Untitled HP/Stargate Crossover

Summary: After defeating Voldemort, Andromeda Potter left wizarding Britain to pursue curse-breaking and archaeology. A previously unrecognized script in Egyptian tombs leads her to treasure left by Merlin and knowledge that humanity is not alone in the galaxy, prompting her to further isolate herself as she plans to reclaim the legacy of the Alterans. Then SG-1 comes to visit.

Crossover: Harry Potter/Stargate

Pairing: Andromeda Potter/Samantha Carter

A/N: I'm a fan of Stargate, and there's a lot of potential in this story, but I wouldn't want to just start rehashing Stargate canon with the addition of a witch as part of the show. I need an end goal for Andromeda to be striving for — something that disrupts the Stargate plot. Trying to get to Atlantis is an obvious choice, but... why? What's her motive? Create a colony of magicals who are the descendants of the Alterans? Then what will disrupt her plans — another Goa'uld attack, forcing her to bring Atlantis to our galaxy instead of continuing to run like she's been doing for so long? I'm not sure, and until I have some answers, I don't have a coherent, focused story.

Thanks to Mainsail for plot feedback, and to Bonnie for not only reading this and improving on the original, but also for her help in developing the plot so far.

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter, JK Rowling does. I don't own Stargate, MGM does.

Chapter 01 - Introductions

"Yes?" I asked as I opened the door, seeing three strangers standing on my front porch. It was extremely rare that anyone ever came to my door, and these three didn't look like solicitors, especially since they were all dressed rather casually. It had been months since I'd spoken more than two words to another human being, and I'd been happy that I'd been left in peace to work for so long. Hopefully these three would be interesting enough to justify the intrusion on my privacy.

"Miss Potter?" the lone woman asked, forcing me to focus on her. "Miss Andromeda Lily Potter?" I was struck by how cute she was, though I wasn't sure if that was because she really was exceptionally cute or because I'd simply gone so long without human contact. Isolating myself like I'd done did have some drawbacks.

"Yes," I replied, smiling a little as I continued to look at her.

"We'd like to talk to you about your research — specifically, your proposal that a common, heretofore unknown language can be found on ancient sites located all around the world, sites created by civilizations that had no contact with each other."

My smile quickly turned to a frown. "That was a long time ago."

"Not so long, just five years," said the taller man behind her. Even though it didn't reach his face or his voice, there was a sneer behind his words that was all too familiar.

I tried hard to ignore it. "Still, it's not something I've continued to pursue."

"The mainstream academic community wasn't receptive to your views," the second man said. "But do you still stand by your original claims?"

I sighed deeply, figuring that I knew where this was going. It wasn't the first time I'd been approached by conspiracy theorists or publishers of crypto-archaeological materials, but it had been a while since any had managed to track me down. Early on, when I'd been pursuing my discovery that something like parseltongue had been inscribed on stones at ancient sites all over the world, I welcomed any sort of support I could get. Later, much too late, I realized how much their enthusiastic support had ultimately harmed me.

I'd been blinded by my positive experiences with the Quibbler and paid a heavy price for it, but given what happened afterwards, I couldn't bring myself to regret it. Not really. Regardless of how much I'd lost. I clung to the hope that once my quest was complete, it would all be worth it. Maybe someday, someone would forgive me.

I certainly wasn't ever going to be able to forgive myself.

"Look," I finally said, "I haven't repudiated anything I've written, but I'm not interested in talking about it anymore. If you actually have access to any of my old papers, I can't stop you from using them, but I'm not going to provide any quotes or new material for publication or broadcast. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm quite busy..."

I tried closing the door, but the cute blonde grabbed it. "No, wait, please, I think you misunderstand us. We're not from any sort of magazine or TV show," she said quickly as she pulled out a plastic ID card. "I'm Captain Samantha Carter, U.S. Air Force. This is Colonel Jack O'Neill, also U.S. Air Force, and this is Dr. Daniel Jackson."

I raised one eyebrow and stopped trying to close the door. Jackson's name I recognized immediately, and Carter's name sounded oddly familiar, though I couldn't figure out why. "Air Force?" I asked. "What would the military want with me? Or my old research?"

"Perhaps we could talk about that inside, ma'am?" O'Neill suggested. There was still something about him that I didn't like, but I could also tell now that he was in charge — and he didn't seem like the sort who would readily take "no" for an answer.

"Alright," I responded, opening the door wider. "Come on in." After serving tea in the living room, I said, "I always wondered what happened to you, Dr. Jackson. Oh, yes, I recognize your name. How could I not, given the sort of research I was doing? I worried that you had descended into complete obscurity, teaching history in a high school somewhere, perhaps. I must admit that I never would have expected you to join the military."

"No, no, I'm not in the Air Force," he protested.

"He's a civilian consultant," Carter explained.

"Consultant?" I said as I took a sip of tea. "What sort of consulting could a discredited Egyptologist possibly do for the U.S. Air Force?" I paused for a moment, then added, "Uh, no offense intended. I mean, I'm one too, after all."

"That's classified, I'm afraid," O'Neill said while Jackson smiled thinly and waved my apology off.

"Yet it has to be related to why you're here," I replied with a frown, looking back and forth between Jackson and O'Neill as they shifted somewhat nervously in the chairs across from me. "So it can't be all that classified, otherwise you wouldn't be able to talk to me. You'll have to tell me something, otherwise this will be a rather pointless meeting."

"That remains to be seen," O'Neill said. "Show her, Daniel."

Jackson opened up his satchel and pulled out several large black and white photographs, handing them to me across the coffee table. I recognized the script which I'd deduced was a written form of some dialect of parseltongue, but which mainstream archaeologists had always dismissed as little more than random, decorative lines. Then my eyes widened slightly when I realized that the parselscript was surrounding Egyptian hieroglyphics — but not a set of hieroglyphics I'd ever seen before.

This was something new, unseen by anyone else, as far as I could tell.

"What do you make of this?" Jackson asked.

"Well, it's definitely the same sort of thing I researched, but I don't recognize it — and I thought that I'd examined every example of this script to come out of Egypt," I said as I flipped through the photos. "Where did you get these images? Where was this found? Is it a new site, or recently discovered chambers in an old site? It looks... archaic, even more so than most of the hieroglyphics I've seen associated with this script."

"That's classified," O'Neill said in a tone of voice that seemed to brook no argument. I raised one eyebrow as I looked at him, but he held my gaze easily.

"Can you tell us anything about it?" Carter asked, drawing my attention to where she sat next to me on my right. Once again I wondered why her name was so familiar, but I was sure that I'd never seen her face before. If I had, I'd definitely remember it. "The papers of yours that we were able to track down never included anything about you being able to translate the script, but several things you did write seemed to suggest that you might be able to. We're hoping that's the case, and that you'll be able to tell us what, if anything, the script in these photos says."

I leaned back in the sofa and gave the captain a long, appraising look. She was right: I had always avoided claiming that I knew what the script said. I never wanted to appear to be even more of a kook than everyone already thought I was, but I couldn't avoid hinting at it, no matter how hard I tried to divert attention away from the matter. For her to be able to figure that out from my now-obscure academic writings meant that she was very smart indeed...

My eyes lit up in recognition as I shifted forward in my seat and turned slightly so I could face her. "Samantha Carter!" I exclaimed, drawing confused looks from the three visitors. "You wrote a paper about two years ago on the theoretical possibilities of stabilizing the event horizon of a wormhole in order to better study the phenomenon!"

"Oh, uh, yes," she said, her expression shifting from confusion to surprise. The other two continued to look confused.

"And a couple of years before that, wasn't there a paper on the space/time warping properties of wormholes, especially with regards to the possibility of transmitting information through them? And whether that information would actually remain in phase with the space and time of its point of origin?"

"Yes, that was me," Carter admitted. "But I didn't think that one got published anywhere."

I smiled knowingly as I leaned back again. It hadn't been published, but someone else had referenced it, and I managed to get hold of a copy. I'd been keeping an eye on everything related to wormholes because Hermione had once theorized that apparition might be a form of wormhole travel, and the idea fascinated both of us. After meeting the holographic Merlin beneath Glastonbury and learning about the Astria Portas, my interest had skyrocketed. I devoured everything I could find on the subject, even if I couldn't understand it all, and my enthusiasm was only tempered by the knowledge that Hermione would have understood and been even more excited.

That was someplace I simply couldn't afford to let my mind go, though.

For some reason, a lot less published research on that topic had been coming out of the cutting-edge labs recently (or at least the government-funded ones, which was pretty much all of them), and I'd been wondering why. Maybe now I'd be able to learn more.

"You haven't published anything on the subject in the past couple of years," I replied, ignoring her implied question. "Why is that?"

"I've, uh, been pursuing other interests," she responded, and I didn't need to use Legilimency to recognize that there was a lot more going on than she was admitting. This visit was getting more and more interesting.

"Pity," I said, as I kept my focus on her. "I found your ideas to be both original and inspiring."

"Really?" she asked, sounding genuinely surprised and flattered. "You know, I never would have expected an Egyptologist to even care about that subject, much less seek out technical papers on it."

"Or understand them," O'Neill muttered.

"Oh, I'm an unusual girl," I said with a smile. "I'll admit that I didn't understand it all at first, but I've gotten better." I made a point of looking directly into her eyes — I'd thought her cute when I first saw her, but now that I knew who she was and how smart she was, she was becoming far more interesting.

"Look, do you understand the squiggles or not?" O'Neill demanded, causing Carter to jerk slightly and pull away from my gaze.

I frowned as I looked back at the colonel, annoyed at having been interrupted. "Maybe, maybe not," I responded. "Why do you want to know?"

"That's class—" O'Neill tried to say, but I interrupted him.

"Classified — yeah, yeah, so I heard. You're not giving me much reason to cooperate here. For years I was derided by pretty much the entire field of professional archaeology, made out to be a laughingstock, and was even physically removed from more than one conference. Now you want me to talk about the same research that caused all of that? And for what?" I tossed the photos back onto the coffee table in front of Jackson and O'Neill and crossed my arms. "If you want me to open up about something that has the potential to cause me a lot of grief, you're going to have to give me a good reason."

"You know, Jack, she's got a point," Jackson tried to say.

"Bah, she doesn't have anything," O'Neill declared, practically radiating hostility as he stood. "Let's go, we have real work to do." I couldn't help but be a little disappointed as Jackson and Carter stood to follow; as much as I disliked O'Neill, I would have liked a chance to talk more to the others. Especially Carter.

O'Neill and Jackson were closest to the front door and reached it first as I hastily scribbled on a piece of paper. "Thanks for the tea, ma'am," O'Neill called back without looking at me, his tone of voice making it clear that the courtesy was strictly perfunctory.

"It was a real pleasure to meet you," I said to Carter, holding out my hand. She took it automatically, and I grabbed hers with both of mine, pressing the slip of paper into her palm. "That's my phone number," I whispered.

"We already have your number and address," she replied with a frown.

"I'm sure the government does," I said, smiling. "But this is for you. Call me sometime. We can, you know, talk." Her eyes widened slightly as I squeezed her hand then quickly let go. She went out the door, seemingly moving on autopilot.

"Did she have anything more to say?" I heard O'Neill ask her as I closed my door.

"No, sir, just thanking me," was Carter's response, and I smiled more broadly as a tiny bubble of hope formed in my chest.

Sadly, the bubble would have to wait quite a while before having the chance to grow.

"So, what do you think?" the holographic image of Merlin asked, only appearing from my concealed wrist device after I was back in the living room and had collapsed onto the sofa. I couldn't believe that I had actually given her my number. Me! I'd never been that forward before — not that I'd ever had much opportunity for such behavior, but still. I never seek contact with anyone. I had no idea where that had come from, and I was practically shaking, probably from some combination of nervousness and adrenaline. What if she didn't call? What if she did call?

"Andromeda!"

"What?" I asked, jumping slightly.

"If you're done mooning over that young woman, we need to talk about what just happened."

"I'm not mooning!" I protested. "I just... I'm just surprised at myself."

"So was I, quite frankly. And stop pouting — it doesn't suit you." Merlin said. I glared at him. "That's better," he continued with a satisfied nod. "For the last five years you've hardly talked to anyone besides me, and according to you, you didn't have much more of a social life before you found me at Glastonbury. At least, not since Hogwarts."

"No, I've never been as smooth or confident as I wanted to be in my head," I admitted. "And even in Hogwarts, I didn't have a very large circle of friends. Then, after what happened to them... well, you know how I am these days."

"So how did you manage to do what you did? And why?" he asked. "I long ago gave up trying to convince you to socialize with your fellow humans — any of them, magical or non-magical. What made you suddenly change your mind today?"

I shrugged. "I... I didn't stop to think about it. They were leaving, I suddenly felt bad about losing their company — especially hers — and so... I just acted. She's... interesting. And cute. I'd like to get to know her better. I know it's a huge risk, but... there's just something about her." I gently put my hand on my stomach, frowning at the odd, fluttering sensation I'd long thought I'd never have to deal with again.

"Perhaps you should eschew over-thinking such things in the future as well," Merlin suggested, and I nodded. It was probably good advice, but I wasn't sure how well I'd be able to follow it. Gryffindors were supposed to be courageous, but I had enough trouble approaching someone just for casual conversation, let alone with the hope of something more. There was a good reason why I hadn't had a date since the Yule Ball, and even then, Neville and I had only gone together as friends.

But that was another place I couldn't afford to let my mind go.

"Now," Merlin continued, forcing me to concentrate on the present again, "What are your thoughts about what they said?"

"They've found something," I answered after a moment of consideration.

"Obviously, but what?"

I poured myself another cup of tea while I pondered exactly that. "Something important," I mused. "They don't send out full colonels for trivial issues. And there's only one thing that would bring together an expert on wormholes, a high-ranking military officer, and a Egyptologist who was discredited because of his theory that aliens visited Earth in the ancient past."

"Something related to the Astria Porta," Merlin said, and I nodded in agreement. "Maybe you shouldn't have been so quick to send them away? It's unlikely that you'll ever come up with working addresses to type into the control stand on your own, but they may have resources that would help. Who knows, they might even have addresses that they got from an archaeological site you never visited, but don't know what to do with them. Maybe they're hoping that the script translates into information about the addresses?"

"They'd be awfully disappointed if they knew the truth," I replied. "Whoever or whatever used that parselscript may have been intelligent enough to figure out how to use your Astria Porta and look really impressive to the local humans, but they never seemed to have anything very interesting to write down — just self-aggrandizing twaddle and threats against this or that rival."

"True, but that doesn't mean it wouldn't be worthwhile to compare notes," Merlin insisted. "Who knows what you might be able to learn from them?"

"I'm not sure that I'd be willing to risk having to hand over control of the Astria Porta to the U.S. government — I need it too badly," I pointed out. "I didn't get any sense that they were in a mood to share. They wanted to know what I could give them, and that was all. If they do have addresses... well, at least I have the Astria Porta. If they had both, that would undermine all of my plans." I shuddered. "It would mean that all I've been through would be for nothing.

"Do you think they'll come back?" Merlin asked. "Or maybe one of them in particular?"

I smiled at him. "One in particular would be nice, I'll admit, but what they wanted was important enough to come here once, so they may try again. If they do, I'll gauge how desperate they are. Maybe I'll dangle something interesting in front of them to see what they'll give up."

"I'm curious — what did the script that they showed you say?"

"Something about Ra's final revenge against some rival named Tau'ri, whoever that is. Nothing important."

Five Months Later...

"Andromeda, wake up!"

"What? What?" I cried, shooting upright in my bed and blinking hard at Merlin's holographic image. "Why are you waking me up like this?"

"The Astria Porta has been activated!" Merlin said. "We need to get there, quickly."

I shook my head and tried to wipe the sleep from my eyes. Antarctica was a long way to apparate, and I'd surely splinch myself if I wasn't fully awake and focused. "It was found? It couldn't have been found, my wards are too good! And besides, I'd get the warning if anyone attacked or breached my wards, not you."

"No, it was activated from the outside," Merlin explained. "Something has come through."

"That can't be good," I said as I got out of bed and started getting dressed. After a moment's hesitation, I decided to dress for a fight, just in case. That facility was even more important than the storage under Stonehenge. It housed the Astria Porta, a control chair, drones, and an important computer core, not to mention copies of all my research on how to make the Astria Porta useable. "How do you even know this?" I asked as I pulled out the basilisk-hide pants and shirt.

"There was already a subroutine in the computer there for remote notification of important events," Merlin said. "I simply added activation of the Astria Porta as one such event, then routed the notification to me."

"Good thing, too," I responded, "otherwise who knows what mischief our visitors might do."

"I still have my uses," Merlin said a bit defensively. "You haven't learned all the information that I have access to, and there's no substitute for experience."

"Yeah, I know, you're amazingly clever for a hologram," I said, wondering again at how the Alterans had managed to develop such an incredibly advanced AI, then squeeze it down into a compact wrist device. "Let's go see who's trespassing on our property." I twisted slightly and with a pop, I was gone.

For safety's sake I apparated into a storage room rather than any of the main rooms. I cracked the door slightly, and when I didn't hear anything after a long moment, I carefully opened it the rest of the way, my wand in constant motion as I searched for threats. A quick Homenum Revelio revealed that there were only two people nearby, both in the portal room and stationary.

I disillusioned myself and headed there, only to be stopped short when I saw the two very familiar, very unconscious figures on the ground. I cancelled the disillusionment as I slowly walked up to the one with short, blonde hair. "Well, well, well. I did hope that you'd visit me again, Captain Carter, but not like this." I then turned to the other and said, "You, though, I could have done without."

A few waves of my wand told me that she was uninjured, but that Colonel O'Neill had several broken bones, including a couple of broken ribs that had probably punctured something and were causing internal bleeding. "Shite," I muttered. "Now I'm going to have to be responsible for saving your sorry ass, aren't I?"

I transfigured some of the ice into two beds and began healing O'Neill. Healing wasn't a specialty of mine, not by any means, but I had been forced to learn the basics after I left Hogwarts and no longer had Madam Pomfrey around to take care of the injuries which I seemed to get distressingly often.

Unfortunately, I'd forgotten that my two unexpected visitors were in the military when I turned my back on Carter in order to work on O'Neill. I was most of the way done when I heard an ominous clicking behind me and Carter's voice saying, "Stop what you're doing and let me see your hands. What have you done to the Colonel?"

I did stop and lift my hands, making sure to keep my wand concealed despite being in the middle of a spell. I couldn't help but smile, though.

"You never call, you never write," I said, trying to sound casual. I had no particular reason to think that she would have taken me up on my offer, but that hadn't stopped me from hoping. "What's a girl gotta do to get your attention, anyway?"

"Who...?" Carter asked softly, and I pulled back the hood of my cloak as I turned my head so I could see her. "Andromeda Potter?" she asked in surprise. "Where?" How?" She lowered her rifle, though only slightly.

"How is not something I know. The where is a place of mine. One of them, at any rate." Carter looked around in wonder after I said this, giving me a chance to cast a few more healing spells on the colonel's chest without her noticing. Fortunately I'd already taken care of his leg, which just left the damage around his rib cage.

"What are you doing with the Colonel?" she asked again, still sounding suspicious.

"He was injured when you two came through, and I'm trying to fix him up."

"How bad is it?" she asked, her tone shifting to concern as she moved forward on her bed.

"Not great, but he'll be alright, especially after a few days rest," I assured her.

Carter started to get up and stumbled slightly. I spun around to steady her and said, "Careful, you took quite a fall when you came out of the Astria Porta."

"The..." she started to say, then answered her own question. "Oh, you mean the Stargate. Right, we were under attack when we came through."

"Oh?" I asked, trying not to sound too eager for information, despite the fact that I was practically quivering with anticipation. Clearly they knew far more than I could have imagined... and far more than I would have liked. I was particularly concerned about the fact that they had their own portal and were using it — I had been under the impression that you could only have one on a planet. And why was I only finding out about it now? Why was this the first time anyone had come through mine? Would I even be able to use mine if theirs was active?

Oh, what I would have given to be able to do wandless Legilimency! I couldn't, though, because I'd focused on developing other skills that I'd thought were more important, which meant that I was going to have to get information out of her the old fashioned way.

"I never would have thought that the Air Force had an Astria Porta," I said as casually as I could.

"Yeah," she said as she put a hand to her head. "Since the forties, actually, though we've only gotten it working in the past couple of years, and only started regularly going off world in the last year or so." She frowned. "But how did you get here, and where—"

"You said you were under attack?" I interrupted.

"That's right!" She replied, her eyes widening in obvious worry. "There were two others with us. Daniel and Teal'c. Did you see them?"

"Daniel Jackson?" I said with a frown. "I haven't seen him since you three visited me a few months ago. And I don't know a Teal'c."

"Big guy, bald with a golden symbol on his forehead," Carter said. "You'd know him if you saw him." She then turned to look at the Astria Porta. "I suppose it's possible that they made it through to Earth."

"Earth?" I asked, confused. Where did she think she was?

"Yeah," Carter said absently as she examined the ring. "There were a lot of energy blasts hitting the Stargate before we went through. I wonder if it overloaded, and if that could have caused the wormhole to jump to a different gate, depositing us here on this planet while the rest of the team, which went through first, actually made it to Earth. Do you mind if I look at your DHD?"

"My... what?" I asked, feeling more off-balance than I had in a long, long time.

"Your gate controller," she said, gesturing to the control pedestal. "We call it the Dial Home Device. DHD."

"Oh, sure," I said, half smiling. "Knock yourself out. I'll go finish with your colonel."

"Will he be able to travel?"

"He'll be fine, don't worry," I assured her.

I let her fuss with the control stand while I turned my back and cast the final healing spells on O'Neill, then cast a light Sleeping Charm just to make sure he stayed unconscious. Carter was chatty, and while I was obviously missing a lot of context here, I was sure that I'd get more out of her so long as her commanding officer wasn't awake to bark out "That's classified!" every five seconds.

I was also pleased to finally have a chance to talk to her again, despite the unfortunate circumstances. And if I wasn't mistaken, she seemed interested as well, at least judging by the fact that she kept sneaking glances at at me.

Unless, of course, she was still suspicious about what I was doing with O'Neill.

"Well?" I asked once I'd finished with the crabby colonel and returned to the cute captain.

"Everything is in order," she said as she closed the access panel in the back. "Whatever caused us to come here doesn't seem to have damaged the DHD, which is good. I should be able to dial Earth."

That would be a bad idea, not that I could tell her why — I was pretty sure that I would be better off if she kept thinking she wasn't on Earth.

"I think I'd feel more comfortable if you went to another planet first," I said. "I, uh, like my privacy."

"Oh," Carter responded, then she narrowed her eyes. "And how is it that you got here, anyway? You haven't used the Stargate, that's for sure. Do you have a starship of some sort? Are you even from Earth? You look human, but are you? Human, I mean?"

Although I knew I wouldn't be able to distract her this time, I couldn't help but give her a wan smile, remembering another incredibly smart girl who loved to ask all sorts of questions. "Yes, I'm from Earth, but no, I don't intend to tell you how I got here. It's a little rude for guests to interrogate a host like that, don't you think?"

"Oh, sorry," Carter responded, taken a little aback. "It's just, well, we've never encountered anyone else who's traveled off-world like us. The only humans we've found are the slaves and descendants of slaves taken from Earth by the Goa'uld."

I frowned, disturbed at such news. Clearly, there was far more going on in the galaxy than Merlin had been able to tell me, and a lot of it was bad. Yet I didn't dare reveal just how ignorant I was. "That's understandable, I suppose," I said after a moment. "I don't mind being asked questions, but there are some that I won't answer."

She nodded in understanding, then looked over at O'Neill. "How's the Colonel?"

"I've done all I can for him, but he should see a medical doctor soon," I said. "He'll sleep for a while, though, so he's not in any pain or discomfort." I stayed deliberately vague about how extensive his injuries had actually been — I knew that a doctor with the right equipment would probably be able to figure out what had happened, but by that point it would be too late.

"I have a feeling you know quite a lot more about what was in those photos than you let on," I heard her say, and when I turned back I found her bright, blue eyes boring into me with intense curiosity.

"You don't believe everything your colonel says, do you?"

"No, I had a feeling you knew more even then, but I had to follow orders." She was quiet for a few moments before asking, "You're not going to answer any questions about how you got here, what you're doing here, or even where here is, are you?" I shook my head, and she sighed. "Well, I should get the Colonel back to the base. Even if he's out of danger now, they're going to be looking for us."

I nodded, and she walked back to the control stand where she dialed in an address — an address which I was careful to memorize, because it was the first one I'd ever had access to. Well, the first address other than the one that Merlin thought would get me to Atlantis, but I didn't have enough power to reach there, so it hardly counted. It had been so frustrating to have the means to instantaneously travel to other planets, yet to lack something as simple as an address in order to do it. Merlin hadn't had any addresses, and all addresses had been wiped from the computers in the Antarctic installation. It was possible that some were still buried in the crystals in the control pedestal, but I had yet to learn enough about how they worked to go digging around.

Unfortunately, having a working address now wouldn't do me much good if I returned through an Astria Porta controlled by the U.S. Air Force and located on a secret military base somewhere!

"Any chance you could wake the Colonel so he can walk?" Carter asked hopefully. "I'm not looking forward to carrying him."

"Sure," I said, "but first, take this." I shoved a piece of paper into her hand. "I don't relish having the government storming my home demanding answers, so that house will be empty and my previous number will be disconnected in short order. This is an emergency number." I squeezed her hand around the paper and caught her eye. "Just you. I hope you'll use this one."

My words flustered her enough to cover a silent reviving spell I cast on O'Neill, waking him up, followed by a Confundus Charm so he wouldn't notice too much and start asking questions.

"Carter?" O'Neill mumbled as he sat up, and I pulled my hood back over my head. "Where are we?"

"Long story, sir," she replied as she put an arm around his waist to help him stand and walk. "Let's just get going, and I'll explain along the way."

She took one quick glance back at me before stepping through, and I mouthed "Call me," causing her to get flustered again and stumble as they stepped through the Astria Porta.

"I hope she doesn't cause him to break his leg again," I muttered as I prepared to return home and pack everything before the Air Force could move in. I frowned at the odd feeling that had once again appeared in my stomach. I told myself that it wasn't a fluttering, and it certainly had nothing to do with why I'd given her my number. I mean, it's not like I would have done it if I'd had such a reaction after passing by her in the grocery store or anything. No, it was solely because she was interesting. And smart.

Like Hermione had been.

Yeah, I didn't find myself very convincing, either.

Two Months Later...

"Hello?" I said when I picked up the phone.

"Andromeda, is that you?" came the reply, and it only took me a moment to recognize the voice.

"Samantha?" I asked, and I could feel those sensations bubbling up in my stomach again. "I was beginning to think that you weren't going to—"

"Andromeda, we need your help," Carter interrupted.

"Oh?" I asked, suddenly feeling very suspicious as the fluttering cut off abruptly. Apparently this wasn't the personal call that I'd hoped it would be.

"I can't explain it over the phone," Carter continued. "Can we meet?"

"Where are you?" I asked. I wasn't happy with how this conversation was going, but I also didn't want to simply reject a chance to see her, whatever the reason. Pathetic, I know.

"Colorado Springs," she said, "We can travel if necessary, but we're working against a deadline."

"Just a minute," I said as I opened my laptop and started Google Earth. "What's the deadline? And who's 'we'?"

"We don't know what our deadline is exactly, and that's part of the problem," she answered. "The 'we' is me and Daniel Jackson, if we have to travel to see you. It includes Colonel O'Neill and Teal'c if you're near and can come to us."

I zoomed in on Colorado Springs and found what looked like a hospital I could apparate to. With such a nice, big roof to focus on, I'd be pretty safe even if I was slightly off target, and from there I could easily get a taxi anywhere else.

"Pick a place," I said. "I can get there pretty quick."

"Quinn's" I heard a voice in the background say, and then Carter said, "Jack Quinn's is a pub on South Tejon Street. Can you get there?"

"I'll find it," I said. "Two hours OK?"

"That'll be fine."

"I'm putting a lot of trust in you," I said softly before I hung up. I dressed fast so I could get going — I had time, but I wanted to arrive early to see if I could spot any evidence of a trap. I also needed a little time to get my emotions in order: the high I'd experienced when I first realized that she was finally calling me had been immediately followed by a depressing low when I learned that her call had only been about business.

I had been able to go several years without thinking much about how alone I'd been. So long as I didn't think about it, I couldn't be lonely, right? But now, after two meetings with Samantha Carter, I'd stopped simply being on my own and started feeling alone. And on top of that were the fluttering feelings I was getting when we talked — feelings that I'd never expected to experience again. I didn't like any of that — not one bit. But I had no idea what to do about it.

I was already on my second coffee when the four arrived. I hadn't seen anything suspicious when I'd gotten there over an hour earlier, and once I was satisfied I came inside, checked out the bathrooms, and sat in a booth as far back as I could. I didn't know what might be coming, but I hoped I was ready for anything. Constant Vigilance! It's a motto that had applied equally well during my training as a curse-breaker as it did for aurors.

Carter said something to the others, and whatever it was it made O'Neill unhappy; then she approached me on her own. "I just want you to know," she said softly when she got to the booth, "that I didn't tell anyone it was you who helped us. I just said it was someone in a cloak."

"Why?" I asked with a frown. I thought I'd been ready for anything, but I never would have expected her to keep that bit of information to herself.

She looked uncomfortable for a moment before answering. "I guess I wanted you to know that you could trust us. Or trust me, at least. You clearly didn't have a lot of trust when we first approached you, and I could tell from the phone call that you're still suspicious. But I also got the sense that you wanted to be able to trust me. And, well, that was the only way I could think of to try to earn that trust."

"That must have been a huge risk, withholding such information," I pointed out.

She nodded. "I checked a couple of days later, though, and you were indeed gone from your house. So them knowing probably wouldn't have helped, would it?"

"No, it wouldn't have," I agreed. "I doubt that your superiors would accept that argument, but I can see that you didn't think you were depriving them of anything genuinely useful. Thank you. That means a lot to me. I don't trust others very easily." Carter smiled and I felt my heart skip a beat. I took a deep breath, desperately trying to shove aside my emotions. "OK, why don't you sit down and tell me why you would need my help and why the situation is so desperate."

Carter waved the other three over, and once they were all sitting, they told me an incredible tale that I wouldn't have found believable even as a plot for a bad summer action movie. I'd have laughed at them if it weren't for two facts: one, I already knew that at least some of it was plausible, and two, there was no way that any of them would have participated in such a complex prank on me.

"Let me get this straight," I said slowly, "The four of you travel around the galaxy through these devices you call Stargates. You're looking for advanced technology to serve commercial and military interests, but in the process keep stirring up hornets nests. You," I pointed to Jackson, "somehow travelled to an alternate reality where one of the head hornets was in the process of conquering Earth. You're worried that the same will soon happen here and want to prevent it, but the people in charge are shutting your program down because it costs too much, preventing you from doing what you believe needs to be done to save all of humanity from enslavement and/or extermination."

"Yep, that's about the size of it," O'Neill said. "Sounds too crazy to be true, doesn't it?"

"Oh, I've met crazy before," I answered absently as I continued to process it all. "But why me? I've already guessed that the first time you visited was about something connected to your Stargate." Jackson and O'Neill nodded. "But I can't imagine that that's the reason you needed to see me now."

"The first time was because we wanted to see if you could tell us anything new and useful," O'Neill said. "If you could, we were going to consider inviting you to join the program."

"Oh?" I responded, raising one eyebrow. That was actually more surprising than their story had been.

O'Neill nodded. "Daniel here is the only real expert we have on ancient Egypt and the languages we encounter. A second expert could be helpful."

"Huh." Apparently, I'd screwed that up pretty good — had I just played ball, I might have been a lot farther ahead in my efforts to reach Atlantis.

"But now we need a different sort of help," Jackson said. "When I was in the other reality, I saw different versions of all of us. Well, most of us — I apparently never joined the program, but you had."

"Me?"

"It's possible that they originally approached you instead of me, or maybe you were more forthcoming when Jack and Sam visited you a few months ago," Jackson continued. "Regardless, you were there with... well, you were with Sam. Working with Sam. Yeah, um, let's go with that. You two were together, working on ways to stop the attack. And you, uh, you were doing things..."

"With Sam?" I asked. Sam cleared her throat awkwardly.

"Daniel's exact words were 'freaky things,' I believe," O'Neill offered helpfully.

"With Sam?" I repeated, suppressing a smirk, while Sam hid her reaction by hastily taking a drink.

"No, uh, with your hands," Jackson replied, causing Sam to choke on the drink.

"Are you feeling unwell, Captain Carter?" Teal'c asked, finally entering the conversation.

"No, I'm fine," she gasped, lunging for a napkin.

"Define freaky," I said, now seeing where this was going. As much as I found Sam's reaction to be amusing, it didn't sound like we had much time to waste.

"It's... hard to say," Jackson admitted. "I didn't understand what you and Sam had been working on, but once the Jaffa entered the base, you left her to continue on her own while you helped the defenders. It looked like you'd just wave your hand and send large numbers of them flying away. I assumed at first that you two had figured out how to use some sort of alien device, but I never actually saw you using or wearing one."

"Whatever it was you were doing," O'Neill interrupted, "Jackson said it looked important — both the scientific work with Carter and whatever you were able to do to help defend the base. Freaky or not, if we're going to stop the Earth from being invaded and humanity from being enslaved, I figured we could use both skillsets."

"And we are very short on allies at the moment," Teal'c added.

"I suspect you know a lot more than we realized," Sam said softly, and I looked at her, focusing on her blue eyes. "Even though we have more experience fighting the Goa'uld, we could use your help."

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath as I considered what they had told me and what they were asking. I was reluctant to get involved in efforts to save the world. Again. On the other hand, I did still live here and would be in a lot of trouble if the world were enslaved by—

My eyes flew open. "Wait, what was that about snake parasites?"

"That is what the Goa'uld truly are," Teal'c answered. "They present themselves as gods, but they are little more than parasites which use others as hosts."

"But snakes, right?" I asked, starting to understand where the parselscript might have come from.

"Indeed," Teal'c answered. Now I knew who it was that started using the Astria Porta after the Alterans left. Unfortunately, instead of using the portals for trade and exploration, the snakes had been using them for conquest and slavery. As a descendant of the Alterans, I felt a bit of responsibility to stop the misuse of my ancestors' creations.

It was starting to look like finding and retrieving the city of Atlantis was even more necessary than I'd ever realized.

"Why is that so important?" O'Neill asked.

"Ask me again once we save the world," I answered.

"So you're in?" O'Neill clarified, his suspicious look brightening just a bit.

"Sure, why not?" I replied with a bravado I didn't quite feel. "I don't have any other plans for the next couple of days."

"Excellent! Just what I like to hear," O'Neill said as he finished his soda and stood up. "I'll admit that I'm not too keen on taking a civilian along like this, but Daniel and Sam are convinced that you can help, and I trust their judgment, so I'm willing to take the chance."

I nodded as I stood and we exited the pub. "I won't let you down," I assured him. It had been a long time since I'd been in any sort of combat situation, but I was pretty sure that I'd be able to handle myself — especially since I had quite a few tricks up my sleeves which neither the Air Force nor the Goa'uld had likely ever seen before.

Literally up my sleeves — my wand under my right sleeve and the wrist device containing the Merlin AI under my left.

Granted, it would mean breaking the Statute of Secrecy, but... did it even apply off-world? I didn't think so, and since the only way I'd ever be charged with anything was if the American government first revealed the existence of the Stargate to one or more magical governments, I was pretty sure I'd be safe. The only question was exactly how much I could afford to reveal and how much I wanted to keep to myself.

"It shouldn't be too hard to get you into the base, but getting you outfitted in gear might prove more difficult," O'Neill said once we were getting into his truck.

"Gear?" I asked.

"A uniform, so you'll blend in," O'Neill answered. "A weapon... wait, do you even know how to fire a gun?"

"Never needed to," I answered with a shrug, "so don't worry about it."

I could hear O'Neill sigh and mutter, "Maybe this isn't such a good idea after all," as he started the engine.

I wasn't paying much attention, though, because Teal'c, being as big as he was, took the front passenger seat, leaving the rest of us in the back. I was lucky enough to be in the middle, which meant that I was squished tight up against Sam, who had an indecipherable expression on her face.

I wasn't sure where exactly my decision to join this bunch was going to take me, but I supposed that I'd try to enjoy the ride while I could. I still needed to find Atlantis, of course — that mission was far too important to compromise on — but until then it wouldn't hurt to spend some time with human beings again.

And that damned fluttering was definitely back.