Chapter Two: The Hospital
The limousine slowed down, and with the next turn the asphalt road changed to gravel. Janet heard the distinctive crunching of the tyres on the small stones. A few hundred metres later it came to a stop. The car door was opened and they climbed out.
A woman with long dark brown hair hugged Samantha and then stretched her hand out to greet Janet. "Doctor Fraiser, I presume. Nice to finally meet you. I only wish it could have been under better circumstances. My name is Svetlana Nikolaevna Markova."
"I remember your name, Doctor Markova. You are the one who irritated the hell out of Colonel O'Neill during the mission in Siberia a couple of years ago."
"Be assured, it was the other way round, and please call me Svetlana, Janet. – Samantha, she's waiting for you." The woman had warm brown eyes, and Janet instantly liked her, despite her heavy accent.
The blonde nodded, and they went inside of the 19th Century stone mansion. As soon as the door opened, Janet knew that they were in a hospital; and judging by the abundance of uniforms, a hospital run by the military. No one seemed to pay any attention to the three women, but she still had the feeling that they were under close observation.
Svetlana led them to a room at the end of a rather quiet corridor. She closed her fingers around the handle and turned towards them.
"She only stopped working four days ago. It took a lot out of her. The radiation inhibitors are no longer working; there are a lot of lesions. Please, be kind."
"I owe her my life, Lana. I never would hurt her, and I know what to expect.
"Would you mind giving us some privacy?"
"Of course not, Samantha. Take all the time you need. We'll be three doors down. There's a lounge with a kitchenette. Would you like some coffee, Janet?"
"Yes, please. It's been quite a journey."
It was more than just a bit strange to have travelled more than 3000 miles just to sit and make small talk with a potential stranger, Janet thought.
The stranger's eyes, however, reflected the same pain she had seen in her lover's eyes. – Perhaps the Russian scientist also felt the need to distance herself from overwhelming emotions.
"The phone call from Nome, telling us that you were on your way, surprised me. I didn't expect Sam's arrival before late tomorrow."
"General Hammond authorised the use of an F-16. He knew that time was of the essence."
"I read her papers and reports. I saw how she reacts under pressure. Despite all I know about her, I constantly forget that Samantha also is a fighter pilot and combat soldier.
"When we were stuck on the mini-submarine, the only thing that kept me from being a nervous wreck was her visible calm. On the way back to the airport, she told me that she knew everything would work out because she had someone waiting for her. You're a very lucky woman, Janet Fraiser."
So, this woman obviously knew about the real nature of their relationship. This had the potential of getting them into deep trouble but under no circumstances would she deny her feelings for the blonde.
"Yes, I am, Svetlana Markova."
They fell silent and after a couple of minutes the taller woman made another attempt at some light conversation. "So, was it your first time in an F-16?"
"Oh, yes. It was a thrill. I'm not too fond of flying but this really was fun. At least it could have been, had I not been so worried about Sam."
Janet fell silent, her mind wandering back to all the times she had spent worrying about her lover, especially the times when the uneasiness she usually felt whenever the blonde was on an away-mission morphed to anxiousness and full-blown panic.
"I'm sorry. I just can't do this. I can not sit here, drink coffee and make idle conversation when I know that at the same time only a few doors down, Sam is hurting."
Janet started to pace and her mind wandered.
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She stood in the control room, watching SG-1 and Martouf step through the event horizon. Her hands gripped the backrest of one of the chairs, her knuckles white with the strain and her face almost as pale.
Janet knew her lover didn't have a choice but to go after her father and to try and get him literally out of hell. Samantha wouldn't be the woman the doctor loved if she had been able to decide otherwise. The blonde was not the least interested in the information Martouf and his symbiote Lantash wanted to retrieve, but she would have made a deal with the devil himself to get her father out of harm's way.
In this case they just had to outwit the devil; and to do this it would be necessary to delve deep into Jolinar's memories – memories that still were liable to give Samantha horrible nightmares. Their plan was based on so many what-ifs it gave her the creeps.
The small doctor knew that her lover was afraid, not of the possible danger on Netu, but more of all the things this Tok'ra memory device could bring to light. She feared losing herself in her former symbiote's memories and Janet had tried to reassure her. She had told her that she only had to think of her and their love to come back to herself, and the flicker of bone deep trust she had seen in the blonde's eyes had made letting her go bearable.
But now she was gone and Janet couldn't help the cloud of despair suddenly settling over her mind. She felt General Hammond's hand at the small of her back.
"Go home, doctor. Be with your daughter."
"Cass is at a sleepover. She'll not be back before tomorrow evening and she…"
"She would know that you're more worried than usual, and you don't want her to worry."
As an answer the Air Force doctor only smiled at him. "Come, doctor, we'll both call it a day. Our shifts are over and at the moment we are not needed here. Let's go to O'Malley's and get something to eat."
And so they did. They ended up in General Hammond's house, sitting side by side in his living room and going through some of his photo albums in which a certain blond haired genius was immortalised almost as often as his own daughters. Both of them tried to ignore the two enormous pink elephants sitting in the middle of the room, one of them with the letters 'Air Force Regulations' stamped on its forehead, the other one with worry and fear written all over it.
Ten days later the team had returned, for once in a reasonably good physical condition, but she never forgot the gut clenching fear she had endured during her lover's absence – though the Artic cruise Jacob Carter had invited them to and the fact that he wholeheartedly approved of their relationship had made it more easy to cope with.
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"Believe me, Janet. I know how you feel. The woman dying over there is my sister. She raised me; she taught me everything I know." The Russian's voice snapped her back to reality and brought Janet to a halt.
"I'm sorry, Svetlana. I wouldn't have complained had I known. Sam wasn't exactly forthcoming with the reason of this journey."
"But you still came, because you knew that at some point I would need your support," Samantha said from the doorway.
"Come, Marina wants to get to know you; and don't be surprised: she knows about us, about Cassandra, the Stargate program, about everything. We've been in regular contact for a very long time."
When she saw that Svetlana was still sitting at the table, she added. "You too, Lana. You're forgiven for calling me."
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When they stepped through the door, Janet didn't find the simple hospital room she had expected to see. This was a fully equipped science lab, similar to Samantha's own at the base but with a bed and a few surveillance monitors.
When they reached the bed Janet was once again grateful for the trauma surgeon who had taught her how to control her facial expressions in the second week of her residency.
The human being lying there was thin, extremely thin, almost emaciated. The skin was stretched taut over the bones; bandages covered two thirds of the visible skin. For the fraction of a heartbeat she was back in her own infirmary, standing helplessly next to Daniel's slowly failing body. She brought herself out of the painful memories by snapping into doctor mode. Janet instinctively searched for her penlight, in a lab coat she was not wearing.
"Don't Janet. I don't need you as a doctor. I need you as Samantha's partner. I will die in less than 48 hours, and there's nothing anyone can do about it. I had a good life and leave a great legacy."
The woman's voice was a carbon copy of her sister's but with only a hint of an accent.
"Come around and sit down. Over the years, dohch-kah mai-yeh-voh syehrd-tsah, the daughter of my heart, has told me a lot about you. According to her you must be the best thing, next to cold fusion."
"Better than cold fusion, Rina, much better. Janet, may I introduce Professor Marina Markova. A long time ago, she saved my life and my soul." Samantha said.
"If you insist on dwelling on the past, then concentrate on the good times, Samantha. Pah-kah vlee-yah-nee-yeh oo prosh-lah-voh nah vas, boo-dyet nah-stai-yah-shtyeh-yeh bahl-yez-nyen-noy-yeh." The dying woman answered.
„Dlyah tah-voh chtoh-bwee dyehr-zhat mai-ee pahm-yah-tee, yah oo-plah-choo tsyeh-noo," the blonde said, her voice still unusually deep and sensual, "mai-yah vtah-rai-yah math!"
"I know, Samantha, no one asks you to give up your memories. But let's stick to English, we are rather rude." She then turned her attention back to the small doctor, "I told Samantha that she has to let go of the past to enjoy the present and she stubbornly answered that she doesn't intend to give up her memories. But now lets talk about something else.
"Come around and take a seat, Janet, and tell me about the first time you met Samantha. She told me that suddenly the world stood still and shrank to two brown eyes."
Samantha blushed.
"That must have been after we literally ran into each other in one of the base corridors and landed with our behinds on the cold concrete floor."
The brunette answered with a smile and took a seat next to her lover at the other side of the bed. From this angle she had a better view of the woman. This side of her face was almost free of lesions and despite her thinness the resemblance to her sister was stunning. She looked like Svetlana would in about 15 or 20 years.
"We climbed back to our feet, made our apologies, and introduced ourselves. Our hands touched and I looked up into the deepest blue eyes I have ever seen – and I thought that I wouldn't mind having a stiff neck for the rest of my life if she were the cause." Janet continued and squeezed her lover's hand.
"You choose well, daughter of my heart. I can tell that she's beautiful, bright, and has a sense of humour."
Now, it was Janet's turn to blush, and it wouldn't be the last time. Marina really knew a lot about them and she had a real knack for teasing them. Samantha visibly relaxed and successfully pushed the harsh reality aside, at least for a few hours.
When the older woman finally fell in a light sleep late in the night, the others retired to an adjacent room where three cots were waiting for them.
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A couple of hours later, Janet woke to the sound of suppressed coughing. She quietly rose and padded to the next room to check on Marina.
She was in full doctor's mode, but the woman had other ideas. "Please close the door, Janet. I don't want to wake them. Tomorrow will be hard enough."
Janet found herself obeying but quickly snapped back into her role. "Let me check on you, Marina."
"Doctor's instincts, I understand. Have a look at this. It will answer your questions."
She indicated a chart on the bed-stand with medical information. More than a few minutes passed in silence while Janet scanned the text and tried not to wonder why it was in English. What she read was nigh on impossible.
According to these documents eight years ago the woman had suffered acute radiation poisoning, being exposed to a dosage of 8.5 Sieverts. For all intents and purposes, she should have been dead for years; such a high dosage usually was fatal two weeks after irradiation – but she somehow had survived all these years.
What the diminutive doctor had in front of her was obviously an abridged version of her real medical file, but it gave a fairly accurate account of the woman's health. It seemed she owed her life among other things to two bone marrow transplantations, the first about a week after the exposure, the second four years ago. Both times the donor had been a certain Samantha Carter.
Janet had known about the second transplantation, but had been told that it was for a patient in Canada. In fact she had personally made the preliminary tests to make sure that neither the protein marker nor the naqada in her lover's blood would influence the process. She couldn't help but feel a pang of disappointment and anger that her partner had not trusted her enough to tell her the truth.
She kept a firm hold on her facial expression and continued her reading. When she came to the most recent tests, however, her face became white. She checked the monitors. The woman was holding on by pure willpower alone. Her internal organs were all but gone, and she had to be in extreme pain. Janet estimated that at this rate Marina had about 16 to 18 hours left, at the most.
The brunette looked up and found the older woman's eyes. She seemed to know exactly what the Air Force doctor was thinking.
"It's all right, Janet. The past eight years have not been easy, but they also were a gift I hadn't expected. I don't mind dying."
Janet now openly stared, then something clicked and the small doctor said.
"You were angry with your sister for calling Sam because you didn't want her to see you die. And if you would have found a way, even your sister would not have been informed of the seriousness of your condition, right? Sam would have arrived tomorrow afternoon at the earliest if not for General Hammond authorising the use of an F-16. She would have just been in time to see you die. You wanted to protect her."
"You're good, Janet, more than just good, but I shouldn't be surprised. The research you did over the years on the effects of staff weapons and on radiation poisoning kept me alive, especially after Daniel Jackson's ascension.
"These last two years, you made my life worth living. When Samantha sent the specifications for the experimental treatment you devised after the incident with Daniel Jackson, I had been bedridden for almost two months; I had been unable to work for more than half a year.
"I thought that I would die, soon. You gave me another chance; you gave me two more years. You gave me the chance to do what I do best; research and teach. I'm in your debt, Janet."
"No, I'm in your debt, Marina. Sam said that you saved her life; so, I'll always be in your debt."
"She didn't tell you about us, about what happened." It wasn't a question but a simple statement of facts.
"She will, as soon as she is ready. I love her and I trust her." Janet said with conviction. "You mean a lot to her and she soon will need all the support I can give. Being with you, right now, might even help to heal a few wounds from the past."
"She was right. You really are svyet yeh-yoh doo-shee, the light of her soul." The older woman's body was raked by another fit of coughing and Janet supported her upper body to ease the pain. "Thank you, Janet. Go back to bed. You don't have to keep me company."
"I'd rather stay. I don't want you to be alone. And I don't mind staying up; with Sam and the rest of SG-1 regularly ending up in my infirmary I'm used to pull all-nighters."
"The drugs I took for the pain, keep me awake. I'd love the company. Might I ask a personal question?"
"You already know so much about me, Marina. Let's make a deal. I'll answer your questions if you'll answer mine."
"You have a deal, Janet. Please, call me Rina. When did you know that you had fallen in love with Samantha? I mean really knew it, with all your heart."
"You really go for the hard stuff. I was attracted to her the first time we bumped into each other. It was those blue eyes and the shy smile while she introduced herself. But I didn't know anything about her. When I got to know her better and found out how brilliant she is, I was intimidated, and I thought she had a crush on the Colonel. We became friends.
"After the incident with Hathor she kissed me. I had been totally freaked out by the whole thing and my shoulder was hurting; suddenly I felt soft lips on mine, right in view of a security monitor I later learned had been disabled by a certain sneaky astrophysicist. A few weeks later Cassandra came in our lives. She was ready to give up her life so a young girl wouldn't have to die alone. She even spoke of resigning from active field duty to care for her. It was then that I knew I no longer cared for Air Force regulations or DoD policy.
"So, in a way it was love at first sight and also falling in love with my best friend."
Marina laughed, a deep belly laugh that had her coughing in no time. Janet slipped into doctor mode, but the dying woman refused her help.
"I'm fine, Janet. Don't worry. I've spent years waiting for my body to finally shut down. I know what to expect.
"Samantha said almost the same about you. She said that she was mesmerised by your sparkling brown eyes and when she got to know you better she was awestruck by the way you treated your patients. She was convinced that someone like you never could be interested in an air-headed geek like her."
"Sam, a geek? Did you ever see her on the back of her bike? Yes, she can get lost in her work, but she also is an adrenaline junkie if I ever saw one. She's a very complex woman."
"That she is. So, what do you want to know, Janet?"
"Sam said that you communicate regularly. Since when?" The small doctor wanted to know.
"Do you remember the incident when Samantha and Colonel O'Neill ended up in Antarctica after the Gate overloaded about six years ago?"
"That long?"
"Being stuck out there brought back a whole lot of dark memories and I was the only one who understood what she had been put through. I suppose she still has these horrible nightmares from time to time, right?" Janet only nodded. "Samantha had a pretty good handle on what happened when we first met, but with her superior officer to worry about and the cold it all came back to her, even the parts I was sure she had forgotten about."
"Please, Rina, stop. I can see that it brings back dark memories for you too. Sam will tell me everything I need to know when the time is right."
"You're right, Janet. This is Samantha's story to tell, but you don't have to worry about me. Due to the radiation poisoning it's no memory for me but part of my everyday life. Samantha was stumbling from one dangerous situation to the next, but I had enough time to put the whole thing into perspective. Now, let's talk about something more pleasant. Tell me about Cassandra, please."
"With pleasure, but could you first answer another question?" The other woman nodded. "What does mai-yah vtah-rai-yah math, or something, mean? Sam used it a few times when addressing you directly."
"Mai-yah vtah-rai-yah math. It means 'my second mother'. Sometimes I still can't believe that she honoured me with this name. But now, back to your daughter."
TO BE CONTINUED
