Chapter 3

Major Samantha Carter now stood behind the teenager, watching his fingers fly over the keys at a speed she'd never seen before. He was currently scouring some Air Force Database she was sure he didn't have the clearance to be in, though she didn't have the heart to say that finding McKay would be as easy as typing in the name on a search engine.

He looked like he was having fun.

Until he ended up with nothing, that is. Ensign Lucas Wolenczak turned his head toward the Major and asked, "Are you sure he was involved with the Air Force?"

Carter nodded. "Yes. Can't you just search 'Stargate Command' or his name? I'm sure something would come up."

In fact, she was betting on it. He couldn't have just disappeared from the scientific community. Carter didn't think McKay was capable of that.

"Well, I've tried everything but that, I guess…" he trailed off, beginning with the search he should have done first—the easier one.

It only took a few seconds for things to start popping up.

"Someone's been busy," he commented before saying, "He hasn't published a paper in a while, though."

"He's probably close to, if not in, his eighties, Ensign."

"True. Uhh, what else do we have…" He scrolled through some files and news clippings, reading them aloud for her as he went waded through them. "Dr. Rodney McKay… worked in contingent with Stargate Command on and off for a few years before heading away for some top-secret project. That took up about five years. When the whole project's crew came back, he ended up staying because the SGC wanted him to work on some device to fight… aliens, I guess. It's not too detailed on just what the device was or what it was to be used for… Uhh… 'Dr. Rodney McKay Deemed Fool for Bridge Thesis' is one article's title. Looks like he was working on creating an inter-dimensional bridge of some sort—"

"Please tell me it didn't work."

She wasn't sure if the statement was made out of concern for the stability of this dimension, or out of jealousy that he had succeeded at something that big.

"…From what I can tell, it was never tested out. But then again, the Stargate Program went unheard of for over twenty years, so who knows whether or not it worked."

"Joy."

"Yeah."

"Anything else?"

Lucas scrolled through some more pages until he found what they were looking for. "Yeah, I can get him on a vidlink for you."

"Can you take the call in the Ward Room?" Ford asked. He had been overhearing most of the conversation.

"Yup," Lucas said before standing and leading the Major back to the Ward Room.

Major Sam Carter had been slightly nervous about calling the man. Dr. Rodney McKay, though completely infatuated with her, had been her biggest rival for years. Asking him for his help… She took a deep breath and dialed the number the Ensign gave her and waited. Then the screen lit up.

"Hello?"

The man on the other end of the vidlink sure looked like the McKay Sam knew, but he was much older now. Enough where she thought the usual banter between them would have to be kept at bay this time.

"Hi, McKay. It's been a while."

"Who are you again?"

Sam sighed. This would be interesting, especially if SG-1 had disappeared at one point. "It's me, Carter. Sam Carter."

Rodney moved to turn off the vidlink connection.

"Rodney don't! Really! It's me! It'll take some explaining, but it's really me!"

"Carter and the rest of her team have been missing for—"

"I know. We're from the past. We stepped through the stargate at the exact moment a solar flare occurred."

"Well that's… horrible timing, Major." He laughed once.

"I know. We need your help."

"I still doubt it's you though. Been missing for over thirty years and you don't look a day older." He shook his head. "Damn kids. Always playing pranks."

The vidlink was terminated then.

"Alright," Carter said. "Worth the try, I guess."

Lucas nodded slightly, agreeing with the statement. "So."

"So, I guess it's just us then, Ensign."

"You can call me Lucas if you want… I really haven't been in the military that long. Besides, you're a scientific colleague."

"Okay then, Lucas. Call me Sam. Or Carter. Doesn't make a difference. We should probably try figuring out an estimate of how long this is gonna take. The Colonel's going to want to know."

"The Captain, too."

Carter gestured toward the door. "Lead the way."

"Captain, can I have a minute, sir?" Ford asked, stopping Captain Hudson as he made his way from his quarters to the bridge.

"Yes, Commander?"

"May I speak freely, sir?"

"What is it that you want to know, Mr. Ford?"

"To work on the seaQuest, especially to be, say, the Commander, you'd need to have some pretty high security clearance, yes?"

"So why didn't you know about the Stargate Program?" Hudson guessed.

Ford nodded.

"If it makes you feel any better, I didn't know about it until it got declassified."

"By why bother? After so many years of going undetected, why declassify it to the world's military and governments at all? For that matter, why not just go out and tell the whole world?"

"Do you want to be the one to tell the planet Earth that they've been fighting in galactic, sometimes inter-galactic, wars for the last few decades?"

Ford didn't have anything to say to that.

"Exactly, Commander. I believe they were going to say something about it after seaQuest's second interesting encounter with aliens but the UEO got cold feet and backed out. And when you disappeared ten years ago, they may have said something then but of course, that's when all the chaos occurred, and here, Mr. Ford, is where we are today."

"And what happened?" Ford asked.

"Not now, Commander. You're minute's up."

Captain Hudson continued to the bridge, leaving Ford standing confused in the hallway.

The end of their first day on the seaQuest found SG-1 crammed into four small cots in a room somewhere in the middle of the submarine. While they were given the okay to roam about most parts of the boat, reasonable accommodations—size wise—had yet to be found. But then again, they'd had worse, so none of them were really complaining.

Except for Daniel.

"Did you know they found a piece of the Library of Alexandria?" he asked of the team in general.

"And that's important because?" O'Neill returned.

"That's not the point, Jack."

"Then what is?"

"There really are no plans at all for a sub like this?" Daniel asked.

"Not that I know. Carter?"

She looked surprised. "Uh, no, me neither. It's incredible."

"And they have no knowledge of the Stargate Program?" Teal'c proposed.

Sam shrugged. "I guess not, except for the Captain, anyway. But I'm not sure how much he knows. That Ensign though, he was able to get into databases I don't think I have the clearance to get into. If anyone else has come across it, he has."

"Did he?" Jackson asked.

"I can ask but as of right now I'm not too sure."

"Were you able to get in touch with McKay?" Daniel asked her.

"Yes and no," she answered. "He didn't think it was really me."

"Ah."

"Sir, this is going to take a few days," she said apologetically.

"Yeah," the Colonel said, rubbing his eyes with his palms. "I was afraid you were gonna say that."

"I'm sorry, sir, there's just a lot of work involved."

"Just… take your time with it, Carter. I don't want to end up way the hell in the future again."

"You mean more than we already are, sir?"

Jack sent her a look.

"Yes sir. Understood."