AN: This was not supposed to be a series. And yet here I am. Janet's story is still my favourite, so it is staying first and remaining the title of the story…but the others need to be heard as well.
Spoilers: This was written for season six, so spoilers up to that, but particularly for the movie, Cold Lazarus and The Devil You Know.
Disclaimer: Sooooo not mine.
Rating: Kid Friendly
Summary:
The flames of sacred fire show you what you wish to see:
What was, what will, what might come true,
And what can never be.
What Was
Jack hadn't slept in about thirty-six hours when Sam came to tell him that they'd all been asked to attend the funerals. The SG teams had spent a lot of the last two days carrying the bodies of the deceased out to the Burning Field. Though it made him feel vaguely guilty, Jack was glad the Lacastrians burned their dead. Digging several hundred holes was not a very appealing prospect to be facing in the morning. Fraiser told him that this way there would be less contamination and risk of secondary infection, and Jack was grateful for that too. He certainly never wanted to do this again.
He splashed some water from his canteen on his face as soon as he and Sam were outside the house. The owners had died before SG-13 made their initial contact with the suffering planet, but the med team cleared it of contaminants before the SGC teams moved in. There were many empty houses in Laca now, entire families having been wiped out by the disease, and still more orphaned children were relocated to surviving relatives. It would be a long time before the city was restored to the thriving marketplace it had once been.
As Jack and Sam made their way towards the city wall, Jonas and Teal'c joined them. No one said anything; even Jonas' characteristic ebullience was quelled as they left the city. Before them, the Burning Field spread out, covered with the bodies of those who had died in the plague. Instinctively, Jack put his hand over his mouth and nose to block the smell, but then realized that there wasn't any. The smell should have been overpowering; some of these people had been dead for five days, and it had been sunny and warm since SG-1's arrival. He saw Sam whispering to Jonas and realized that his 2IC knew why there was no smell, that it must be some sort of technology. That was good enough for him.
SG-1 fell into line with Fraiser and the other SGC teams. Unconsciously, all the officers straightened to attention and when Janet wavered, Jonas put his hand on her shoulder. Jack watched as the Lacastrians walked among their dead, placing flowers on the shrouded bodies and then withdrew together to the safe distance. All around the field, there was music. First horns, then drums and then everywhere at once, there was fire.
Jack knew suddenly that he was not alone. Obviously, he was in a group of fellow officers, but he felt very separate from them, as though they were moving away from him to places he could not comprehend. It was another presence altogether that he felt beside him. One that was achingly familiar and painfully real. He knew, rationally, that the odds of the Lacastrian funeral dirge sounding anything like "Take Me Out To The Ball Game" were exceptionally high, yet the music was impossibly the same.
Jack looked down at the baseball glove that hadn't been on his hand two seconds ago, and then back up into the smiling face of his son.
Charlie was laughing. Jack didn't play with him very often, and Charlie was was always happy to the point of giddy when he did. Charlie had friends, of course, but he did love it when Jack came outside to play ball.
Sarah came out on to the porch to yell at her husband for leaving his gear all over the living room again. He had been gone for weeks and, though he couldn't say where, there seemed to be a lot of sand in the seams of his military issue luggage that was now threatening to spill itself all over her floor. But she saw them laughing together and said nothing because they had so few times like this, when they were just a family that played baseball while dinner was on the barbeque.
Jack caught his laughing son under the arms and swung him up and around in the sky. Soon, Charlie would be too big for this…or Jack's elbows would go the way of his knees. But these days were short-lived and Jack knew that. The setting sun bathed Charlie in a red light and for a second, Jack was so startled that he almost dropped in. He hadn't seen the ruddy glow of sunset on his son's face.
Somewhere, Sarah screamed.
And then the spell was broken and the backyard fell out of space and out of time and ended, and he saw that the field had burnt to ash before him, and his friends were all around him. Everywhere, it seemed, there was a mother, a father, a husband, a wife, a sibling, a child, all with tears on their faces and a light of wonder in their eyes. Jack could see it clearly in the faces of his team mates and knew that it lit upon him as well.
The Lacastrians made their way back into the city in silence, and the teams from Earth went back to the Stargate, also silent in their awe. Jonas dialed the address, and just before he stepped through, Jack heard a voice on the edge of familiar sing.
The flames of sacred fire show you what you wish to see:
What was, what will, what might come true,
And what can never be.
finis
GravityNotIncluded, October 22, 2006