Chapter Four: You Can Never Go Home Again
"How did I become a traitor?"
Sara looks at her from the other side of the room where she's reading a magazine. "Chance?"
"Yeah. Chance." Reading would be interesting, but she's already bored with everything she knows. "Sara?"
"Hrm?"
"I want to meet Charlie."
The words fall flat in the silence. She knows why they do, but she's feeling perverse. She shifts onto her side and watches the emotions play across Sara O'Neill's face.
Finally, she says, "Why?" her voice a soft whisper.
"Closure? I don't... I need to do something, Sara. I hate waiting. I hate not having a god-damned thing to do."
"Like me when Jack was out on missions."
"Yeah. Probably."
"All right. I'll... talk to Jack about it."
Jack. General Jack O'Neill, who she hasn't seen once since she got to his base. She wonders, as Sara leaves, if he has been avoiding her. If there is some instinctual part of him that knows she doesn't want to see him. She also wonders if Sara understands how very damn lucky she is to have him.
The next day dawns something she can't see, confined to Janet's infirmary as she is. The doctor has been mothering her almost efficiently as she does Cassie. Sam allows it to a point. Revels in it, actually. She misses Janet being like this in her reality. Misses being able to tell her anything and everything. This doesn't quite fill the void, but it's close.
Of course, she hasn't seen Daniel or Teal'c, either. So maybe SG-1 just doesn't want to meet her.
"You have a visitor," Janet tells her at mid-day.
Since it's peaches and something suspiciously like ramen chicken noodle soup, Sam figures any visitor would be better than lunch. "Send them in."
He's not as old as she'd expected, she thinks after he stops halfway into the room. His brown eyes are big with something approaching fear. It's a fight or flight response she recognizes from his father. "Hi, Charlie."
"You're dead." The words seem to be all he's capable of for a moment.
"In this universe, yeah. But not in mine." She pauses, draws in a breath, "In my universe, the gun you were playing with killed you."
Silence, then.
He continues to stand and stare at her. She continues to lie there and stare at him, cataloguing many many details. He reminds her of the General's younger cloned self. All that arrogance and self-assurance is gone, though. This is the body of a teenager with the mind of a teenager.
"I'm sorry, Sam." His face crumples and he steps back, sitting awkwardly on the step stool Janet's been using. "I'm so very sorry."
"It's all right." And she gets up. She's not supposed to, but she does it anyway. Two steps and she already wants to be laying down again. Charlie doesn't notice her until she's nearly touching him. Maybe it's the way she's panting softly (damn Janet for being right about how screwed up her body is). "Hey."
"You're older." It's obviously the first thing he can think of to say, and it jars him.
She barely has time to regain her breath before he's hugging her tightly, crying on her shoulder. She can feel tears of her own drifting down slowly. Damn, but she's been awfully emotional lately. Maybe it's hormonal. "It's all right, Charlie. You didn't mean it." Automatically her hands rub circles on his back.
"It's not all right. It won't ever be all right."
Janet comes in a few minutes later, and eyes them. "You two ok?"
"Yeah." She pulls back, looks at Charlie. "Aren't we?"
"I don't know." He touches her face, traces his fingers down her nose, and then steps away. "It's strange. Why are you here?"
"It was an accident. I'm trying to get to my own universe again. I... Stopped here."
"Ah."
It was awkward, she thinks. There was no reason to have done this except she felt she had to. She steps back further, finds a bed at her back and leans against it. "I'm sorry, Charlie. I shouldn't have... I shouldn't have requested this."
"You're undoing years of therapy, Sam." His voice is almost amused. But there is a deep bitterness resonating through the room.
"I was wrong."
Sam Carter, admitting she is wrong? The Rodney McKay in her head mocked. Gosh, gee, has hell frozen over, you insane woman?
"No," she whispers softly, "I have."
--
Nearly nine months after falling through a rip in the fabric of space, Lieutenant Colonel Samantha Carter steps through the quantum mirror, hoping she's returned home. She spent nearly a day paging through the worlds until she settled on one that looked promising. Then, of course, Janet insisted she sleep. She was almost too excited to do so.
As they step through, pain ripples through her skin. It's nothing like the last time, but it still hurts. Looking at Janet, she knows it hasn't affected the doctor. "Like falling off a bike."
"Yeah." Janet frowns. "You sure we're in the right place?"
"Nope."
Over the next few hours, they discover that they definitely aren't in the right place. Luckily, this SGA isn't too horrible, and they (also) have their own Janet and Sam. So the two are allowed an hour of rest and then sent on to another universe.
And another. Some of them are more suspicious. Usually, though, the story is believed and they're passed on after getting checked for infestation, implantation, and a thousand and one infectious diseases.
During the time they spend in the fifth universe, Sam makes sure Janet is distracted before curling up in a ball and shaking for a while. Each successive trip through the mirror is more and more painful, the resultant adrenaline lasting longer. And her torso is beginning to ache again. She is almost afraid to look and see that the skin has stopped healing.
Another trip through the gate, and she knows the moment they step out of the storage room that something is wrong.
Two hours of searching the deserted base confirm it and they make their silent way back to the mirror.
Sam stops in front of the mirror, then sighs. "Janet, I have to stop."
"I know. You're tired."
"Yeah."
They sit down, backs against the wall. Janet rummages through her pack then produces a syringe and a bottle. "Janet--"
"You're in pain."
"A little."
"Uh-huh." Janet eyes her, "Y'know, General O'Neill likes to claim he isn't ever in pain."
A wry grin touches Sam's lips. "Fine. Dose me. But..." There is an urgency to her journey. A worry at the back of her mind, but she understands that a few hours of drug-induced sleep won't destroy her world.
She hopes.
The needle slides in and moments later a warmth slides through her veins. Sam turns on her side, and curls around her own pack. As the darkness closes over her, she hopes there aren't any dreams.
--
A gentle hand shaking her is her next memory. That, and the fight her waking mind has to claw its way out of nightmare images of death and destruction, blood running thick and sticky glass slivers piercing her skin. "Gah." She winces.
"Still sore?" Janet asks.
"A bit."
The doctor snorts and begins packing her stuff back up. "I figure we should leave before whatever left this place so empty comes back."
"And that didn't occur to you before you knocked me out?"
A chuckle echoes in the small room. "I'm surprised it didn't occur to you before I knocked you out."
Having to admit Janet is right, Sam nods, "Fine. I was too exhausted to continue. I'm better now. Can we go?"
"Sure."
--
They have both become used to being poked and prodded and separated. Sam never mentions to them that Janet doesn't know how much the skin the stitches are holding together is falling apart. Once, Dr. Warner gave her a look. He knew her, apparently.
Or thought he did.
Being in these different SGCs has its own strange emotional disturbance.
There are times when she is dead or Janet is, or neither of them is. Daniel and Teal'c and Jack and Hammond and Kawalsky all revolve in a never-ending stream of losses and gains.
She wonders, sometimes, what Janet is getting out of this--how they'll get her back to her own universe.
But, then, Janet's universe is waiting for her, with flags up announcing that this is the way home. It makes her wistful, because her own universe doesn't know she is missing. And so there will be no flags and no grand hellos.
They probably don't even miss her, but she isn't going to dwell on that. It's defeatist. And would be untrue.
If they knew she was missing, they would miss her.
Daniel once told her about the way Jack tore the country apart (metaphorically) when she'd been kidnapped by Conrad. She knew that was part of the reason he insisted they call each other at least once a day. It had been strange to transfer that tradition on to Jonas, and then have to take it back from him when Daniel descended.
She misses them.
Which is an understatement. She craves them, wishes they were right here in this painful existence with her--and she knows that's a little bit selfish, but she allows herself to be selfish now.
Oddly, she only misses Pete for the sex.
She worries that this is a bad reflection on her. And then doesn't care anymore. She wants to go home, if Pete is there, if he isn't... Jack needs to be there. Jack and Daniel and Teal'c and Jonas and all will be right with her world again.
--
It's old hat, now. Janet still hasn't noticed the way she winces. Sam's got a few theories about the pain that she's terrified are true. The slow degradation in her cells is a result of stepping through a fractured quantum mirror. Every successive trip is slowly wearing away at the structures inherent in her own DNA. The other thing she's kept from Janet is that the slashes on her abdomen are slowly returning. It makes sense that the weakest points of her anatomy would degrade first.
She isn't bleeding again yet. At least, not externally. And she is so not thinking about that.
They step through and she stifles her whimper again.
Alarms sound as they re-appear on the other side of the mirror.
It's obviously standard operating procedure for any SGC that has a quantum mirror in the basement. They leave the room in silence, heading for the upper levels.
They reach the elevator before the cavalry arrives.
"Put your hands in the air!"
They both comply.
Within minutes they're in a holding cell, awaiting the General's presence. The SFs hadn't known what to think of the calm and collected alive Janet Fraiser. Many of them had known her, most of them had been treated by her. It seemed to disconcert them to see the woman they'd all been terrified of alive again.
Sam feels like she's walking on pins and needles. The base is still here, the people she cares about seem to be alive. But she doesn't know enough. She doesn't know if the other her has subverted people or is running a spy ring or has simply decided not to. And she needs to know, badly. Because... Because if the other her is perfectly innocent and not a traitor, she will leave.
The thought makes her want to curl in a ball and cry, but she doesn't think there's a choice, in the end. There were at least two other alternate realities that could use her skills. Ones where Sam Carter was either never born or had died. Either way, anything has to be better than usurping a good life.
General Jack O'Neill enters the room, Lieutenant Colonel Sam Carter a step behind him.
She meets her eyes. It's the strangest thing, she thinks as she stares at herself. One can learn so much from not knowing one's self. And, yet again... There was a flash in the other Sam's eyes. Just for an instant, there was recognition and worry and fear. I know, she thinks at her. I know what you've done. I know what you're probably doing now.
"Doc." His hands are in his pockets as he studies Janet from head to toe. Then his gaze moves to her. There's something odd in it. Something she can't define. "Colonel."
He steps back, motions. The SFs unlock the door and motion for them to step through.
For a moment, her eyes meet Sam Carter's again.
And it all comes crashing through her. Everything the other woman may have done to the people she loves. Everything her machinations did to them in the alternate dimension. It's too much. She's still in pain, and she's fucking dying, and her alternate self is going to let the world burn.
It takes less than a second to step past O'Neill. He really isn't expecting anything. They had no weapons and they've been so peaceful. Her punch lands solidly, and the imposter's head whips around before she falls to the floor, bleeding already from a split lip. Her own shoulder aches from the impact, abused muscles protesting. "Get up." Something close to hatred is in her voice. "Get up so I can hit you again, you bitch."
"Sam!" Janet's calling to her, trying to drag her back from the abyss of anger.
Hands grab her ungently, and she stifles a cry of pain as one of them gets her around the waist.
"Be careful, you idiots, I just put her back together!" The sharp tones of Dr. Fraiser's voice loosen the grip, but it's not enough. Something slick is beginning to soak into her shirt. The stitches have finally succeeded in being torn.
"Damnit." This was not what she had planned. She was supposed to convince them with words and facts and figures and proof.
The alternate--Samantha--rubs a hand over her mouth, hiding the smirk that reaches her eyes. They glitter with malice in triumph. I win, they say.
Sam wants to suddenly cry and hates this fact desperately. This is fucking pathetic. Dying has turned her into a cry-baby. "She's a traitor."
"Riiight." Jack's drawl whips her head around and she stares at him, sees the scorn in his eyes.
"Nine months ago, she--"
"She what?" Samantha's tone is mocking. "Did you think to come and claim that this is your reality?"
"It is."
"Think again."
"I want them locked up again until we decide what to do with them."
"Well, we could let nature take its course," Samantha suggested.
"Carter--" Jack eyed her, one eyebrow raised. "That entropic thingie? Isn't that kind of painful?"
"Entrophic cascade failure." A shrug, while she wipes her lip off elaborately. "Probably."
"It's all right, Jack." Sam's shoulders sag. Her abdomen is hurting again. Janet's not going to be happy when she finds out there are torn stitches. The SFs take the relaxation as a sign she won't resist and release her to stand on her own two feet.
"Jack?" His eyebrow pops up.
She meets his eyes, weariness pressing down on her spine. "You've been Jack in my head since I challenged you to an arm-wrestling match, sir. I figured, since I was living in a universe where you died on Abydos it was allowable to call you 'Jack'."
"Who leads SG-1?" He asks, sounding almost curious.
"Colonel Makepeace. He's not as good as you, sir. For instance, his Antoniak armband fell off first. Daniel and Simmons had to drag him back with them."
"And how do you know you're in the right universe?"
"Because she knows she doesn't belong here."
"Oh, fun logic there, Carter."
"Thanks, Jack. I try." She wants to sit down, she thinks. But she can't. Not now, not when to show weakness could... could what? Get her killed? Perhaps she's being overly dramatic. Or maybe she's just beginning to feel the effects of the quantum mirror again. A shiver wracks her, and she steps back. "Janet." There's a curious edge to the pictures her brain is processing. Like a photograph whose edges are burning.
"Sam, what--oh, hell, somebody catch her!"
But they're not really watching the sun rise and fall over Japan. And the floor is colder than Antarctica.
--
Oh, this is familiar. There are voices nearby, talking in phrases and words that her brain isn't quite processing yet.
"--an idiot!" Ok. That's Janet. Good Janet. Berate whoever is... being an idiot.
Wow. These were some drugs. A giggle escapes Sam, and her entire abdomen shoots a lick of fire upwards. Ow. Ok. No giggling. Right, Colonel, I forgot. But it's not my fault you made a bad side-arm joke.
"Sam?"
"Hrm?"
Janet has a golden crown on her head. "Sam, wake up. C'mon, Sam."
Her eyes open wider. The crown disappears into the blinding light overhead, and she winces. "Hurts."
"I know, honey, I know. Those idiots tore some of my stitches out."
"I want to go home." The sound of her voice is pathetic. She sounds all of three. There are even tears leaking down her face. She, Lieutenant Colonel Samantha Carter, is crying. She doesn't cry.
Ever.
"Yeah." Janet's hand touches her cheek, "You're tired, Sam. So very tired."
"Yes."
"I know something you don't know, Sam."
There is something in the sing-songing voice that pricks at her. Something that settles coldly in her gut. Janet didn't ask how the skin could be that fragile again. She didn't even sound worried anymore. "Janet?"
"You're never going home." The voice shifts ever so delicately. An extra amount of bass and pride and authority.
"Oh, god." She tries to get up, grabs desperately at Janet. "You're goa'uld."
Hands restrain her easily. "She's panicking! Get me a sedative now!"
"NO!" She fights, pushes and pulls and ignores the searing pain in her stomach. "She's not Janet!"
Needles prick her, and the images of Janet and the nurses and the orderlies all spiral away into nothingness again.
--