Chapter 14
Darkness had swallowed her whole. It was warm and soothing and quiet. She nestled down into it, pulling it over her like a warm blanket on a cold morning. Somewhere in the distance there was noise that kept disrupting the overall peaceful rest she was getting being in the shell of unconsciousness.
She wished the noise would go away and let her rest. She was so tired after climbing mountains for the last two days. For once, she was comfortable. There were no rocks to climb, no hiding to be done. Whatever was going on around her was inconsequential. Sam didn't care, and she really didn't have the energy to find out if she should be caring that she was out of touch with reality.
A dim crack of light appeared before her eyes. She shut her eyes tight, blocking it out. She wanted to stay in the dark warmth of sleep, but her body was demanding she awaken. The noise that had been in the distance was louder now, a series of beeps and clangs and voices that grew in intensity. She would have kept her eyes shut, except there was a gnawing curiosity about why she was the way she was.
Suddenly, the memories came rushing back in a torrent. Teal'c, the guards, O'Neill, Jackson, Avedra. She tried to force her eyes open, pushing upward against the darkness she found so comforting just moments before. The lights were so bright. The rays cut into her eyes like knives. She struggled, fighting through the pain to reach the surface of consciousness. Her limbs curled with the hurt she felt. Her head was throbbing, pounding with each pulse of her heart.
Carter managed to get her eyes open more, finally able to make out blurred shapes. One of the shapes approached, and she instinctively knew it was Janet Fraiser. It was hard for Sam to focus on anything in particular, as though her eyes were not ready to follow the commands her brain was issuing.
Sam continued to fight her way to being fully awake. At last she was nearly there, able to bring Fraiser to clarity. There was concern etched on Janet's face, and Carter was not thrilled that it was most likely attributed to her.
Carter had so many questions that needed to be answered. Where was everyone? Had they all made it back through the gate? The last she could remember was seeing the patrols round the maltak and begin firing on Teal'c. Where was he? Had he made it?
"Sam, can you hear me?" Janet asked, leaning in close.
Carter swallowed hard and licked at dry lips. "Where's Teal'c?" she rasped.
"He's fine," the doctor assured. "You all made it through."
A wave of panic passed through Carter. She felt the sudden need to sit up and get out of the infirmary. She had to find her team. She had to make sure O'Neill and Jackson were getting enough water, that Avedra wasn't coughing up blood, that Teal'c had not been shot. "I've got to find them."
"Sam, they're fine. Try to relax," Janet said, keeping Carter prone.
Carter looked around the room, restless. "They were shooting at us. Teal'c . . . he . . . he was right behind me."
In low tones Carter could not decipher, Fraiser conveyed an order to a nearby nurse. "Sam, I promise you, they're fine. Colonel O'Neill and Daniel are in the ICU only as a precaution until the flu bug they have passes. Teal'c and Avedra are already out of the infirmary."
Sam's mind was muddy with exhaustion and confusion. Somewhere in the equation of confusion, it dawned on her that she, herself, was in the infirmary. She had no idea how or when she had come to be there. "How did I get here?"
Janet seemed relieved that Carter had let go the urge to find O'Neill and the others. "An energy blast came through the gate before we could get the iris closed. You and Teal'c were thrown off the ramp and were knocked unconscious. You took quite a hit."
"How long have I been here?" If the aches coming to life in her body were any indication, it felt like years. Her hand was taking on a life of its own, the pain in her fingers seeming to pulse with every heartbeat.
"A little over a day. We had a hard time getting you to wake up, but I think you're going to be just fine."
"That's good," Sam said quietly. Her energy to keep up the conversation was waning fast. Janet was not the type to lie to a friend. She would have let Sam know if O'Neill and Jackson were worse off than reported. Guilt settled over Carter as she found herself too tired to be concerned with anything but sleep. She could not help anyone if she refused to get the rest her body was demanding.
She closed her eyes to the sounds and the light. Sleep was calling with insistence again. They had all been denied it so much over the previous seventy-two hours. Images of the mountainside kicked into view, and she worked to shut them off with determination. She had done that once before – dreamt she was on a mission, running and hiding and hiking and fighting all night long, so that she felt drained and exhausted at the sound of the clock buzzer the next morning.
It was time to make her mind a chalkboard that she could erase. She erased the images manually until there was nothing but a blank slate with no thoughts or memories or fears or nightmares. Soon, she was drifting off again in comfort, not caring about the world around her.
"About time you woke up."
Janet Fraiser's voice was clear and seemingly happy. Carter opened her eyes, then squinted hard. Her brain rebelled once more against the bright fluorescent lights of the infirmary. She struggled until she was able to open her eyes fully and view her surroundings. She saw no sign of Jackson or O'Neill, and that sent a wave of alarm through her.
"Where are they?" she asked, her voice barely above a whisper.
Fraiser approached Carter's bedside and leaned over slightly. "Sam, they're fine. Remember what I told you last night? I have them in isolation only as a precaution until I'm sure the bug they have is out of their systems. Teal'c and Avedra are busy debriefing Hammond and the Tok'ra about Beman."
"I don't remember last night." She closed her eyes against a stab of pain that seemed to split her skull in half. "My head hurts."
Fraiser smiled. "Well, it should. You got thrown twenty-seven feet off the ramp."
Carter looked at Fraiser once more and managed a weak smile. "New record?"
The doctor smiled. "Yeah, they put up a chalk line for the rest of the teams to aim for when they come home."
The joke was lost as Carter's awareness grew, waking up to the world around her finally. Then the memories came. A pall washed over her as vivid images of Antalus being beaten and killed rose to the surface. Her hands balled into fists at the visions of his death, and she suddenly found it hard to breathe. She gasped for air, finding a lack of it to fill her lungs.
"Sam, talk to me. What's wrong?" Fraiser's countenance had shifted to one of concern again.
For a long moment, Carter was unable to speak. There were no words to express the emotions tumbling across her senses. She fought for more air, taking in big gulps to satisfy the void in her lungs. "He's dead. Antalus is dead," she said, her breathing staggered and labored.
Fraiser was quick to apply oxygen to get her patient to settle down and relax. "It's okay. Just take deep breaths."
The quiet hiss of oxygen and the cool flow of air calmed Sam's senses. She did as she was told and breathed deeply, letting her lungs fill again. No one except gate travelers knew what it was like to step into the void of a wormhole and give up the sensation of breathing. Carter felt that same sensation now, only it was in the infirmary and there was no reason to think that she was in a void of some sort. The images, though, were coming so fast, one after another. There was no stopping them. They kept replaying over and over, each one more vivid than the next.
Fraiser kept issuing soothing commands until Carter had calmed and was under control again. She removed the oxygen, allowing Carter to speak once more. "Oh, my God, Janet. They beat him so badly. He could have given us up, but he didn't. I couldn't do anything to stop it."
"It wasn't your fault, Sam," Fraiser soothed, grasping her friend's uninjured hand.
"I should have made him come with us. I should have taken him at gunpoint."
"Something tells me he would have stayed anyway," Fraiser consoled.
A quiet mist formed in Carter's eyes. She worked to blink it away, rolling her eyes up in an effort to mop up what might fall. "He died for us. We're here because he allowed himself to be killed."
"Maybe," Janet admitted quietly, "but if that's the reason, then he didn't die needlessly. He saved your team and maybe even worlds by allowing you to get Avedra back to the SGC."
Carter's eyes closed then, allowing the tears she had been holding at bay to finally roll down in a silent stream. "I should have done something," she whispered.
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O'Neill and Jackson spent less time in the isolation ward than had been expected. With antibiotics and a few other tricks up Medical's sleeve, the two men were sniping at one another with vigor by the time they were released to go home for a while.
Jack's youthful spring had returned to his step, and aside from heaving his internal organs out for a day, the rest had been good. His meals were brought to him, and his comfort was attended to night and day by the medical staff. In exchange, he gave them blood samples, a debriefing and the occasional scan of some part of his body.
His tactics for getting released from the infirmary had remained solid – complain and be difficult until Fraiser got sick and tired of listening to him being a crab. Some might have labeled it whining, but if it got him out of the medical ward, any method was fair game. Daniel caught on, too, after being denied the request to go to his lab to "catch up on" his reading. Combining their efforts to get released did seem to hasten the process, even though Daniel looked less than fit to be let go from the care of the SGC's chief medical officer. His face still held a pallor that was slightly unsettling to those who knew him, but Fraiser was confident that would pass with a little rest and solid meals.
O'Neill had made it a point to check on everyone who had been on Beman, even Avedra. The inner workings of the SGC began absorbing the Tok'ra's information and applied it to simulations the moment the higher math could be done. Teal'c was offering what information he had, and all seemed to be going as planned. However, O'Neill noticed the curious absence of Carter in all the nerd math buzzing around the SGC. Twice, he had found her holed up in her lab working on something, but not really working at all. She seemed to just stare at what was in front of her, then come back to reality, as though her mind was a million light years away. And the next day was no different.
When he rounded the corner to her lab, he once again found her on the stool, sitting almost in a daze. Her dark shirt was blending her into the shadows of the room. It had gone on far too long for O'Neill to ignore it anymore.
"Carter, don't you have a social life or something?"
Her head snapped up, surprised at his entrance. "Sir, I'm sorry," she said, straightening. "I didn't see you come in."
"Yeah," he said with deliberate happiness, "I know." He walked over to the counter where she sat and looked down at the piece of electronics that had been dissected in front of her. "So, whatcha doing?"
Carter looked down uncomfortably at the exploded parts. "Actually, sir, I don't know. I kind of lost track where I was going with this," she said, casually pointing at the pieces with a hand still wrapped in bandages.
"Just my opinion, but it looks kind of broken."
"It is," she said, though her voice sounded tired, "I've been meaning to fix it for a while, but I just haven't had the time."
O'Neill pulled over a stool and sat down. "Carter," he said, curiously, "maybe my mistake, but you sound wiped out. Why don't you leave this stuff, head for the surface and breathe some real air?"
She smiled wryly. "We seem to have this conversation whenever some down time rolls around."
"Yes, we do, don't we? So, I ask you again - why don't you leave this stuff, head for the surface and breathe some real air?"
She looked at him, more serious now and eyes that were so tired. "The truth, sir?"
The mirth vanished from his voice, and he became totally focused on her. "Yeah, the truth."
Her gaze held steadfast to his. "Because if I go out that door . . . " She hesitated, seeming to contemplate the rest of her statement. Finally, she relinquished to herself to his trust. "If I go out that door, I'm not so sure I'd come back."
Jack raised a brow in curiosity. "As in a small vacation? A sabbatical?"
"No, sir," she said, shaking her head, "I mean I'd be leaving the SGC permanently."
Jack sat dumbfounded. She had blindsided him with the idea of leaving. He knew she had been restless lately, but so had everyone else. Then he remembered the whole Wheeler thing, and suddenly her ideas of leaving became logical. It made sense that she'd want to get away from the place that was eating her emotions alive. Add to that her experience with Antalus, and Jack could see that one might be pushed over the edge and encouraged to run like hell.
He heaved a sigh, picking his words to her very carefully. "Well, you can always leave, but I gotta warn you – it's a big world out there. Lots of dangerous stuff. Muggers, bank robberies – I'm telling you, it's just not safe."
She smiled at his sarcasm, knowing he was admitting her point. "I'll make sure I carry some mace."
His face fell to seriousness again. Sam was not hinting she wanted to leave. She was saying, he realized with a sinking heart, that she meant she was leaving for sure. He had to look away for a second. When he felt himself under control again, he looked at her. "Does Hammond know?"
"Yeah," she said. "I just have to give him the forms and my letter."
"Wow," Jack answered, giving in once more to his shock. "Daniel and Teal'c?"
Sam turned back to the parts on the table bitterly. "No, they don't know. I just haven't found the right moment to tell them, and I can't exactly dial up my dad to tell him, either."
"Carter, are you sure about this?"
She closed her eyes and grimaced, then concentrated on the parts again. "Right now, sir, it's about the only thing I am sure of. I know I need to move on from here and do whatever it is I'm supposed to do next in my life."
"Any ideas on what that is?"
She swiveled her chair toward him again. "A teaching position opened up at the Academy. I've been accepted for it, so I'll teach there a while until I get my bearings."
It was his turn to grimace. "I suppose you'll be having that kid we had in here for class?"
Carter laughed quietly. "Yeah, well, someone has to get her moving in the right direction. Who better than the one person she hates the most?"
She looked at him plaintively, as though seeking his approval, seeking his understanding of her emotions and situation. He decided in that moment to give her what she needed. "Sam, you do what you need to do. But I won't lie to you – I don't like it. I don't like breaking up good units."
Sam leaned on the counter, resting her weight on her elbows. "It wasn't an easy decision, sir. I wanted you to know that."
"I know," he answered gently.
"It's been an honor, sir."
"Yes, Major, it has."
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Epilogue
Major General George S. Hammond
Stargate Command
Cheyenne Mountain Complex, Colorado
Sir:
Effective immediately, I am submitting my request for reassignment to the United States Air Force Academy at Colorado Springs and respectfully request the termination of my active involvement in the Stargate Program. I understand that I will remain under the non-disclosure terms of my assignment until notified otherwise by an outstanding authority.
Per regulations, I am submitting all pertinent forms subject to my transfer and the redesignation of my MOS.
It has been an honor to serve under you and with those assigned to Stargate Command. I thank you for the opportunity to have been involved in this program.
Sincerely,
Major Samantha A. Carter
Stargate Unit 1
