The next day, Sam arrived at the infirmary about five minutes before her appointment. As she walked in, she could hear the nurses scurrying about, and wondered which team had come in under fire. When she saw no one in the infirmary except Siler, she realized that Jack had gotten there first. He was playing with the equipment, and he was wreaking havoc for the two new nurses, Lt. Angela Short and Lt. Suzanne Andrews.

"Sir!"

He turned. "Hey! I was wondering when you would show up!"

"Glad to see you too. Now are you going to leave Lt. Andrews and Lt. Short alone so that they can do their jobs?"

"Hey! I wasn't distracting them! I was just playing with these…cool…"

"Colonel O'Neill, stop playing with that defibrillator or so help me you will get my biggest needles yet!" Janet said from the other room.

He put the paddles back onto their stand just a moment before Janet Fraiser walked into the room. She scowled at Jack before turning a smile to Sam. "Captain Carter, how are you doing?"

"I'm doing pretty well." She said as she took a deep breath.

"Dizziness? Nausea? Tiredness?"

"A little of everything, but…nothing debilitating."

"Well, if you'll follow me, I'll begin the initial examination, and then, Colonel, you can come in for the sonogram."

"Okey-dokey."

"And don't bother my nurses!" She called as she led Sam to the exam room.

--

It was another half-an-hour before Janet came back. "Colonel, we've finished. You can come in now."

"Great!"

He walked in to find Sam lying on an exam bed, her shirt lifted up and her pants unbuttoned. "Hey!" She said, somewhat cheerfully.

"Hey!" He replied. He could see that her stomach was slightly swollen and his heart flip-flopped when he realized that that swelling was being caused by his child.

"You can sit down." Janet said from behind him.

"Right."

He sat on the chair next to Sam and Janet took the place opposite his own, next to the sonogram machine. She squeezed a tube with a clear gel in it onto Sam's stomach and used the wand of the machine to move it around. After Sam's drew a sharp breath, Janet turned to her apologetically. "Sorry it's so cold."

"No, it's okay." She said, with a smile.

Janet looked at the projector and began moving the wand around to see the different aspects of the scan. She looked at the scan intently for a moment. "Sam, you said your last period was about ten weeks ago, right?"

"Yes." She said, hesitantly.

"Well…" Janet said, trying to study the picture. She decided to try another method. "Let's hear your baby's heartbeat."

Sam looked at Jack, and nodded. "Okay."

Both of them could tell that there was something wrong, and neither of them had the courage to ask her what it was. However, as Janet went to get the monitor, Sam felt Jack reach for her hand. She looked over and wordlessly asked him what he had done that for. He shrugged. Suddenly, she realized that he was as worried as she was. Maybe even more because of Charlie.

Janet quickly returned with a small device. As she hooked it up to Sam, she asked the unexpected question: "Sam, is there a history of multiples in your family?"

Sam looked at the doctor and then at Jack who were both looking at her for the answer. "My brother and I are fraternal twins."

"You are?" Jack asked, surprised. "Why didn't you tell me?"

"Because you didn't ask. And I already told you about how great our relationship is."

"Right."

Janet smiled. By now she was finished setting up the monitor and they all heard a faint whooshing sound. Janet was listening intently.

"Is that…?"

"Yes, Sam, that's your baby's heartbeat." She said, with a smile.

"Is everything okay?" Jack asked, Charlie's lifeless body floating before him, as if it was a projection of what was to be.

She nodded. "I was worried about the size of your baby. But…I guess I didn't look hard enough.

"What?" Sam asked, confused.

Janet moved the wand of the sonogram over all of Sam's stomach and then turned to the parents, who both still were unable to comprehend what was going on.

"Congratulations! You're expecting not one baby, but four."

Sam's jaw dropped and Jack's eyebrows raised. "Did you just say…?" He fell off the chair as he passed out.

"Colonel?" Janet asked, leaning over Sam's bed to see if he was all right. She found the Colonel crumpled in a heap on the ground.

"He fainted?" Sam asked, now too absorbed in Jack's health to deal with the reality of her delicate pregnancy.

"Yes." Janet walked over to the door of the exam room. "Nurse! Colonel O'Neill needs medical attention. And bring the smelling salts."

Lt. Short walked in, carrying the small vial of smelling salts. "Did you say that Colonel O'Neill needs medical attention?" She asked, confused when she saw Sam lying conscious on the exam table.

"He fainted. He's on the other side of the bed."

Angela nodded. "Got it."

"From the looks of it, he may also need either a few stitches or an ice pack. Maybe both."

The dutiful nurse brought the smelling salts and placed them under his nose. Almost instantly he arose. "Agh! My head!"

Angela helped him up and he looked at Sam. "She just said that we're going to have…"

"Quadruplets, Colonel. That's right." Janet said, soothingly.

He looked somewhat faint again. "Don't even think about it." Lt. Short said, allowing him to lean on her. "Now let's take a look at that head."

"You gonna be okay, Sam?" He asked before allowing Short to take him away.

"Yes, sir. I'll be there in a little bit."

"Colonel, I'll take care of her. Now, get yourself checked out."

He finally left the infirmary. Janet turned to Sam. "Now, I didn't want to say this in front of him, but…this is risky."

Sam nodded. "I know."

"No, Sam, I'm not sure you do. I'm not making any guarantees here, so don't hold me to this, but chances are you're going to have to have a cesarean section, and there's a high likelihood of needing to have at least a little bed rest. However, that's not what I want to focus on. I am officially going to place you on maternity stand down."

"What?" Sam asked, surprised. Nine months of not being on duty…at all? "Why?"

"Sam, this pregnancy is going to be very demanding on you. You are going to get fatigued very easily. Sam, I know you like the physical and mental challenges of your job, but…unfortunately, the physical challenges of this pregnancy are going to get overwhelming. It's going to be a full-time job taking care of yourself."

Sam nodded, still somewhat in shock. Quadruplets.

"How did this happen?" She asked, almost of herself.

"Well, we won't be sure until the babies are born. But…it's possible that you were originally going to have fraternal twins until one or both of the fertilized eggs decided to split, creating in essence two sets of identical twins or one fraternal fourth and identical triplets…we won't really ever know for sure."

"What about that high level of anti-histamine that you gave me to cure me from the Virus? Are the babies safe?" Sam asked, suddenly very concerned.

"I think so. If it had been very traumatic, you should have had a miscarriage by now. However, it's possible that was what caused the zygotes to split. But, to be honest, we just don't know enough about what causes a zygote to split to even begin to speculate about this."

Sam nodded, suddenly feeling very tired. She wasn't sure if it was the emotional drain that this was starting to become, if it was the power of suggestion, or if she really was just experiencing the level of fatigue that Janet had mentioned earlier. "Well, am I free to go home?"

"Well, right now, I'm going to go and submit my report and recommendation to General Hammond, and unless he needs to speak with you, I would anticipate that you would be able to go home."

"Thanks."

"And don't forget…drink lots of water and get lots of rest."

"Yes, ma'am."

Janet chuckled as Sam began to button her pants back up and pull her shirt down before getting off the bed.

"Oh, and Sam?"

"Yes?"

"I would like to see you for biweekly checkups. So…I'll see you in two weeks?"

Sam nodded. "Okay."

"Great."

--

As Sam walked down the hallway toward the elevator, she was approached by Daniel. "So…Jack fainted during the sonogram, huh?"

She smiled. "Daniel, you're not getting any information from me…"

"Come on, Sam…it must be juicy!"

"Daniel, all Janet said was that I was expecting quads. I mean…that's…"

There was a thud as Daniel hit the ground.

"Oh brother…" Sam muttered as she reached for the red phone on the wall. "Janet…prepare for round two…I've got Daniel in the hallway just outside."

Sam shook her head as she looked at the unconscious archaeologist, waiting for the medical team to come and collect him. "And I didn't even mention bedrest and cesarean sections," she said, with a half-hearted chuckle.

Unbeknownst to her, Daniel had started to come to when he heard the words 'bed rest' and 'cesarean sections.'

So this is how we're going to get a new generation of SG-1, he thought before returning to the dark world of unconsciousness.