Chapter 7:

Helen eyed the SF with a critical eye as he handcuffed her. "Could you do anything more degrading?" She asked harshly. "I'm being treated like a common criminal."

He was silent.

She rolled her eyes as she sighed. This routine was getting really old really quickly.

"The prisoner's ready for transport." The SF announced as he knocked on the door.

If only she had enough strength to overpower both of the guards, she thought to herself. And to outrun all of the other guards in this secret base.

Part of her hoped that Ashley had attempted and succeeded in escaping, but she knew that even her daughter, with all of her strength and fury, would be unable to overthrow the oppressive hand of the United States Air Force.

And Will was as hopeless as she was.

They walked down the corridors, and she studied them for any hope of escape. From what she could gather, they were most likely underground. Though, how far underground was a mystery to her.

She was escorted only a few feet before she was allowed into a recreation room. Two figures stood in the room, dressed in official uniforms. The blond didn't catch her attention nearly as much as the gray-haired Air Force general who stood, waiting expectantly.

She swallowed. "Jack."

"Hello, Helen." He said with a stony expression on his face.

-

Ashley was escorted into the room, practically dragged by the SFs.

"Colonel, she tried to escape." One of them announced.

Sam sighed. "We'll handle it from here, sergeant."

Ashley stared at the woman before she looked back at her mother. "It's like...having two moms!" She cried, incredulously.

Helen didn't even hear what her daughter had said though Sam managed a less than comfortable smile at the thought.

"What are you doing here, Helen?" Jack asked after a moment.

"Your team brought me in."

"Okay...what I meant was why were you looking for that creature?"

"Isn't that what I do, Jack?" She asked, looking at him with a raised eyebrow. "Or don't you remember why we met in the first place."

He sighed as Sam turned a questioning glance to him. "There was...a rash of brutal murders of US soldiers." He explained. "We were sent in to assassinate whomever had done it."

"It was an abnormal." Helen said, looking over at the woman. Her eyes widened, though she didn't say anything about the strangeness of having a grown woman unrelated to her look like her twin.

"An abnormal?" Sam asked, confused.

"Boogeyman...Bigfoot...monsters under the bed..." Jack clarified.

"Mythological creatures?" She asked, skeptically.

"They're far from mythological." Helen said, seriously, before she looked back at Jack. "You never introduced me to your friend."

He sighed. "Helen Magnus, I'd like to introduce you to the acting commander of this base, Colonel Samantha Carter. Carter, I'd like to introduce you to the director of the entire Sanctuary Global Network, Dr. Helen Magnus."

"Sanctuary?" Sam asked, confused.

"My home and other places around the world like it," Helen began. "Have become havens for abnormals who are so brutally treated that humans deny their existence."

"So, you thought you were tracking an abnormal..."

"I know I was tracking an abnormal." Helen corrected.

"Actually, Helen, that was an alien."

"Alien?" She asked, skeptically.

"Now, that is a myth."

Sam raised an eyebrow. "I don't think so. That's what I do for a living."

"Track aliens?" Helen asked, dubiously.

"Actually, I just do the meet-and-greet. Every so often, I have to track them down, but usually I just learn what I can from their cultures and their technology."

Just then, Daniel arrived with the SFs who were escorting Dr. Will Zimmerman to the rec room.

Helen looked at her daughter and protege, both dressed in the same gray jumpsuits as she was, to verify their safety before she turned back to Jack O'Neill. "Why have we been treated like prisoners, Jack? We've cooperated so far."

"Your daughter tried to escape." He said, evenly.

"And if I give you my word that she will refrain in the future?"

"Then we'd have the simple problem that you haven't aged in twenty-five years."

She tensed.

"We'd like to run some tests before we expose you for the alien that you are."

She raised an eyebrow in surprise. "The what?"

"Take her to the Infirmary. Dr. Lam's expecting her." Jack said, looking at the SFs.

"I have an explanation, Jack." Helen announced as the SFs approached her.

"What kind of explanation?" Daniel asked, curiously.

She looked at Daniel, and then, she looked at Jack. "I am 157 years old."

"Excuse me?" Jack asked as his mind refused to comprehend this.

"I was born in the year 1852 to Gregory and Althea Magnus."

Sam's brow furrowed. "Althea Magnus?"

Helen looked over at her American double. "Yes..."

"That was my mother's name..."

Helen's eyebrows raised. "Excuse me?"

Jack's jaw dropped. "You really are twins?"

Sam shook her head. "No. My mother wasn't born until 1949, and everyone called her Thea. But she was born in England, and her maiden name was Magnus. She met my father when he was on a tour in Germany. He took a weekend trip to France, and they met in the Louvre. They were just excited to meet another English speaker, and the rest is history. But my mother always said that her name was a family name that had been passed down for generations."

"And it was." Helen said, thoughtfully. "My mother happened to have the same name as my father's mother, and the name was passed down the Magnus line every few years. Beginning with my cousin, Byron Magnus, who named his daughter, Althea." Helen thought for a moment. "She didn't survive into adulthood, and when her older brother's oldest son, Henry, married, he named his eldest daughter Althea in memory of the aunt he'd never gotten to meet."

Sam's eyes widened. "Henry Magnus? That was my grandfather."

Helen's eyes mirrored the surprise in Sam's. "We're cousins, then." She said, shocked. "Four times removed."

Jack stared at the two women. They were cousins...that had been separated by four generations. His brain hurt.

"All of that aside," Sam said, waving away the genealogy. "How on Earth could you be one-hundred and fifty-seven years old?"

Helen inhaled before she admitted her secret. "I injected myself with the pure blood of the ancient Vampires."

Sam and Jack exchanged looks of skepticism.

"Vampires?" Daniel asked, surprised.

She nodded. "They ruled the world during the Greek and Roman eras for certain, and possibly as far back as Egypt."

Daniel shook his head. "Not Egypt. The goa'uld ruled the world for Egypt."

"The what?"

"Goa'uld." Jack began. "These little alien snakes that wrap themselves around your spine and interface with your brain so that they can take over your body whenever they feel like it."

"That's fascinating." Helen said with a thirsty gleam in her eyes at the thought of another abnormal parasite.

"That's terrible!" Ashley cried at the same time.

"Thank you." Jack said, motioning to Ashley. "My thoughts exactly."

"So, you're a vampire." Sam said, returning to the earlier topic.

"No." Helen said, shaking her head. "But I have been blessed – or cursed – with an abnormal longevity for a human being."

"Doesn't sound like much of a curse to me." Jack said, seriously.

Helen tensed for a moment as she swallowed. "How many friends will you have buried in your lifetime, Jack? A rough estimate will suffice..."

He tensed. "Uh...I don't know...if I'm lucky it will only be thirty or forty..."

"And lovers?"

"Uh...none..."

"I have buried at least a hundred friends, and eighteen lovers." She said with an eye filled with experienced sadness. "And with each passing generation, it becomes more and more difficult."

Jack looked at Sam, who shrugged. "It would make sense, sir." She admitted. "I mean, Jolinar had been alive for nearly two hundred years, and she'd been in love for more than a hundred of them. It's something I'm still not sure I can understand. And Martouf...well, his grief was overwhelming to see."

He looked back at Helen. "I still want a physical to verify her story - and to check on the other two."

Helen sighed. "If you're that stubborn, I suppose we will have to submit ourselves to your tests."

"Thank you."

"In exchange for a telephone call."

"A telephone call?"

"Any common criminal would get one." She reminded him. "And I am no more a criminal than you are, Jack."

He sighed. "One phone call."

"Where is your infirmary?" She asked, looking at the SFs.