Double Take

Sara's story

I knew they were out there of course. Living their lives, not making babies, intending to see how it would be like to live thousands of years. I'd heard that General Hammond had the go-ahead of making them unofficial, off-the-books, SG team called SG-X.

What I didn't expect was to see them again. Well see them at the SGC at any time. I still remember robo-Jack, as I'll never call that one to his face, when he first came through and he thought he was my Jack just as I thought he was my Jack.

When we saw the white liquid that should have been red as blood ought to be, it freaked everyone out, them as well as us.

It's been years now since then, although Jack still doesn't like them, others do, especially SG-6 who appreciates the rescue they pulled off from the Stragoth. I've even heard the Tok'ra praise them.

Now they, well Harlan and 'I' are coming through the Stargate. It was very weird watching me walk down the ramp dressed in BDUs. Irrationally I wonder if this is how others see me.

There are many times I just don't follow Jack out to greet visitors as if by an unspoken rule between us for me to remain safe, but I was not going to stay in the control room while the rest of SG-1, and General Hammond went out to meet me...them.

"We have to talk," I hear my other self say and then turn over the conversation to Harlan as she turned to me.

"Congratulations," she said surprised me with a hug, in fact from the look on her face she surprised herself with the hug. "You and your Jack are now officially married as I've heard," she says in a way I know from myself means something else. It won't be major, but Jack and Dad have picked up on it over the years to know there was something else, possibly amusing left unsaid.

So while she dangled the bait, I did what I'd wish the men in my life did more often, I bit, "Heard?"

"Downloaded," she made a face that made me laugh, one she joined in and turned the heads of the others towards us.

"What?" we chorused and then looked at each other to laugh again.

It turned out I'd have to wait to find out what that look meant when she made as she mentioned downloading. It was meeting time, yet unlike other times I was included in the meeting. I imagine the reasoning was that 'I' was also the visitor who was very much apart of this meeting.

"We need to coordinate," I, she, began and then asked a question, "Do you remember a world called Juna?"

"P3X-729," Teal'c said without hesitation, I noticed Drey'auc was ready to answer if her husband hadn't. From the look on 'my' face, I could see my robo-self noticed that too.

"Ah, P3X-729," 'I' had said and made that look again, not quite as strong as when she uttered 'downloaded' but it was still there so that meant it was associated with it.

Wow, I'm actually psycho-analyzing myself. Now who would have thought of that as part of the SGC weirdness?

"Well we ended up there and it became very ... messy," I know that look, she was understanding in a way I had learned from Jack. No way was did I start out that way, I picked that up over our years of marriage.

"They unburied their gate," my Jack said with a look that screamed 'idiots!'

"Yes and no," robo-self said, she was looking for a way to say it delicately but as I often had to do plunged in bluntly, "Kronus came, he saw, he conquered and then he died."

THAT was a Jack-ism if I ever heard it. Have I really picked up that much from my husband? Stealing a glance at him, and catching Daniel looking at him too, I can see we're wondering the same thing.

Teal'c and Drey'auc were focusing on other matters, the former likely didn't realize he rose out of his seat, "Kronus is dead?" Even our stoic son of Chulak looked a mix of pleased and shocked all at once.

Hmm, from that look on 'my' face I gather I didn't take his reaction into consideration when 'I' spoke, but it's not surprising 'me' now.

"Yes," she nodded, it really was weird listening to me talk, and watching me move with gestures I know are mine, even that slight smile on my face, "You killed him with your bare hands."

Now Teal'c sat back down, Drey'auc's hands going to his shoulders in a gestured of being happy for him that crossed the cultural divides. He had a smile on his face that the rest of us rarely get to see.

"Yes, you're quite pleased with yourself too," robo-Sara added with a larger smile, then turned back to the rest of us, "What happened was our team ended up on P3X-729 and were ambushed by the natives. The long story short is they naturally thought we were you and were not happy that while you overthrew Heru-ur and told them to bury their gate, Kronus came in a ship to take them over."

"If Kalakek wasn't there it would have been awful," and I knew from the way she was looking down at the table, and then over at Daniel, just who it would have been 'awful' for. I also knew she meant dead.

Drey'auc's Day

Seeing myself waiting to greet us was as unusual as it had been seeing Sara's robotic duplicate. After her meeting, General Hammond did authorize a relief effort to P3X-729. It was partially to show support for abandoning false gods and also to give truth to the words of our duplicates who their Sara kept telling them that they were not us, but only a few believed them.

Instead of what had become customary for me to flank SG-1 with my husband on the other side in a non-threatening situation, I walked ahead to talk to myself as Sara might put it.

"Your Sara says she was not there, but you were. How did it happen?" I did not think I needed to specify what as killing Kronus was something important to both of our husbands.

"O'Neill had been hit with a Zat'nik'tel when we stepped through the Chappa'ai, the rest of us knew we could defeat the native population yet their assertion we had been here confused us enough that we decided to let them take us prisoner," my duplicate self started at the beginning as I might have done instead of getting to, again as Sara would put it, 'the good part.'

She went on to tell me of how O'Neill had slipped away while the natives and their Jaffa leader were focused upon us. How Kronus was summoned once it was learned who was captured, and how the team was brought into his presence in chains and made to kneel before him.

"...all when we could have broken out at any time. Kronus had also gathered natives, not knowing the O'Neill was now among their number in disguised, nor that Kalakek walked among them unsensed by any symbiote." I knew I did not have to repeat this to Teal'c as he would ask himself how Kronus died, but others back home would want to know. Indeed Jenny now flanked on the other side of me listening.

"I bet he pontificated for a while didn't he?" she asked to the bafflement of both of us.

"Pontificated?" we chorused as Sara and her duplicate had back at the SGC.

"Gloat, she means gloat," apparently O'Neill was close enough to hear us. I knew he was not happy about meeting his duplicate, and tended to distance himself from the duplicate Sara that walked beside his own wife as she came along this time.

"Then yes, Kronus pontificated about how this will be a great day in history, how Teal'c would die a slow and painful death worse than his father," I could well imagine such a scene as I heard my duplicate describe it unfolding in front of me.

"To prove the loyalty of the natives he had their leader who apparently knew of you," I needlessly filled in the name Darien, or thought it was needless until I realize unlike we who met him on our trip to this planet, or our duplicates now, Jenny would not know the name of this person.

'I' nodded and continued, "Darien was handed a Kara'bashaak'tak and told to kill Daniel Jackson."

Sha're's story

"You were going to let him kill you?" I knew my voice climbed several octaves as Jan'et told me the word, and I didn't care at that point. Besides, I could tell that my other self wanted to say these words yet did not.

That Dan'yel acted so much like my own, "Kronus had staff weapons pointed at Darien's people, and it was either let them kill me or have them shoot the others. I couldn't count on Jack being able to stop them all in time."

"But you should have let him try rather than let Darien shoot you," I scolded the other Dan'yel, feeling mine was trying to be anywhere else but right here and feeling sorry for 'himself.'

"But he -didn't- shoot me," that Dan'yel defended as mine would have done.

"Only because Kalakek was there," it was very liberating, another word I know has more meanings than in my language, to be able to admonish that Dan'yel as I knew we didn't have to make up later. That I would leave to his Sha're.

After all, making up is half the fun to what arguments Dan'yel and I might get in.

I was playing what the Tau'ri call the 'bad cop' and would let that Sha're play the 'good cop' later on.

"You could have broken your chains and there were five of you, four chained where they would not expect you to get free, and Jack who was hidden among Darien's people," from the way he looked down I could see that both he was very sorry and did see what could have happened had not Kalakek been apart of their number.

"Instead I fired into the Jaffa, and had them firing everywhere but at the natives," Kalakek startled me as much as Chake does back at the SGC when he spoke up so suddenly.

Now Dan'yel, the other one, had that shy smile I always loved and shook his head, "Yes, Kalakek loves chasing Jaffa in panic mode."

"Panic mode?" Kalakek repeated and to my ears he sounded defensive.

"You love scaring them, Kal," their Jack spoke up looking at the spot that the Re'tu must have been standing in. From the way the rest of the other duplicates also looked, all of them could see him.

Having been startled more than once by Chake who often suddenly spoke up beside, or behind me, I found for a brief moment I wished I was my duplicate self, but only for a moment.

"They are so delightful when they get all panicky," I could not believe the Re'tu used a Tau'ri word and that had to be a Tau'ri word.

"Panicky?" both Dan'yel's chorused prompting me to look at my other self and smile. Our gaze held the same message, they are the same person and we love them so.

"Well yes, panicked and running or firing where they think I am. They pretty much guessed what was attacking them, but the fact their symbiotes aren't sensing me throws them into a panic. Even Kronus looked scared there at first. Definitely at the end of his lives, both his host and himself."

Sara's summary

I could not -believe- we're doing this.

Not the fact that General Hammond promised to send updates about where and what SG-1 is doing so we don't have this mix up again. Nor the fact of having K-9 back on base.

It was actually nice that the General brought 'Toto' in for an idea Jenny had and Teal'c in particular loved. Jack suggested the popcorn, probably totally inappropriate for what we were watching, but considering it was my Jack who suggested it and what we were watching, it made sense.

"I'm kind of nervous even though I didn't do this," Daniel told us as he stood up in front of a packed room. Just about everyone who could get here is here for this so-called private viewing.

"In away you did Dan'yel, be proud of your work," I hear Sha're support her husband just as Jack was doing as he went up front to take the spotlight, but really to take the heat off of our Danny boy.

"Jack?"

"Daniel?"

Then he promptly turned from Danny and to us the audience, he seemed a natural although I know he hates talking in front of crowds like this.

"Folks, what you are about to see is curtsey of SG-X, our official, unofficial covert ops team. I know we're all happy how they got SG-6 home that one time and a few times when they backed up a team who couldn't get support from the SGC directly. You'll have to talk to our resident girl genius on the particulars, but bottom line, they downloaded what they saw into Toto and their Danny boy did some editing, hopefully this won't come across as a dig's documentary."

"Hey!" I couldn't help but smile with Daniel's protest.

"Well girls, roll 'em!" Jack said and hurried to join me. I took his hand, gave a squeeze, pecked his cheek and left him otherwise alone. I was rewarded with a return peck as he leaned into me and not so much looks at the movie that was being projected by K-9 of all things, but at Teal'c's face.

I have to admit that made better watching than the gruesome replay of Kalakek slaughtering the initial Jaffa and then the survivors. The ones he deliberately let go I'm told, they ran out firing as they went in hopes of hitting him.

So while I listened to the firing, the yelling, the screaming and watched Teal'c's face as he stood up as his other self snapped his chains and ran up the dais Kronus was on to grab the Goa'uld by the throat.

I did turn to the screen to see what all the strangling noises Kronus was making was due to. I suppose it was like some strange fascination of a train wreck. You know you shouldn't watch, you should turn away, but I didn't. I looked and palmed my face once I realized what that Teal'c was doing with Kronus.

Teal'c must have gotten the idea from watching TV during that first year he was on Earth, because he lifted Kronus off the ground. On television we'd get a cut to a pair of dangling legs, here we'd have to use our imagination. Whomever this recording was from didn't look down, they were watching Teal'c and Kronus with great interest.

Several someones as the angles changed, none of them below the waist.

It really was like some Hollywood flick with the way the Goa'uld hit at Teal'c's arm as he hung in the air, but if he thought he was going to die that way, this Teal'c had another Hollywood-ism he did.

More than one movie had the threat 'Tear your heart out of your chest and watch it beat as you die.' Well Teal'c made that a reality.

I'm not one for gore and I suspect a few in the SGC attending this movie night weren't others from the sounds they were making, I turned away at first. However that train wreck watching reflex rose up and I found myself watching what I normally wouldn't want to see.

With one arm still holding Kronus up, Teal'c's other hand drove effortless into Kronus' host's chest and pulled out the still beating heart.

I -might- ask Janet if that is really possible or if robo-Teal'c was doing something technical to make the heart keep beating, but I doubt I would actually get around to it.

Robo-Teal'c showed it to Kronus and I looked back at our Teal'c, just as Jack was doing. Teal'c, our Teal'c had this huge smile on his face and I swear his eyes looked wet, but that could have been just the lighting.

Once Kronus the host died, Teal'c dropped him like a trash bag, no longer a concern. We found out that also was only for effect.

Kronus the symbiote was trying to slither away and robo-Teal'c's reflexes were too quick for him.

Despite the fact I looked for the heart-out-of-the-chest-thing, I couldn't when Teal'c crushed Kronus slowly in one hand.

Opening my eyes after the cheering was over, I felt Jack pull me into a comforting hug as if we'd been watching a horror move, which in a way we had been.

I joined in the applause not because I enjoyed that gore-fest, but because I also was happy for Teal'c. Regardless of what had been seen, I focus on what that Teal'c said to Kronus before the symbiote went splat.

"For our father."

Whether he knew our Teal'c would be watching this or not, at the time of avenging their father, that duplicate of Teal'c made sure to include the original as they both shared the same memory and passion about the man Kronus took from them.