The ancient chamber felt more like a tomb. Even though four people stood around it
now, it was deathly silent. If one strained, they might be able to hear a
member exhaling or a piece of equipment being shifted. If they stopped breathing, the
furious pounding of hearts would have almost ruptured each eardrum.
Though things were quiet each person worked efficiently, preparing what they had been assigned. The machine Daniel had recalled had been dug out of SGC's storage area, was adjusted by Sam so that they wouldn't have to look on in first person, and set on a fold-up table. An extra cot had been brought down from the infirmary, with a fluffier mattress placed on it by Dr. Prist's orders. And ever, the Colonel's stiff eyes watched.
"We're just about ready." The Kichee doctor observed, shattering the stillness. He
glanced over at Major Carter. He had watched her intently over the past hour
that they had been setting up. She seemed almost rigid. "Major?"
"Hmm?" She inquired, not looking up from the machine on the table.
"Would you like to lay down now?" He suggested noting her reluctance to respond.
Sam complied, but stopped momentarily in front of the Colonel. A shiver ran down her spine, making her unable to move. The moment her legs functioned again, she proceeded to the bed, slipping under the covers that had been placed there.
"I don't know, Daniel." She said as he connected a piece that correlated with the visual machine. "I don't think it's safe for you to be looking in my head. It might be hazardous to your health."
Daniel smirked, shaking his head slowly. "You know, when I said you had to take on a bit of sarcasm in Jack's place, I didn't think you'd adopt it."
"I aim to please." She sighed as Prist came over to her, his left ear twitching as he gently
as he took her arm into his furred hand in order to place an IV in and attach the
monitoring devices at the tips of her fingers. She watched patiently as the monitors
kicked in.
The consistent wave of her heartbeat lulled her eyes into a droop. It was comforting. She
saw something she felt in a way she could understand. And right now, it
told her that she was scared as hell. Damn. Maybe this wasn't such a good idea. Did she
really want them seeing into her mind. In there, she couldn't hold up her shields. She
couldn't hide behind a calm composure and technical wit.
"Your going to feel a little sleepy, tired, a bit cold." Prist explained as her eyes became even heavier. "Just relax your body, your mind. That's It." he coaxed. "Now, picture the Colonel in your mind,call out to him. He'll come."
The Kichee's voice became very distant. She could barely make it out. Everything was
so loud! She heard her heart going slightly off beat, her lungs dragging in air. She heard
the blood coursing through the labyrinth of veins that tangled inside her. Her head
pounded.
Focus. She whispered to herself. She took as deep of a breath as she could, forming a
mental picture of her Commanding Officer. She sent out memories by the dozen. The
exasperated version of him from when they had first met, his aggravation at possible SG
members as he inhaled strawberry jell-o, his confused expression as she attempted to
explain to him how something worked, and his quirky grin he put on anytime he
accomplished something flashed by her. The last image shook her. She saw his
distorted and unfocused face as he lay in the chamber chair after
executing the attack on Anubis.
"Colonel? I'm here. Where are you? Colonel O'Neill?" She called out with her mind as
she vaguely remembered Prist telling her to do. No answer. She pondered; it
had worked when he was in the chair. Would it work now? "Jack? Jack, where are you?"
Something had gotten through. She found herself flying through the same black
web-tunnel as in her nightmare. Her stomach clenched, hoping she wouldn't have to
relive that again. Relief filled her as she zipped past the empty chamber. For once,
everything turned white.
She wasn't in web anymore. She was in the mountains. Sam stood before a boat ramp, hovering over a nicely sized lake. She turned around, confused. That is, until she saw the cabin. A grin spread across her face. If O'Neill were sleeping, it would be a nightmare without a place abundant in fish.
"Carter?" A dazed voice asked her. Sure enough, when she turned around, there stood Jack, rod in hand. "I thought you said you wouldn't come fishing with me." He smirked.
"Well, sir, you gave me no choice this time!" She retaliated, only for an uncomfortable silence to spread between the two. "Jack, do you remember what happened?"
Daniel watched as they flew through space only to land in the peaceful landscape. So
the mind did retreat to a comfort zone in times of distress. He thought, eyes
sparkling at this discovery.
He watched as Jack appeared out of nowhere. He watched as the two exchanged short
sentences, goofing around as if they were simply in the SGC cafeteria. It hadn't
exactly occurred to them that they wouldn't be able to hear. But, if they could remember
what they saw, it would at least give them a heads up.
Something tugged at Daniel's thoughts. What if Jack wasn't the key they needed? What if it was the Ancient he had practically became? Though Jack had reached out to Sam, did he know how to free himself? Or was he just begging for release?
"I remember...Squids." He said, giving a typical Jackism. He looked out to the lake as fog started rolling over them, into the banks,stepping closer to her. "I remember feeling danger; felling I had to get rid of it. I knew I had to protect people who...who... who where important to me." He glanced around, looking at his feet.
"I felt...very distant... Like something had taken over me, and I was just moving around. It hurt" Sam was shocked that he had used a reference to pain. "I felt like I had run a few hundred miles in the rain."
"Than, I heard you. You were calling to me... yelling at me...telling me to stay... which, may I remind you about ordering around your CO!"
"You resigned." She said quickly.
"True."
"Sir,Please, is there anything you know anything that will help get..." She stopped as he vanished once more. "Sir?"
Daniel watched as the dream world went white again in a blinding flash. Sam was falling, her arms spread out as if they were wings, forcing her to glide. No gracefulness did her flight have, only the clumsiness of a nesting chick.
The archaeologist almost winced as he saw her hit a black floor, the white walls around her. She forced herself onto her knees, and seemed to be yelling out into the room. The Colonel didn't answer this time. Instead, a figure with flaming hair stood before him, one very familiar.
"Ayiana!" Daniel exclaimed. It couldn't possibly be her! But the one who appeared in front of Sam now looked identical to the frozen women they had assumed to be an Ancient a couple of years ago. The only problem, the same Ancient was dead!
His eyes were glued to the image. Ayianna had walked to the obviously confused Major, and knelt down to her. She placed her hands on her temples looking down at her almost lovingly, sympathetic. She graced Sam's forehead, which was oddly sweaty, with the palm of her hand. The moment after, Sam's eyes were closed.
Daniel's brows knotted. How could someone be asleep in theirsleep? But she was, and she looked as if she was in agony. He looked over to where the Major lay only to see her face contorted in the same pain. What was going on? He glanced to the vision, only to see Ayianna's face, mouthing something that he could not understand.
"Will you not wake her up DoctorPrist?" Teal'c asked the doctor who was frantically who was working near Sam moments after everything in her mind went black.
"I... I can't!" He said, frantic. "Nothing like this has ever happened before!" He exclaimed,
glancing at the monitors beside her. "Her heart is beating... ten beats per minute. But,
she's breathing perfectly fine!This doesn't make work out right! Not for your physical
body at least. It's almost like she's gone into a form of comatose!"
Daniel looked around in confusion. "But, Ayianna wasn't a bad person! None of the Ancients were! She healed all those others at the sake of her own life! She would never hurt Sam!"
"Perhaps it is not Ayianna, DoctorJackson. Maybe it is a collection of their minds." Teal'c suggested.
Stopping to ponder this for a moment, Daniel slowly nodded. "Maybe...Maybe your right.
Jack gained the knowledge of the ancients, plural, more than one. What
if a collective consciousness is answering her? It's searching her mind just as she was
searching for them. And, so, they appeared to her in a common form, so it was more
comfortable."
He looked down at Sam, frowning down at her sickly state. He had supported this idea so that they could free one member from sleep. Now it seemed that he had only condemned another. He gritted his teeth. "I never intended this, Sam. I don't know why they did this. I'll figure this out. I promise you..." He whispered.
Sam twirled around. Whispers. Screams. Cries. They all flooded into her head with the force of a sixteen wheeler. She couldn't make sense of any of them. One moment she had been joking with the Colonel, and now she was being rammed with voices.
"Saaa-man-thhha" She heard her voice stretched out. Glancing up she saw a very
familiar face. Ayianna, the young Ancient that had given her life to save several
SG members.
"Ayianna?" She questioned. How could she be here? She had passed on. Than again, how could any Ancient be here? Unless when they passed their experiences traveled into one place, almost like a stream of knowledge tucked away in a separate dimension then Earth's own? If there was one thing Major Carter had learned in all these years, it was to never doubt anything.
The "young" women nodded slowly, her eyes glowing for a moment. Glowing. Fear spread through her. It reminded her far too much of the Gao'uld. She was about to open her mouth and ask what was happening, but the women moved to her, and gave her almost a sickening look of pity.
When the Ancient's hand passed over her head, Sam's eyes involuntarily slammed shut. Images flooded past her. Several people, dressed in light fabrics, ran in terror. She saw thousands of faces, all sobbing, bloodied, or terrified. She smelled the blood, she felt their sadness. She heard their screams, their pleas.
Black clouds flew over head. A small girl screamed for her mother. An old man hobbled through the streets of a pearly-white city. A young women huddled over the limp body of her husband, her infant crying out at her hip. Boils covered the body of a stranger in an alley. Humane horrors brought tears to the Major's eyes.
"Why are you showing me this?" She screamed out into the abyss of chaos, as if waiting for a reply. Why show her this suffering? What were the black clouds? Why was she finding no answers.
"Because...Your suffering is not unlike our own. Your strengths. Your weaknesses. Your fears. They are the same as ours were. But, maybe you can avoid our fate." Ayianna's voice came to her.
She saw then, a Stargate. In front of it Ayianna stood accompanied by two others. She was in similar garb as the others she had seen, with the exception that it was laced in what looked like gold. A dirty women, who looked like a servant, was dialing a address making the circle go WOOOOSH.(right Chrissy? ;-)) One male placed an arm around Ayianna's waist and ushered her towards the Gate. His eyes flew to the skies as he saw the strange black clouds coming towards them.
Her vision flashed once more. Sam looked in on the same chamber she now lay in. It radiated the same deep blue color as it had when Anubis had been attacking. Ayianna was placed into the same chamber as Jack now stood in. The male that had accompanied her placed his hand to hers before stepping back with a tear in his eye. When he was out of the chamber's reach, it activated, freezing Ayianna into the block of ice that they had found her so many years later in.
The young man looked in tears back at her frozen form before he spun around. Ebony particles swirled down through the openings left from their entrance. The particles soon took form, almost in the same manner as the replicators, to carve the body of a rugged man with glowing eyes. The man looked at him with a tight-set jaw, the tears evaporating. Determination shined brightly giving a natural glow to his irises, as if challenging the phantom.
Sam didn't see all of what happened. All she saw was the particles separating once more to decompose into a fine dust, and flood over the man. She heard a defining scream, a vow of defeat, and saw his badly burned body crawling to slump beside the sleeping chamber. He closed his eyes to enter eternal sleep, not in defeat, but in victory.
With his last breaths, his hand was placed at the right corner of the chamber Ayianna lay in. He took a sharp dagger from his belt, and slit his palm open. His blood spread across dirt covered skin as he drew a long line from on corner to another. He whispered something in Ancient, but Sam understood it.
"By birth and death, time and cycle, sleep for hope, trust the brave, live by truth, dream in peace." Sam had never known the Ancients to be superstitious, or mythical in much sense. But, as he spoke those words, a wall of light encased him and Ayianna. When her eyes adjusted, they were both gone. The room was empty. The particles gave out a screech.
The astrophysicist tried to cover her ears from the sound. It didn't work, it only amplified it. Her body felt like it was on fire, as if the light and scream had gone directly through her. Suddenly, she felt numb. She was on the shore near the boat dock once more. Colonel O'Neill was leaning over her, whispering the same thing as the man Ayianna had known was saying.
"DanielJackson!" Teal'c exclaimed. Daniel was still near Sam. The moment Teal'c had shouted to him, Sam's vitals had soared back up to normal. The Archaeologist's head snapped over to the machine.
On the screen, stars filled the heavens. He could see Sam laying on the beach, water lapping at her feet. He saw Jack leaning over her, pulling her up to her feet. He seemed to be telling her something before he pushed her away from him,disappearing into the fog.
"DON'T!" Sam shot up from the cot, calling out. Daniel ran over to her, trying to push her back to lay down. She would have none of it. She ripped the IV out of her arm along with whatever else was attached to her.
"Sam. SAM! STOP IT!" He shook her until she looked at him. "What happened! Why did everything go out?" He demanded.
"No. No time, Daniel. I have no time." She hopped up, and began looking around the room. She started feeling the walls, all the while explaining as best she could to them what had happened.
Her fingers caught on to something at the side of one of the archways. She breathed deeply as she tugged on it, extracting a large crystal dagger. It was the same one as in her "dream." Red still stained the blade.
She nodded, and went over to where Jack was being held. "Daniel. I need you to find out where I was at the lake. I don't think it was by the Colonel's cabin. Teal'c, if you can try to remember anything odd. Maybe a old folk tale or legend of your people that might encluded something like those black things.. It would help."
Daniel shook his head,realizing Carter's intentions. "Sam, don't do this! Let us come with you!"
Sam shook her head. "Don't even try, consider it an order. You'll die." She said nothing else in English. Instead, she slashed her hand, and muttered the words of the Ancients that seemed to be imprinted in her brain now. She was gone in a flash of white.
A/N: Sorry for the cliff hanger. Comments and Suggestions, like always, are grately welcomed.