Hello, we are there! Explanations will be out, finally!

Enjoy!

M.

PS: Please let me know at what point is too obvious that I have no life other than work and fanfics ... or better not.

Fourteen

"Your request was rejected, Colonel. Is that why you chose to disappear for the following nineteen months?" Henry Hayes asked seriously. Jack looked at Sam and then at Henry, a disbelief look on his face, but then, Sam didn't react and Hayes didn't laugh.

"What?!" Jack asked, "Are you seriously going to blame her?" he added loudly, standing up. Sam didn't flinch and he looked at her as if she had lost some marbles during the last twenty-three months since he had last seen her. She inhaled deeply.

"No, sir." she answered firmly, but shortly.

"Then, you are affirming you didn't choose to join the mission?"

"I did join the mission, sir. I had to, I couldn't leave them there," she commented.

"And yet, you had Rodney McKay, and Lieutenant Colonel John Sheppard and a lot of people who could've fulfilled the position you took and you could've given the orders from afar. And with most of the crew of Atlantis available to take your spot, you lead the teams. As far as we know, from all of them, only you had a request to return which was refused." Hayes pointed.

"Then, sir, I must affirm I chose to risk me. I decided I would be making most of the situation if I was able to make decisions and help with whatever outcome we encountered as the time progressed. The fact that I was one of the most prepared officers on Goa'uld technology weighted heavily on my decision to join the mission and my knowledge of both Goa'uld and Alteran languages helped me save lives which would be missing if I wasn't on that bridge. If had I not chosen to risk myself." She added calmly, but Jack knew her too well. He could hear the bitterness and the pain the others couldn't.

"Carter," Jack whispered, she pressed her jaw because she understood what he was trying to tell her. Her words came out too full of sentiment and too out of control. She inhaled to calm herself.

"When I took the mission, I didn't' know my request was rejected. But even if I knew, I would have reached to the same decisions. I know how easy to think it through when you are not under the pressure of the situation; and yet, I considered this for a long time. I must confess, I've analyzed it in all possible angles and this outcome was the best possible outcome. Would I do it again if I knew what would happen? Yes."

"Aha! You are admitting to having been AWOL," Hayes smirked.

"No, sir. I'm admitting having been a Commander officer for Atlantis Stargate Command. I had to choose to partake in a mission to protect the people under my command and, by extension, the base itself. I'm admitting I probably didn't take enough crew to do it, but it was just the right amount to get the right outcome. I'm admitting I made a decision under pressure and I'm admitting I would stick to it again if it was necessary," she finished.

"Then, if you were so headstrong and willing to make commanding decisions such as the ones you've just mentioned, then please explain to us why is that you requested the permission to return before your time?"

"That's easy, sir. I requested the change of assignment because, earlier that day, I had found out I was pregnant."

"Then why such thing wasn't mentioned in your request?" Her mask of calmness almost fell for that one, but she managed to catch herself.

"I didn't attach the real motive because I wanted to let my husband know in a very different way, other than reading it on a personal transfer request or learning it twenty months later. Although, when I forwarded my request, the Atlantis CMO also forwarded my medical file. Adding more, a copy of my medical file was attached to my request making my condition known to all the proper members of the SGC and all those Air Force members who were authorized to read it. I'm also aware that the SGC CMO, Doctor Lam, had informed the change of status to General Smith, that conversation, by itself, should have granted me the return if we take into consideration the IOA rules against birthing Earth humans on Pegasus Galaxy and by prolongation at Atlantis."

"And knowing you were pregnant; you still chose to engage in that mission, even with the potential death menace that now covered not only you but your child's life?" She looked at Jack, he noticed the pain in her eyes and he braced himself for the answer he knew would come.

"Yes, sir."

Jack closed his eyes and clenched his jaw, knew it was coming wasn't the same than actually hearing it. He wondered shortly if any of the other members of the meeting were at least once in the same situation he was now, listening to their wives confessing they would've done what they did even if that meant that the father, a.k.a him, wouldn't know his child until it was too late. By the expressions he saw, they had no idea.

"According to the last member of your crew who saw you alive," Henry continued, after clearing his throat to gain Jack's attention, "the only two who remained in the Mothership where you and him. Then, you ordered him to enter one of the lasts remaining escape pods and he did as you ordered."

"That's almost correct, sir."

"Almost?"

"Yes, sir. The ship we boarded might have looked like a mothership from the outside. However, it had several structural differences that don't fit with Goa'uld technology. The fact that the computers were not purely in their language was one of them," Hayes frowned.

"We also debriefed the rest of the crew who joined you on that mission," he continued as if he hadn't heard what she just said. "Most of them were already on the planet near the confrontation zone. Planet which, luckily, had a stargate, they didn't saw anything from their position. The ones who remained on the ships agreed that judging from what they managed to catch from your last words, and what the last officer with you saw, the Mothership you just secured… exploded. What do you have to say about this, Colonel?"

"First, I must correct your vision of the situation: the existence of a planet with a Stargate near the area of disembarkation of the crew wasn't luck. While they started to follow us, and a safe distance was reached, I ordered a search of near Stargates, towards which we moved and set an orbiting course. That way, even if we hadn't managed to board their ship by then, we would have been able to eject on escape pods and survive, no matter if the escape pods were theirs or ours…" she took a breath, remembering the nerves as her mind flowed her with memories of that day.

"And when they were all safely ejected, you escaped with the ship," he pointed.

"What?" It was her turn to be surprised. "Oh! I wish that was what happened, sir. But it wasn't… the ship auto-destruction started a countdown of roughly a minute and a half; which, believe it or not, is not near enough time to learn how to stop it. Even if my Goa'uld was good to try, my Alteran wasn't enough. The reformed version they were using for that ship was nothing I had seen before and by then, Intel pointed to the planet being a Naquadah paradise."

"We are currently mining that planet," someone added.

"Then, you should be aware that the fact that not only the planet but the whole system surrounding the planet are Naquadah heaven… an explosion of the magnitude of the auto-destruction of any ship could start the collapse of that whole solar system, not to mention what the explosion I survived would have done, considering the cargo of the ship."

"But by then you were already far away from Atlantis and you had managed to transport the prisoners, what difference would have made if you transport yourself to either ship and flew away with Doctor McKay or Lieutenant Colonel Sheppard?"

"Sir, the explosion wouldn't give enough time to the people who was on the planet to leave it unharmed or at all in some cases. After I ordered the last member of the team who had joined me at the bridge to take one of the four remaining escape pods from that area, I ordered Lieutenant Colonel Sheppard to return to the ship I was piloting before and asked Doctor Mckay to make a life scan. With all the variables, I ordered Lt Colonel Sheppard to enter hyperspace. And then I did the same with Doctor McKay. While I was trying to find a way to enter on hyperspace myself and that way take the explosion the furthest away from that system as possible. I pointed towards the Milky Way with seconds left."

"Aha! You did escape with the ship and towards our own galaxy!"

"Yes, sir. I did. I set course to the Milky way because it would have taken me far away enough from the system in which we were. Then, I ran to the closest escape pod hoping it would give me some sort of shelter from the explosion. I suppose one doesn't really want to die when faced with that chance." She sighed and looked at Jack, "even if the possible help doesn't seem like a valid or logical help."

"What do you mean?"

"The escape pods are not meant to work on hyperspace, we don't really know if one will resist the speed needed. Yet, that's where I ended up… on an escape pod on a ship which was on hyperspace"

"And yet, you are here…"

"I felt the change of speed when the ship came out of hyperspace somewhere, I knew I was out because the force pushed me towards the side and as soon as I caught myself, I reached for the ejection button. The ship exploded and the force of the explosion send me flying further away. I was sure I wouldn't survive, I even considered that it was stupid to have entered it, but, an escape pod isn't exactly thought to be a comfortable place to be for more than an hour or two. I don't know for sure how long I was inside. The pod was to seat four people; therefore, I could have been there for a decent amount of time before intoxication by carbon monoxide started, which it did. Thankfully, at some point, I was attracted by the gravity of a planet. Until it ended up pulling me in."

"That's a lot of luck, Colonel. However, not a single word of what you said makes sense or is close to what I've been informed."

"Then let me explain what happened from the start."