes. Today had been a difficult one. First, the soldiers and then the student's questions. Usually she could keep the memories at bay, but today she just couldn't. Leaning back on the couch, she relaxed and let the memories pass over her.

They had been on a regular reconnaissance mission – go in, check the terrain, meet the locals, see if they had anything worth trading for and then reporting all back to the SGC. Out of no where the inhabitants attacked. SG-1 ran for the Stargate while shooting at the ones behind. They had taken cover in an abandoned building while they made sure the way to the Gate was free of hostiles. Seeing how bad it was, O'Neill ordered Carter to run and dial the Gate. She did, while O'Neill followed to protect her six, Daniel and Teal'c kept the hostiles busy. Sam had just finished dialing when the Colonel ordered her to go through. She stood in front of the Stargate and turned, to help cover the others. O'Neill radioed Daniel, telling them to start for the gate. All of a sudden there was an explosion from the building. The force of it knocked Sam through the Gate. In the control room, Hammond and Siler watched her body hit the ramp. Debris followed her, and then the wormhole shut down. The medical team rushed into the Gate room, but Sam was unconscious. Once she was sent to the infirmary, Hammond tried to dial up the planet. It was useless. The Stargate wouldn't engage. Over the next three days they would try to open it. Finally it connected. Unfortunately the MALP showed that the planet was barren, the building was in rubble and all signs of life were gone – destroyed.

It was four days later when Sam woke up. Apparently the force of the explosion combined with her head hitting the ramp caused her to go into a comatose state. At first she was unable to understand what they were saying. SG-1 was dead. Impossible! They couldn't be. She screamed and ranted and tried to persuade General Hammond to go back. To figure out where they were, to let her go there. When they kept refusing, she went so far as to visit the president, since he owed Colonel O'Neill some favors. Even he said "no". Everyone tried to be understanding – she had just lost her team, her best friends, but to be honest, she was annoyingly stubborn in her lack of belief that the rest of SG-1 were dead. Sam didn't see it that way. She just saw that they had given up. After a major blow out with General Hammond, she decided to quit. She really had no choice, they were gone, Hammond's harsh words convinced her of that. Even if they weren't dead, it would be up to them to get home as the SGC wasn't going to help. Sam spent a couple of weeks going out with different teams looking for them secretly. Then their allies came back and reported that there were no life signs on the planet. That day Sam gave up. She packed up her house, handed in her resignation, left her lab and took a job at this University.

It had been exactly what she needed - a place she could remember her friends. A place she could walk around without everyone knowing of her loss. She could just be Dr. Carter, not poor Colonel Carter. Here she didn't need to be the brilliant life-saving, alien-ass kicking soldier. Here she could just – be. That was if you excluded the phone calls, emails and messengers from the SGC and other affiliated technology companies who tried to call her back into "their" world. No matter how many times they asked her back – making it seem like the world was going to be destroyed, she refused to go back. They tried everything – bribes, blackmail and in some cases begging. The second year, it slowed down a bit. Finally, they had only called a couple of times. She was enjoying her life - her work was enjoyable; she enjoyed teaching and she liked not having to come up with ideas to save the planet every other day. Most of all, she enjoyed her anonymity. She knew that the university people were curious about her. She didn't feel the need to explain, hell most of it she couldn't explain since it was classified. Then again she didn't mind the curiosity of those people nor did she feel the need to assuage it. She was content now. She had her work and she had her memories that were all that was needed.

Now they were back? For what reason? And this seemed worse then before. They actually came to her work. They sent soldiers to take her...hmmm. Oh well – she could care less. She was done with them, the politics, the "emergencies", the life-and-death situations. She had a good life, she was content. That was all she needed.