In the Gateroom: 0800 hours the next day

SG-1 stood before the Stargate, about to embark on a mission to a Furling planet in order to find the two Furlings mentioned on the tablet that Doctor Daniel Jackson had found the previous day. Oh God Sam thought, nervously, How did I know what it said? What if they're not here? What if— her thoughts were broken by the stargate activating; the Kawoosh broke through the offending thoughts.

Sam rubbed her head, trying to get rid of the headache that had crept up on her as she sat, lost in thought. She ran her fingers slowly over her ears, ears that had, as they always had, a slight, almost invisible point to them. These points had been a joy to a young "Sammy" Carter, who would tell her friends that she was part Elf, that and the slight tilt to her eyes that nothing explained, up until her father shattered her world by telling her that Elves weren't real. These points had infuriated a teenage Sam as she tried to hide them and wear her hair in different styles, in the end she had given up and kept her hair down at all times, even in the summer. These points that she had tried to keep her hair long enough to cover as well as keep her hair within regulation length. Sam smiled to herself, taking her fingers away from her ears to hold her gun properly as she stepped through the gate.

Silence. Darkness. Sam clicked on the light on her gun, but no light came forth. Angry, she turned the switch back to the off position. She took a breath, breathing in deeply to calm herself. She realized that she had closed her eyes and that had made no difference, but now she opened them again. Now she could make out small things, she could make out the outlines of her team members: Daniel, the Colonel, and Teal'c. She felt as if there was a pulse, slow but steady, running through the area, reminding her unpleasantly of a heartbeat, the heartbeat of someone sleeping.

She found Daniel, walked towards him, placed her hand on his shoulder. He turned to her, looking into her eyes, eyes that she now noticed had a similar tilt to them as her own eyes had although slightly stronger. "Sam?" she heard, but only the pulsations rang in her ears, slow and steady as before. This was Daniel's voice, she was sure, she had worked with the man for long enough to know his voice. Daniel smiled weakly and Sam heard words again, "That pulse is really unnerving, isn't it?" She nodded in response, then she pushed several strands of hair behind her ear, feeling the point as her fingers ran over the edge of her ear. "Me too," Sam looked at Daniel, who pointed to his ear and then the other, both ears had points. Points more pronounced than the points on Sam's ears. She wondered how she had never noticed them before, but decided it was unimportant.

"So," she said, speaking in the silent speech to Daniel, "Let there be light?" she asked jokingly, startled when the room slowly filled up with light, a light that emanated from the very walls of the room in a soft, soothing glow that made Sam feel at home. The others blinked quickly, and the Colonel looked around, and finding Sam and Daniel, he began to shout. The first thing that ran through Sam's head then was a shock of wonder at how the Colonel hadn't seen or heard anything, the second thing was why can't I hear him?

"Let there be sound?" Daniel half jokingly suggested, but on finishing, he wished he hadn't, the Colonel was screaming many rather insulting phrases at Daniel and Sam.

"Let it be silent!" Sam called quickly to put an end to the Colonel's loud, jarring insults and talk about... what ever it was he had been about to scream at them. Sam almost laughed as she looked at the Colonel, his mouth moving furiously without any sound, making him look rather like a fish. "This way," she motioned to Daniel and the others, heading down a hall and not glancing back, for she heard a voice calling to her in her mind. She found herself in a room, having no idea how she got there, but she was staring at two cases, dark as they were, Sam got the impression they hid something, and they gave off the pulsation she had felt earlier, turning, she saw Daniel and Teal'c. She turned back to the cases and the Colonel was standing by the nearest one. He touched it, walked round it, and looked for anything. Shrugging, he turned to Sam and Daniel. Sam walked up to the case now, she knelt down to look for a control, and she placed her had on the case itself.

The case grew warm beneath her fingers and she leapt away, noting that the pulsations grew quicker and then a bright light shone from the case. The light blinded all of them and when it was gone, all four stood blinking, trying to clear their vision. When it cleared, they all gasped. There no longer was a case, but in its place stood a bed. On the bed was a girl, or so it seemed. She looked as if she was no older than 21, but something about her face said otherwise. Her long blond hair fell in soft waves around her head, over her shoulders and onto her aqua colored toga style garment, making her look like she was a princess straight out of a fairy tale. She shook her head slightly, groaning as she did so, a sound that even with pain in it sounded very ethereal. Her hair fell away from her ear, revealing a sharp point that made Sam and Daniel both gasp.

At the sound, she moved her hand away from the robin's egg blue belt that was tied around the center of her toga. The hand traveled towards her face, all six fingers splayed fingers, Sam and Daniel both noticed as being very long for anyone they had ever seen. It found her eyes and two of the fingers wiped her eyes, the way anyone does upon waking. The hand moved slowly to find a place with the thumb behind her ear, and then the other hand followed, finding the same position on the other side of her head. Then Sam and Daniel saw the reason for her long fingers: they had an extra digit each, four bones rather than three. An extra joint that allowed the girl to do much more that any human's hands could do.

"Whe'ht Ath'Nei?" she asked as Sam helped her sit up. "Whe'ht Arhtahl ahn'Denehl?"

"You are among friends," Sam replied, instinctively speaking the Furling language. "Are you Kaianta?"

"Arhmijsh, I am," Kaianta murmured, tilting her head to the left slightly in a way that Sam knew to mean "yes". Kaianta maneuvered herself to the edge of the bed, so that her feet dangled off rather than staying in the slab. She now put her head in her hands, and lowered her elbows to her knees, allowing her hair to cascade down around her, like a curtain, cutting off the light.

"Does your head hurt?" Sam asked softly and Kaianta whispered the word again: "Arhmijsh" and Sam dimmed the light so that it didn't hurt Kaianta's eyes, which, now that she looked, were slanted and almond shaped. "My name is Samantha Carter," she told Kaianta.

"Thank you, Samahnthah Cahrtah," Kaianta said with an accent on the name that was unique to Sam's knowledge. "Can I see my brother?" she asked, and on seeing the look on Sam's face, "Denehl?"

"He's still in stasis," Sam explained, but as she spoke a bright light blinded her as the second stasis pod deactivated at Daniel's touch. On the bed this pod left was a boy, his skin was the same pale shade as his sister's, and his hair was a light honey-ish shade of brown, bordering on blond. His hair reach down to his shoulders in an alluring fashion. He too rubbed his slanted, almond eyes with his fingers, at least until his sister took his six-fingered hand in her own. Denehl opened his eyes, looked into Kaianta's sea colored blue-ish green eyes as she looked into his eyes, the pure blue color that reminded some of a blue jay.

"Brother," Kaianta said, "I am here," she then turned to Daniel, locked onto his sky blue eyes and smiled. "Thank you, cousin, for freeing my brother. What is your name, cousin?"

Daniel wondered for a moment how he understood her, but he answered automatically. "I'm Daniel Jackson. We're peaceful explorers from Earth—" his reply was cut off as Kaianta planted a passionate kiss on his lips.

"Thank you, Dahnyehl Jahcksohn of Earth; we know it is a long trip, even if one travels by Stargate, from Ahtlahntus," Kaianta spoke in English.

"Actually," Daniel interjected, "Atlantis isn't on Earth any more, we don't know where the Ancients took it," he couldn't figure out how Kaianta looked so lost.

"The Alterens," Sam said, recalling the word used on the tablet.

"They left?" Denehl asked, speaking for the first time, haltingly, softly.

"Yes," Daniel began, but he stopped, seeing the look on Kaianta's face he smiled sadly. "You've been in stasis for thousands of years," he stopped again as Kaianta ran one of her six fingers over his ear, noting the slight point that it had.

"Your ears," Kaianta said, shocked, "Are you part Furling, Daniel Jackson?"