by ALC Punk!
Waking to warmth is a different feeling. There's no scent of the sea, and she knows instinctively she is not home. Jack isn't curled at her back, either, and she slowly identifies her surroundings as she sits. Cimmeria. A thought bubbles across her mind, too quick to catch, and she wonders if it was a bad one.
"You're awake."
She turns and smiles, "Gairwyn."
"Major Carter, 'tis good to see the friends of Midgard again."
"It's not Major anymore. Just Sam."
"How is this so?"
Sam shakes her head and stands, "I should get dressed. Jack and I need to get... We need to speak with Thor, actually."
"Yes. So he has said." Gairwyn hands her folded cloth. "I'm afraid your own attire is still drying from the washing we gave it."
The skirt and shift are simple, but they're clean and dry. Sam decides she doesn't care who undressed her, and wanders out into the main room. "So, what's the plan?"
Jack looks at her, and half-smiles, "We go to Thor's Hall. Have a chat with my good buddy, and get this crap taken out of our brains before it does permanent damage." He stands and reaches out, brushing his hand through her hair. "You ok?"
Moving closer, she leans against him. "Yeah. Just tired."
His arm slides around her, and he tucks her head under his chin with a soft sigh.
"You're both weary." Gairwyn observes softly.
"And miles to go before we sleep." Jack replies.
"Where are my boots?" Time to go, to get this over with and then go home. Where they could sleep for a week.
It takes a little over an hour to get to the monument that contains the transport device to Thor's Hall. The two of them follow protocol and are whisked away.
"Welcome to the Hall of Thor's Might."
The voice echoes in her brain, and she remembers the last time she was there.
"Hey, Thor, buddy," Jack half-waves to the illusory construct. "It's Jack O'Neill. You guys called?"
For a moment, the construct remains, then it fades, and the body of an Asgard appears in its place. "So you have come."
"Yeah. Look," Jack waves a hand, "We went to the place, and now we've both gotten it in our heads, and it'd be nice if you'd help remove it."
"Indeed."
"Uh, please?" Sam looks at the image, then at Jack, "That's not Thor."
"I am Thor's replacement, Asa. I am afraid he mis-informed your species. The Asgard require no assistance, and we cannot help you. Good day." The hologram winks out.
"Well... Fuck." Jack's voice is thick with derision. "So, what, we're supposed to die now?"
"Jack."
"No." He stalks away from her and kicks at the wall. "I will not be calm, Carter."
"Jack." Something slithers across her brain, and she moves to touch the wall where the projection came from. "How long do you think Ba'al had us?"
"Long enough."
"I can..."
"Ah, Carter," he runs a hand over his face. "My frond hurts, can we talk about this tomorrow?"
"There." Her fingers find the knob and she twists, the communication device sliding open. Another prod, and she hesitates, "This is Samantha Carter, attempting to contact Thor. Please come in, Thor."
Interference splashes out of the speaker, then it clears. "This is Heimdahl. Commander Thor is currently occupied. How may I assist you, Samantha Carter?"
"Uh, hi, Heimdahl. Look, Jack O'Neill and I have been given the memories from one of the Ancients' databases. Is it possible you could remove them?" She feels almost hesitant asking, considering Asa's response.
"Indeed, Samantha Carter, that is the reason Thor wished for you to go to the planet." There's a flash, and Sam finds herself standing on the bridge of an Asgard ship, Jack at her side. Heimdahl nods to them from his chair, "We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused, but the Asgard are incapable of handling the library devices anymore, and we needed your assistance."
"That's all well and good," Sam acknowledges, glancing at Jack. "But why did you need the information?"
"The Replicators have freed themselves from their prison. We hope to find a solution among the information the Ancients acquired." Heimdahl blinks at them, "How is it you both have this knowledge?"
"Ah, well..."
"I was standin' behind Carter and it caught us both," Jack supplies. "So. Removal?"
"There is a complication."
"Oh?"
"If you absorb the knowledge, you may be able to discover a solution faster than our computers will sort one out." The Asgard looks almost uncomfortable. "It was Thor's intention to request that you wait for removal until such time as you could discover this solution."
"Thor's intention..." Something about the inflection bothers Sam. "Where is Thor?"
"I am afraid Thor was one of those lost in a recent upheaval among the Asgard High Council."
Jack snorts, "The Asgard had a coup?"
"Indeed, Colonel O'Neill."
"And you want us to wait until the information has permeated our brain tissues before removing it."
"Yes."
"How bad is the war going?"
"Very. The Asgard are nearly wiped-out. And I fear that once we are no longer a threat the Replicators will turn to another galaxy and begin again."
She looks at Jack, then slowly nods. "Very well."
"Yeah..." He nods. "Fine. But, look, can we sleep through it? Can you put us in some sort of stasis, or do we have to stay awake?"
"I am afraid you must be awake, any stasis field would prolong the time it took, and therefore would render it pointless, as I believe the Replicators would have succeeded by then."
"Right. Fine." He sighs. "Carter?"
"Jack?"
"The things you talk me into..."
She half-smiles, "Heimdahl, can we have a place to sleep, please?"
"I have prepared quarters for each of you."
"We only need one room."
The Asgard scientist blinks again. "Very well. This is an unexpected, but not entirely disconcerting development."
"Er, thanks. I think."
The room is as simple as Gairwyn's home, and they move without speaking to the bed. Her boots hit the floor before Jack's, and Sam claims the left side of the bed, curling up and facing him. "Are you really ok with this?"
"Yeah." He flops, absently reaching for her hand. "We should contact the SGC."
"Can it wait?" She tugs him closer and begins to relax against his side. "I'm so tired."
"It can wait."
-
She should have remembered that life is never this simple.
"Hello, Samantha." The voice is cold, metallic, it digs into her skin and sends fear down her spine. "You left me." He's childish and whining.
"I don't..."
Pain. Pain, images she shouldn't know, shouldn't see. Ba'al again, always Ba'al. "I don't..."
"You betrayed me, Sam. How's it feel?"
Equations full of imaginary numbers explode across her brain, and she suddenly gets Narim and the Tollan, and why they think of the Tau'ri as idiotic children. "Stop."
"Why?"
She slumps to the ground, breathing quickly, "I didn't want to. But the Colonel was right." She looks up at him, finally able to see his face. Fifth. "If we had taken you with us, how long before you decided to make another of your kind? How long before there were accidents, and then Replicators taking over our galaxy?"
"You speak in suppositions." He sneers.
"I speak in possibilities. Ones you know are true!"
"No. You're lying."
She closes her eyes, thinking. "Please let me rest. I'm so tired."
"Aww." His hand caresses her hair, and she bites back a scream as the fingers dig through her skull. "Poor Sammie Carter, lost to the universe, all for love of a man."
Words she doesn't know stream across her brain, then disappear, and she shivers. "Please."
He stiffens, "I must attend to other things. Don't go anywhere."
Then he's gone, and she's alone in the cold, cold room. Her knees drawn up to her chest, she shivers as more words and equations and concepts begin slithering across her brain. "Please hurry, Jack."
-
Sam doesn't remember everything the Replicator has done to her. Unlike dirt on her skin and stale sweat on her tongue, there is no permanence to the twists his mind spins around hers. She knows that Jack is real. He is too real for the illusions Fifth tries to convince her are reality. It's the only thing she can cling to, even while she slowly loses her grip on the way the world is supposed to work.
(Naive Earth simplicity)
There is no surprise when Fifth suddenly looks worried, when he suddenly tries to get her to believe that Jack is dead.
She is spilling out words she doesn't really understand even as the ship disintegrates around her, and she's suddenly spinning in space.
It's cold.
Jack, she thinks, as the cold sucks the life from her. I didn't want it to end this way.