Chapter 15: Over And Over Again
Everyone was gone. There was an eerie silence as Isabel walked through the halls of the SGC. The emergency lighting illuminated the dead bodies on the ground; Jaffa and human. Arrows painted on the walls in blood directed her to the General's office. His freshly mutilated carcass was sat on the chair behind his desk. Isabel picked up the blood splattered file on his desk; it was a brief for SG1 and 2. Isabel slowly turned her head to look through the window at the briefing room. Eight dead bodies were scattered across the room, one on the stairs and another reaching for the alarm. Isabel blinked and all of the bodies were lined up against the window, hands out stretched. Reaching for her, asking for her to join them. Isabel heard the engaging of a staff weapon behind her. The General's body was now replaced with Ryan's. And he was holding the staff weapon to her chest.
"You did this to me."
Isabel was sweating and panting in the small cot the Nox had offered her on the planet's surface. Nafrayu peeped his head round the thin curtain of vine that was separating Isabel from the forest around her. She just nodded at him and he walked over to her bed side.
"Why does your sleep trouble you?" Nafrayu asked her, holding a cold rag to her head. "Doesn't it help your kind?"
"It's not the sleep itself; it's the same nightmare I've been having for weeks now." Isabel reassured the boy as she sat up, taking the cloth from his hand and placing it on the floor beside her feet. "You don't need to worry about me. They'll go away soon."
Nafrayu's forehead creased in protest to what she had said. He was worrying about her, worrying about her far too much for a little boy. He placed his hand on her shoulder. "You need to rest, you might be sick."
"I'm not sick; I just need to occupy myself." Isabel pulled her over shirt on top of her vest top that she had been wearing in place of a pyjama T-shirt. Isabel also pulled on her converse and left the tent holding his hand.
"She's sick and she won't rest." Nafrayu burst to Opher, who was working on fixing the roof of the hut that had broken over the night. He dragged her over to him and he looked directly into her eyes.
"I'm not sick. They're only nightmares." Isabel shrugged.
Opher placed a hand on either side of her head. "This is no ordinary dream." He said as he closed his eyes. "This seems to be the image of the future as long as you stay on your current path."
Opher rushed inside of the hut and swiftly ran out, just as quickly, with an arm full of pots and vials. He placed them all down in front of the slowly dying fire and selected different herbs and oils as he mixed them together in the lid of an empty pot. "This will show us the path you are currently on. We only need to know what direction your life is headed in now in order to change what you saw."
Isabel's brow creased as he explained exactly what he was doing. "You don't think that this might show me the path I'll take after I've seen it. We could be changing it now, as we speak."
"Yes, that is deeply worrying." Opher threw the lid into the fire anyway and watched as the flames licked the contents. "Close your eyes and take my hands." Opher said from the other side of the fire. "We will be the only ones seeing this; you have no need to worry."
Isabel did as she was told and closed her eyed once Opher's hands had firmly gripped hers. She saw herself surrounded by so many different people. Nafrayu, Opher, Lya, Sam, Daniel, Ryan… and the Goa'uld. Slowly Nafrayu started to fade from sight, as did Opher and Lya. Slowly everyone disappeared until there was only a single person left. Ryan. Something started to form in his hand as he walked towards Isabel. A staff weapon. Slowly Isabel saw herself fade away as Ryan became less of a shadow and more real than he had before. Suddenly the flames flared up from the fire, scorching Isabel's hand and face. Opher had already released her hands and was helping her move away from the fire.
"That is deeply worrying. We saw two different futures. You saw the course you are on now and I saw the path you must continue to take." Opher made his way into Isabel's hut and emerged with the bag that Nafrayu had made for her birthday. "You must leave. Now!"
"What? I can't just pack up and run away." Isabel objected.
"You must. If you don't all will be lost. You must go now." He shoved the bag into Isabel's hand and one of her old T-shirts. "You will need to look more like your old self."
Isabel removed the Nox over shirt that she was wearing and pulled on her black T-shirt. It seemed she was wearing all black now. Nafrayu handed Isabel her gun and thigh strap, after strapping it on she gave the little boy a squeeze and gripped his hand. "It's time for me to go now." She said, still crouched on the ground. "I promise that I won't forget about you." Isabel kissed the little boy's forehead and held his hand all the way to the gate.
Isabel pulled out her radio and GDO before she punched in the Iris code. The radio crackled for a second before she heard a familiar voice over the radio. "It's safe to come through now Miss Hastings. Is anyone coming through with you?"
Isabel looked down at Nafrayu and then up into Opher's eyes. Opher gave her a small nod. Isabel clicked on the radio and answered "One of the Nox will be coming with me, he's seemed to grow attached." Nafrayu beamed up at her and skipped with her to the event hosison. Nafrayu took a deep breath before walking through. Isabel chuckled and stepped through the gate .
Sam's lips turned up a little into a smile and she saw the little boy clutching Isabel's hands. The SFs in the gate room pointed their guns at the little boy, staring solidly down their sights at him.
"Stand down." The General alerted them. Immediately, they loweed their weapons and slowly backed away from the ramp. "Welcome back to Earth Miss Hastings."
Isabel smiled up at General Landry and the company with him, SG1. They paced quickly into the room and Nafrayu relaxed when he recognised the faces looking up at him. "Thank you General." Isabel beamed. "It feels strange somehow but it still feels like home." Nafrayu was still clutching to Isabel 's hand as she walked down the ramp. "You guys should already know Nafrayu. He was one of the Nox you met a few years ago."
"Well you will need to get down to the infirmary and then come up to my office for a long overdue debriefing." The General half reminded half ordered.
After a very quick stop in the infirmary, Isabel and Nafrayu were waiting for the General to finish his phone call. They were sat on the two chairs in front of the General's desk. Nafrayu stood up and sat on Isabel's lap, he obviously was still a little affraid of the SGC. The General placed the phone onto the reciever. "So what brings you back to earth?"
"Well, I was having this recurring nightmare where the Goa'uld had killed everyone in the SGC. Opher told me that I might have been seeing the future and that I had to come back and fix it. I think something is coming and I'm not going to let it destroy everyone."
"We destroyed the last of the Goa'uld just a few months before you came through the gate." General Landry informed them. "You're a little late but you might as well stay, as long as you have finished your studies."
Nafrayu tightly wrapped his arms around Isabel's neck. "Please don't leave me."
"I have to but I promise that I'll come back for you." Isabel took her hand out of Ryan's and squeezed the boy tightly to her. "I promise I'll come back. I'd never leave you behind. Anyway, what would Opher say if he found out I'd left you behind?"
"You really promise?"
"Course I do. And I always keep my promises." Isabel kissed the boy's forehead and dropped him onto the floor. "You need to do what he General says from now OK?"
Nafrayu nodded He walked over to the General with a big smile on his face. The general took the boy's hand and led him into his office.
Isabel was directed to a locker that had her name on it. She opened it up to see a pair of shorts just like the ones she was wearing, a black vest top and several 3/4 button up shirts (black, green and sandy). Isabel also spotted some deodorant and dog tags. It seemed like she was officially part of the team. She stepped into one of the many showers and turned the heat right up. The water washed over her body, almost burning her but that was how she liked it. She could think now, she thought about everything that had happened over the past year and wondered how her life was so screwed up. But then again, nobody's life is perfect so... moving on. Isabel cleaned her hair and skin only to realise just how dirty she was when the water ran down the drain black and soapy. Isabel was in the shower for half an hour before the brown in water started to fade lighter and lighter until it was completely clear. Isabel then switched the shower from boiling hot to freezing cold, it was bad for her skin but would make her hair a lot easier to manage once it started drying. She finally turned off the water and pulled on the clothes she had selected from her locker after drying the water from her skin. After changing, Isabel looked closely at the dog tags in her hands. They said 'Miss A Hastings, SG1, 083917' She smiled to herself and slid them around her neck, tucking them under her shirt.
She left the Locker room and made her way to General Landry's office to find out where she was going to be working for the foreseeable future, and to collect Nafrayu who must have been in the General's office for an hour at least. She saw the door open and the General inside, he seemed a natural around little kids. After savouring the short moment, Isabel knocked on the door frame and waited for the General's reply. Nafrayu and the General both looked up instantly, the little boy running towards her with almost too much force that she was almost knocked to the ground. The General beckoned her in and pulled out a few files from the cabinet behind him.
"These contain the details of your assignments, you can complete them at your own pace but don't take so long that it's painful." The General gave her the files once she had sat down on one of the chairs, Nafrayu clinging to her leg. "Dr Jackson would also like for you to help him with this." General Landry puled open one of the drawers in his desk and pulled out a thick file, it looked more like a brick. "All of the details are inside. We just need to agree on what to do about the young boy that has grown so attached to you lately."
Isabel took a long look down at the boy resting his head in her lap. She knew that he would have to go home but it was almost unfair to make him leave so suddenly. She looked back up at the General questioningly, luckily the little boy was either asleep or oblivious to what was being said. "We need to send him home don't we?" Isabel had a frown on her face and looked a little sheepishly at the General. "We need to send him today." Isabel knew that it would be a little harsh on him but there was no other way that this would work seamlessly. He had to go home and Isabel had to be the one to tell him.
Isabel shook the Nafrayu awake and looked down at him lovingly. "We need to take you home now. Opher might start to worry that something went wrong. It's time to say goodbye." The little boy nodded in acknowledgement, he knew that it was time to leave too.
Just seconds after the Stargate had disconnected it whirred back into life and alerted the rest of the base to the incoming wormhole. As the gate engaged, SG2s IDC appeared on screen. Isabel had taken the place of the absent Gate tech and was waiting for orders to open the iris. On command she pressed her hand to the lock and let it open Ryan's way home. A man in uniform stepped through the gate with three people, and they weren't any of the team she knew. They seemed like survivors from some sort of attack. "Stand down, Airmen."
Isabel and the General ran into the gate room, followed shortly by SG1 and a medical team, to greet the newcomers. Isabel grew increasingly worried when the gate shut down.
"Who are these people?" The General demanded of the first man, but somehow he said it with complete kindness in his voice.
"They were the only people I could save from the prior. Sir, the Ori are out of control. They burnt the rest of my team alive and there was nothing that I could do to help them." He had acid in his voice and his eyes hardened once he mentioned his former team. "They destroyed the entire village. We need to do something, and fast, if we are going to have any hope of stopping this from happening again."
"Very well. I want you to go to the infirmary and take a week of leave for you to come to terms with what you witnessed before you our debriefing." With that, the General left the Gate room and walked back up to his office.
Sam took a step forward and placed a hand on Isabel's shoulder. She knew what that meant and it wasn't a good thing. "Why don't you come with us tonight? Jack and the rest of the team are going to O'Malley's for dinner tonight so it might do you good if you came with us. Anyway, the last time we were all in the same place was a year ago and Thor dropped a pretty big bomb shell on us."
"That sounds great." Isabel muttered. "I'm sorry I missed the wedding." She added as an afterthought. Before Sam could react she was already asking another question but to the man that had come through the gate. "Was Ryan Langer one of the men on your team?" Her breathing sped up, her heart rate reacting the same way as she waited for his answer.
"You're Isabel aren't you?" The man asks. "I'm so sorry, I couldn't save him. I couldn't save any of them." Once he finished talking he left the room, beckoning the three stranger to follow him.
"Isabel?" Sam asked but Isabel walked away, her face void of all emotion.
THIRTY YEARS LATER
Isabel was the only one who had stayed the same. The rest of them had changed so much, Sam was getting little hints of grey in her hair and her husband was starting to round off a little too much. Jack still put his arm around Sam but it took more effort visibly, especially when Sam would tell him to lose weight. The new SG1 were waiting around the pool table for Isabel to join them after spotting the two Generals, doctors and Jaffa. The new team were very young compared to the group that sat closest to the bar. They were fit and agile but the old SG1 had left those days behind them, they were either retired or only visiting.
Ryan however had gone completely, burned to death by the Ori. Isabel could never forget that. She felt like she was alone sometimes but she also felt like he was still there with her. She liked to think that her gut instinct was him telling her what he thought was right, even though it was stupid.
Life was too different to explain. Isabel had fought along side Sam, Jack, Daniel and Teal'c and now she was fighting with their kids.
"Isabel, how about a game?" Cameron shouted to her from the pool tables. Lieutenant Cameron Jackson, super soldier and super nerd just like his dad but he had traces of Janet in him too. The compassion and the resolve that Isabel had noticed in the little doctor all those years ago. He was bad at pool and always lost but he liked to see the smirk on Isabel's face when she ended a round in minutes. They had been dating for a few months now and she felt strange for doing so, sure he was older than her physically but there was a twenty seven year gap between them.
"Sure." Isabel walked over to him and accepted the cue that Grace had offered her. Major Grace O'Neill and her twin brother Jacob completed Isabel's team. Jacob was like Jack in every way possible and Grace was like Sam, even though she shared the infectious love for dessert that her father had. They were both in contest with each other when they were off-world, it used to drive Isabel and Cameron up the wall at first but now they didn't know what their team would be without it.
They were a family and that was never going to change.