Chapter 49

They followed Lam'zel into the palace's dark passageway. It took a moment for Daniel's eyesight to adjust and when it did he saw Lam'zel confidently leading them deeper into the palace. The green eyed warrior slowed to look cautiously around a corner.

"Lam'zel, what about a sarcophagus? It may still be possible to save Rya'c…"

The Jaffa warrior stopped. "There is no sarcophagus. Samantha ordered Rya'c to destroy it."

"What! Why?" he exclaimed

Teal'c stopped in mid-stride and Daniel heard a faint pain-filled groan escape his friend. He suddenly became filled with concern. Had Teal'c been injured and Daniel not known?

Lam'zel stiffened at the groan. Scanning the hallway quickly, he reached out and passed his hand over a door sensor. The door opened and they hastened inside. Daniel noticed a faint smile curve the corners of his grim mouth as the Jaffa closed the door.

Another groan banished it from his mind and concerned for his friend, Daniel looked at Teal'c. His eyes widen in disbelief and he gasped in amazement.

Teal'c stood stock still, disbelief and joy mingled together in the warrior's face, in the center of what appeared to be a storage room still holding Rya'c dead body. Except that Rya'c's dead body was not behaving like a dead body should. It was groaning and the young man's hand which had been dangling lifelessly at his side moments ago was now rubbing the back of his head.

The young man's eyes opened and stared up into father's confused face. A frown creased Rya'c brow. "Major Carter did not say anything about hallucinating." His voice had a bit of a rasp in it, but came across strong. He moved uncomfortably in his father's arm. Teal'c reluctantly lowered the young man's legs allowing him to stand. Rya'c wavered slightly then stood straight and tall.

"Rya'c." Awe and disbelief filled Teal'c's voice as his eyes darted back and forth from his son's face to the blackened hole in the young man's chest.

Rya'c looked down at his chest and unbelievably… smiled. "It is gruesome." He looked at his father's face seeing the traces of the man's pervious agony in the lines around his eyes. "I am well, father." He reached into the blackened cavity and began prodding it around a bit. It was quite a morbid sight. A second later the terrible injury flickered then was replaced by the undamaged sight of Rya'c's tunic. The young man reached under his tunic and pulled out a small device. "Major Carter called it 'movie magic'." He said proudly. "It is a combination shield generator and holographic imager." He reached up and rubbed the back of his head again. "The landing is a bit hard." He said smiling.

His smile faded as he looked at his father and Daniel. "Forgive me, Father, but why are you here?" He turned to Lam'zel. "And where is Major Carter?"

Lam'zel's harsh gaze roamed over Teal'c and Daniel. "With the Tok'ra in her rooms. She is dying."

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Pha'esh was pouring every ounce of his mental and physical strength into the hand held healing device that he had found in Samantha's pack. It wasn't enough. He was able to repair the external injuries, but the device could not repair the extensive damage created by the Tauri bullet, which had burst into a thousand tiny pieces when it entered just below Samantha's left ear tearing apart the back of her neck and hurling deadly fragments up into her brain.

Confusion dominated his mind. What was a tauri weapon doing here? No one on Earth or among the Tok'ra knew where they were.

He watched her labored breathing as she struggled to draw breath where she lay on the deep blue cover of Sekhmet's oversized bed. He ran the healing device over her prone body once more willing it to heal her. The light on the device flickered once then faded. There was no more it could do.

With an angry thrust, he threw the useless piece of technology across the room, where it hit the wall with a sharp bang.

Everything she had been through…how could it end like this?

"Why Samantha," He burst out "the sarcophagus would have healed you…"

He heard the door to Sekhmet's outer chamber's open. Lam'zel and Rya'c, he thought.

With one last look at the young Tauri woman, he left the bed chamber and prepared himself to deliver the terrible news of Samantha's condition.

It was not Lam'zel or Rya'c that met his gaze as he walked into the outer chamber. Colonel Jack O'Neill stood watching him exit the bed chamber, understanding dawned and fury followed immediately.

"You!" He roared. "Samantha is dying because of you!"

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Although Jack flinched at the Tok'ra's accusing words, they did not stop him.

He pushed past the First Prime or the Tok'ra or whatever it was and strode quickly toward the bed chamber.

The Ancient said that Carter was still alive, but Jack knew her life was measured in seconds.

The Colonel was all too familiar with the damage inflicted by the ammunition he had chosen for this task. A specialize hollow point designed to penetrate and fragment doing as much damage as physically possible. The back of her neck, where the symbiote resided would be gone along with much of her lower brain. He paused at the doorway. He had heard the Tok'ra's outburst moments ago as he opened the door and entered Sekhmet's rooms.

No sarcophagus. No hope.

Jack stumbled and came to a stop at the threshold of the bedroom, the weight of his actions almost driving him to the floor.

Another bedroom flashed before his eyes. Tonka trucks and action figures filled small wooden shelves. A baseball bat and glove lay haphazardly on a small twin bed with a blue and red plaid bedspread where it had been tossed earlier that day. He entered the remembered room, his steps faltering as he stepped through the doorway. Blood splayed across one light blue wall he turned from it and…

The remembered screams of anguish filled Jack's head and the memory of his son's death flashed before him and the soul searing pain and loss stilled his breath and froze his feet. His gun had ended his son's life, but that had been an accident.

His gun. Carter. He had pulled this trigger.

On the roof every thing had seemed so surreal. Now the reality of what he would soon see was crushing down on him, smothering him, tormenting him.

You killed her! His mind screamed at him. You killed her…you killed her… YOU KILLED CARTER!

He pushed back. I didn't know. He argued weakly. I thought Sekhmet had her! Everyone said that if Sekhmet had her, she could not be saved. She was going to kill Rya'c.

You should have trusted her! The screaming voice demanded easily over powering his feeble denials.

You said you would trust her…No matter what!

Jack closed his eyes and leaned his head against the threshold of the doorway. The screaming voice continued to send wave after wave of accusation against him. His guilt held him frozen.

Coward.

The word started small, barely heard over the accusations thundering in his brain

Coward! The word became louder and louder.

Coward. Coward!

She needs you and you are standing here letting your worries stop you from going to her. It is not about you! Can you not see that, even now? Will you let your doubt and fears rule you here… and… now of all times?

Shame filled him. The voice screamed at him again, but he shoved it aside angrily.

Jack pushed himself forward and walked into the garishly decorated bedroom of Sekhmet. The room was dominated by a huge bed and it was there that Jack saw her.

She was still, her hands by her side, her head resting gently on a white linen pillow. Amazingly, he could see no physical damage from the bullet he had fired. Her blond hair, longer now and past her shoulders gave evidence to the damage done by Jack's rifle. Where before the tresses had flowed like liquid gold now they were snarled and matted with blood. She still wore the golden dress, but now the bright gold was muted and covered with the dark red of Sam's drying blood.

Steeling himself, he came to stand beside her and stared at her pale face. Shock jolted him. On the platform Carter had radiated the godhood she was impersonating. But lying here…up close, Jack could see the ravages the last month had wrought on his 2IC. Gaunt, almost to the point of starvation, she looked like a skeleton with a paper thin sheet of flesh colored skin covering its bones. Gone was the vitality Samantha Carter emanated.

He reached out tentatively, brushing his fingers against the back of her hand. The skin was almost translucent and he could see the delicate bone structure that lay beneath. Gently, he slid his fingers under hers. They felt fragile in his grasp as if he tightened his hand around them they would shatter into a thousand tinkling shards.

"Ah, Carter", he breathed, tenderly enclosing her delicate hand completely hiding it within his own.

Carefully, he lowered himself to the bed.

She did not react to the movement or to his voice. Her eyes did not open as they always had in the past to stare at him in wide eyed confusion, her head full of questions on why she was there.

The urge to bark an order at her to 'wake up, Major!', to stay in the fail safe military mode that had sustained him all these years battled against the deep ache in his chest to say the words that have been rolling around inside him all that time.

"Carter." He called to her softy, her last name an endearment. All these years he wondered if she realized that his use of her last name had not been a means of separation, everyone who knew her called her Sam or Major Carter, but no one else called her Carter. As ridiculous as it may sound, everything he felt for her was in that word.

He reached out and touched her cheek with the tips of his fingers. "I am so sorry." His voice broke as he blinked back the moisture gathering in his eyes. He leaned in close, his fingers gliding across her temple into her hair, his hand cradling her cold cheek. He had no idea if she could hear him or not, but he refused to let her go without letting her know what she was to him.

"You know I'm lousy with words, Carter." He began, his voice gruff with emotion. "My whole life is filled with the things I should have said and never did." His thumb lightly traced a path along her cheek to the corner of her pale lips. "There are things I should have said to you years ago. Things I wanted to say, but…" He sighed deeply; the burdens of the last years of silence could be heard in that breath. "To say them would have changed everything… and… how could I risk losing you? Keeping them unsaid, holding them inside meant you would be with me." A self-depreciating smile touched his lips. "I guess that it was selfish, but I think you understood…I hope you did." Frustration filled him at the inadequacy of the words he was using. "Damn it, Carter…" he whispered, desperately. "You knew didn't you? You had to know."

He brought her hand up to his chest and laid it flat against the area over his heart. The muscle pounded painfully against his chest. "You're in here, Sam." He whispered. "You will always be here." He said pressing her hand over his beating heart. "Please know that."

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Sam wanted to cry. Not the timid little tears of film and screen, but the gut wrenching sobs that felt like your chest was going to pull apart at any moment from the despair that filled you. She had heard every word the Colonel had spoken and the pain that filled them.

Yes, she had known. From the moment so many years ago when they stared at each other through the force field separating them on the gou'ald ship they had rigged with C-4. The Colonel desperately beating the control panel while she insisted he go, 'Sir you have to leave me.' She remembered the intensity in his dark eyes when he shouted back, 'No!'

Time had stopped then and there while he stared at her. It had been the basis of there relationship in so many ways. Not a word had been spoken. Everything had been said in the silence that had surrounded them. In that moment she knew. Colonel Jack O'Neill loved her.

And she loved him.

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"Dying!" Rya'c looked at the men around him in disbelief. "How is that possible? We had this all planned out! "

"You have to understand," Daniel said, "we had no idea that this was not real. We believed that Sam was Sekhmet and she was about to kill you."

Rya'c paled beneath his dark skin as Daniel continued.

"Jack shot her." He said hesitantly, pain obvious in his voice. "He did not know…"

A Jaffa curse word erupted from Rya'c lips as he bolted out of the door and into the hallway. He stopped a moment getting his bearings.

Daniel caught him by the arm.

"She cannot die, Daniel Jackson." The young man said angrily.

"Rya'c." Teal'c placed a comforting hand on his shoulder, but the young man shrugged it off.

"There is a way, father." He insisted.

Teal'c shook his head, sadly. "Without the use of a sar…"

"I lied to Major Carter." The young Jaffa blurted out. Shame filled his face. "I did not destroy the sarcophagus."

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The feel of Jack's heartbeat against her hand filled Sam with a comforting peace and she concentrated on the strength of the steady beat as memories of their years together drifted through her mind.

How sweet…

Sam closed off her memories immediately hiding them away from the malevolent consciousness that was regaining its strength.

So this is the Colonel that surfaces so often in your memories and dreams. He would make an interesting host for one of my children.

Sam's humorless bark of laughter echoed through her mind. My body is dying you malicious worm.

You are lying. We cannot die.

We can and we are. Sam thought viciously. I am dying and I am taking you with me.

Sam could feel panic overtaking Sekhmet's consciousness within her.

We cannot die! It screamed. We cannot die! We are immortal!

You will die and with the help of the others, the Colonel and the rest of SG-1 will destroy you're spawn and free the Jaffa you have imprisoned.

No!

Yep!

The sarcophagus!

Destroyed on my orders, remember?

A wave of blistering hate slammed against her mind. Sekhmet screamed obscenities galore at her and mentally pounded against Sam's brain, but even in the last moments of her life Sam was stronger and held the immoral creature back.

She contented herself with ignoring the raging creature and reveling in the feel of Jack's heartbeat under her hand, the touch of his hand against her cheek these things would enable her to let go. She focused on the quiet of the world around her. The silence of the room, the breathing of the man sitting next her… the shouting of voices coming closer… Wait.

Sam could hear Daniel's voice.

"Jack!" The scholar sounded out of breath and Sam could hear him run into the room, his lungs struggling to gulp down air. "Is she still alive?"

She heard Jack respond in the affirmative. "Barely."

"There is a sarcophagus!" Daniel said breathlessly.

"What!" Jack yelled.

What! Sam felt a sudden fear course through her. No! Rya'c destroyed the sarcophagus!

"Where is it?" He demanded. She could feel him sliding his arms underneath her body and lifting her up.

No! She screamed. You can't put me in that thing. No!

Sam screamed at her body to move. To stop them, but it ignored her and remained limp in the Colonel's arms.

Jack, please! She begged. Don't put me in that thing.

But he kept moving, her body held closely to his as he navigated the passageways of the palace.

Within moments she heard the grating sound of the lid to the sarcophagus opening and terror like she had never known filled her. She screamed at the Colonel to stop. He didn't.

She felt herself being lowered into the sarcophagus. Jack's voice whispered in her ear before he removed his arms around her.

"Come back to me, Carter."

Sam sobbed within her imprisoned body as the grinding of the lid began to close.

No Jack…no…

A shriek of insane laughter filled her mind as Sam sobbed the Colonel's name over and over…