A/N:
Secrets
"What is going on?" Asked McKay looking back to Sam's office.
"What, Rodney?" Asked John.
"Caldwell stayed there!"
"And?" Asked Ronon. "Is that wrong?"
"No, but he didn't look like he told us everything about that ship!"
"I know, McKay" growled Sheppard. "I am aware that what he told us is not all there is to it."
"And you're going to be okay with that?"
"Do I have a choice?" John said with resignation, but Teyla heard a little annoyance there as well. "Let's get to what we were charged with."
Meanwhile in Sam's office …
"What is it, Steven?" Asked Sam.
"Can we talk without others knowing?" Asked Steven looking through the glass to the technicians and AR-1 leaving the control room. "Jack?" He turned to the retired general.
"Oh, yeah… right." And Jack just blurred the glass.
"Wow, I still can't get over what you and John can do with the place on will." Murmured Sam looking at her fiancé." Then she looked back at Caldwell. "Go on, Steven."
"I've managed to meet the captain of the Borealis." He just said.
"You said…"
"I did it, Jack, I stayed and demanded." Continued Caldwell. "I was granted an 'audience' when she noticed me. Turned out it was her XO that didn't want me near her."
"Maybe we should bring John and McKay back, they would surely like to know…" started Sam but was interrupted rather rudely.
"Absolutely not!" said Caldwell. "Sheppard is one of the last people who should be notified and McKay will leak this information to the whole City and beyond and that's precisely what we need to avoid."
"Okay, it will stay here between us. You were saying?" Concluded Jack.
"I met her. I met Maya and I talked with her." Declared the colonel. "I even saw her son."
"The commander of the Borealis has a son?"
"The rumors were just right, Sam, the warship is commanded by a woman who has recently given birth to a son."
"Cut to the chase, Steven" whined Jack. "I can see the best is still to come."
"The Ancients call her Maya, but who I saw…" Steven stopped for a moment. "It is Weir, Jack. The commander of the Borealis is no one else than Elizabeth Weir."
"What?" Asked Sam. "Surely you were mistaken, Doctor Weir is –"
"KIA. I know, Sam." Growled Steven in frustration.
"Did she recognize you?" Asked suddenly Jack. Then he saw a blank stare on both colonel's faces and clarified. "Did Elizabeth recognize you, Steven?"
"She knew who I was." Then he hesitated for a while and obviously understood the true meaning of Jack's question. "She knew my name and my status aboard the Daedalus, but she didn't 'recognize me'."
"Jack?" Asked Sam curious as to where O'Neill was going with it. "Any thoughts?"
"Remember when we found Daniel on that backwater planet? He had another name -"
"He didn't remember a thing about who he was…" Carter looked at Jack amazed.
"Wait a minute." Caldwell raised his hand. "Are we all considering the same insane idea?"
"Not really insane if you think about it." Sam smiled. "We know an ascended being can help a person ascend. And we know that you require some qualities to actually allow it to happen, but Weir could well have them."
"Danny boy would be helpful, but you were right, Steven," said jack somberly, "we need to keep it quiet for now. I will ask Daniel some questions, leave it to me."
"In the meantime we've got to find some way to define if she is really Weir or not. And it's not that I do not believe you, Steven, it's just – "
"I understand, Sam." Said Caldwell. "That's why I brought you these."
Caldwell put his hand in one of the pockets in his green one-piece uniform and produced two small containers from it. Then he handed it to Sam and watched her reaction when she realized the contents."
"How on Earth did you get hair samples?" Sam wondered.
"I was in the right time in the right place… and I took the chance it offered." He said. "One of the samples is from Maya and the other from Mercury. I know it's too little for our tests but I understand Beckett and Keller are good with the ancient medical tech. It should do the trick."
"I will talk to Beckett." Said Sam looking again on the samples. "I will get Weir's DNA from somewhere to compare and ask him to do it out of the mainframe. This was nobody would see the result and the results would not be matched automatically to the one in the database."
"And I will come back to my ship and supervise the repairs." Said Caldwell with a wry smile. "And everyone has his own workload."
"Good job, Steven." Commented Jack.
"We've got a problem." Sam said after the door closed after Steven.
"I know" said Jack "but the Wraith have a bigger one. After all it was her who demanded to be a System Lord."
Another team came back without any intel whatsoever. It looked like the Borealis made sure that people they protected had their mouths shut. It was even more frustrating when they were denied knowledge at another place just after they were given full load of crops for free because the villagers wanted to honor the Borealis and help Atlantis just as the Ancestors wanted them. So food for free was easy to get, any information impossible. There was also no word of Ford. It shouldn't surprise him to have no news about the man, he was in hiding for a lot of time already and no one had found him. But still, after seeing him, weaned off the enzyme and with fixed eye, with that carefree attitude Sheppard remembered from the beginning of the expedition, it was much harder not to have any trail.
There was also one major factor he was so desperate to get in touch with the young man. Aiden knew the commander of the Borealis. And the way he spoke of her was disturbingly familiar and enthusiastic. Sure, John would be glad if someone has just healed him but the young man was still too happy when he mentioned they knew the leader of the Ancients. There was something going on about it and John had a feeling that Caldwell did not tell them the truth. The man looked pretty shaken when he had been beamed to the Gateroom. It could have something to do with the fact that he along with his whole crew he was rescued at the last moment from certain death but John saw how the man looked at him. It unnerved him.
There was also the fact that he was excluded from the talk he just knew had to do something with Borealis and so with the safety of the Expedition. For someone who used to be solely responsible for that part it was hard to let it go. Everything was different when Elizabeth was there. The thought came on its own.
Beckett was having a hard time hiding from Sam that he helped that strange Ancient man. He was a doctor and he was used to keep confidential all the details of his patients' health but not telling colonel Carter about the encounter was mixed with all the information that seemed to flow in about the Borealis. Since Caldwell met the crew it was obvious that they will be meeting them again. Probably soon. Carson decided to come clean to Sam. He did not intend to disclose the name of the man or even Jinto's involvement, just the fact so that there was no problem when this came out. And he knew it would. Things like that had a tendency to come out into the open even sooner when they were tried to be kept really quiet.
He walked to colonel's office and had a sudden reminder of Elizabeth. He would not be as uncomfortable with telling her the truth but he would probably by more sad that he had deceived her. As it was now he was unsure what Carter would do or tell him.
"Carson" she smiled when he walked into the room. "Just a man I wanted to see."
"I have to tell you something." Carson decided to get to the point before another topics. "I met with an Ancient some time ago. I believe he was one of the healers from Borealis."
"What?"
"He came to me for help with one of his human patients and I gave it."
"Wow." Was all Sam said. Then she looked at the man and noticed his look. "I mean I think I should be mad at you."
"Probably yes…" Carson said warily not knowing where this was going. "But…?"
"Weir would not be."
"I don't think she would." There was a brief pause. "But you're not Elizabeth Weir."
"Of that I am not allowed to forget…" Growled Sam in frustration. Did everyone here wished she-
"You're not the same because you're different, not worse, just different. And maybe you're what this city now needs. You're a 'good different', lass."
"Yeah… right. Everyone here would gladly replace me with Weir."
"Don't misunderstand. We would like to have Elizabeth back. We were all grieving her death because she was family. Bloody hell almost everyone was after that first year. And the truth is that everyone knew she was much tougher than she thought but at the same time she was still the same diplomat who stepped through the gate that first day or who was able to calm me down when I accidentally fired the drone. Or rather… my original." Carson smiled sadly. "It's hard to accept changes and you are, were the change. They need time just like they needed with Elizabeth. Don't expect they need to forget her to accept you because if you do that you'll be destined to fail here and it would be far from truth."
Carson stood patiently seeing as Sam digested what he said. He was shocked he was able to deliver such a speech. He was never a skilled orator. When he remembered what she said as he came in he decided to break her out of her thoughts.
"You said you actually wanted to see me. What about?" He asked.
"Ah, right." She shrugged and took two small containers and two vials of blood from her table and handed them to Carson. "I need you to do the DNA tests."
"DNA?"
"And I want you to do them yourself and keep them secret from everyone else on the base."
"Well, you know I can't keep all the secrets." Beckett attempted a joke and he succeeded, Sam smiled with him. "But the ancient mainframe would put them automatically in the database with comparison to all the previous samples."
"That's why I need you to do it on a machine I will personally isolate from the mainframe and that will be reset after those tests so that the results would be only on one paper, for me." Sam said. "I need you to compare the DNA from the long hair with the blood from the first vial and if it's the parent of the person with the short hair. If these are matches then I will need you to check the second vial of blood for being the other parent."
"All this without results getting saved anywhere?" Beckett clarified. "What's the purpose in such a secret?"
"Believe me, leak of this information would wreak a serious havoc here as well as on Earth if what we suspect is true."
"That sensitive?"
"Unfortunately."
"I should get it done in a few hours if you reconfigure the machine."
"Lead the way, Carson." Said Sam signaling him to do just that with a hand."
"Colonel?" Said Sheppard entering the bridge of the Dedalous. "Can I have a word?"
"What is it, Sheppard?"
Caldwell didn't look at him, just continued to work on one of the workstations. It was strange to see him working on something he could have designated to one of the techs. That could have something to do with all the crew repairing some portions of the critical systems. It left the colonel alone in the room.
"You've met the captain of the Borealis, didn't you?" He confronted, but didn't get any answer. "Why do you need to keep it a secret?"
"Because the IOA will have a field day with the fact." Caldwell answered after a long while. "And if I am right about her identity then it will get really messy for us and especially for her. The less people know the less a chance there is for a leak –" Caldwell stopped mid-sentence.
"You can trust me…"
"There is also the thing that awakening any hope and destroying the measure of peace we have here is not worth the destruction it could bring." Caldwell turned and looked him in the eyes. "Believe me, Sheppard, it's better for now. When it's time you'll be the first to be informed."
"Yeah, that's comforting!" John snorted and left the ship.
"You sure about these results?" Asked Sam the next day reading the file Beckett had just handed her. "Absolutely sure?"
"I run the test twice to be sure, that was all I could manage from the hair you provided."
"Thank you Carson." Sam smiled. "Does anyone know you did those tests?"
"No, I've been careful."
"Thank you, Carson." Sam dismissed him and immediately asked Jack and Steven to join her on the balcony outside the Control Room.
"And?" Asked Jack.
"It's a match." Sam informed. Then she turned to Caldwell. "The woman you met is Elizabeth Weir. And the kid is hers."
"So what now?" Asked Steven.
"We keep it quiet as long as we can." Said Jack. "At least we know we can trust Borealis."
"At least we can assume that." Commented Caldwell and turned to leave. "The repairs on my ship are complete. I need to get back to Earth. I'll see you in six weeks."
"See you then, Steven." Said Jack and waited for him to leave. Then he turned to Sam. "Carter, the other blood sample?"
"It's a match, Jack." Sam stepped into his offered embrace. "I have no idea how it is possible but the child is Sheppard's."