General Hammond cleared his throat and everybody shuffled back to their seats.
"Jacob had to return to the Tok'ra home world. He will return for the memorial service, which is slated for tomorrow afternoon. Colonel, will you be speaking?"
"What are our options here Sir?" Jack appeared not to have heard.
"Options Colonel?"
"Can none of our allies help us?"
"Our allies Jack?" Hammond wasn't sure where this was going.
"Yeah – doesn't someone out there owe us a couple of favours by now?"
"Jack … Major Carter is dead. Nothing we can do will bring her back."
"Were the Nox not able to revive the dead?" asked Teal'c.
"You see … right there … the Nox!"
Jack slapped his hand on the table.
"Ehm … the last people to contact the Nox were the Tollan Jack .. and we all know what happened to them" Daniel pointed out apologetically.
"We do not possess the technology to summon them then .." mused Teal'c.
"Could we send a message back to ourselves in time, warning Sam of the danger?" asked Janet.
General Hammond shook his head.
"We would need a solar flare .. and in the absence of Major Carter I don't believe any of us here are in a position to calculate when the next one will be."
Jack perked up.
"What about that time thingy .. on P3X .."
"Do you refer to the planet with the geomagnetic storm O'Neill?"
"Riiiiiight … the one where we got stuck in the time loop. You could figure out the machine right Daniel? We could create another time loop and stop this from happening?"
"Actually no Jack – we would need to travel back in time to the day of the explosion before we could initiate a time loop, and we just don't have any way of doing that."
Jack looked crushed.
"What about the Stargate?" asked General Hammond.
"What about it?" asked Jack.
"We currently use seven chevrons, but there are others on it …" ventured Janet.
Daniel shook his head.
'The idea that the Stargate was designed for time travel doesn't wash. It's a transportation device, not a temporal one. We've been using the seven chevrons for interstellar travel. From what Sam told me recently there are plans to try and use the eighth chevron for intergalactic travel."
"What – like an area code?" said Jack.
"Sorta. A distance multiplier to enable travel to other galaxies. If the gate had been capable of time travel the Ancients would never have built that machine on the storm planet."
Silence settled on the room.
"Can the Asgard render no assistance General Hammond?"
"I contacted Thor shortly after Major Carter refused the symbiote. He expressed his sorrow about the situation."
"His sorrow?" Jack snorted. "She's only saved their skinny asses once or twice!"
General Hammond frowned at the outburst but continued.
"He also said that he felt Colonel O'Neill would not condone their sharing technology with us in view of past events. Do any of you have any idea what he means by this?"
Jack jumped out of his chair.
"Permission to contact the Asgard Sir .."
He was out of the room heading for the control room before his Commanding Officer could formulate a reply.
The General looked around the room for answers.
"Oh my God …" said Daniel. "I can't believe we didn't think of that. Janet? Can it be done?"
"DNA samples are taken from cadavers for paternity tests all the time, so …"
She rose from her seat in a hurry and hovered. "Permission to be dismissed Sir …" Hammond nodded and she ran from the room, her mind way ahead of her body.
"Would somebody please explain what is going on here" General Hammond said.
"Thor can utilise Sam's genetic material General, like Loki did with Jack several years ago."
"Are you telling me that he can clone her?"
"Indeed" said Teal'c. "Only this time there will be but one."