AN: Thank you for reading and reviewing! I'd really like to hear your opinions on this chapter, so if you enjoyed it, please take a minute and tell me:)!

Chapter VII: (In Which SG1 Learns Once More That Death Is Not Necessarily) Final

The morgue section of the SG command center was not a place people thought about or talked about. It was not something that they worried about, either. The unspoken consensus was that each and every member of the SGC worked to discover, understand and improve life all the time, and tried to escape, cheat (and occasionally recover from) death at least once a month. When they didn't…

It was in that dim, cold room with scorched walls that no one had bothered to paint that Daniel sat, alone, next to the metal table that held Vala. Staring at her face, he did not even notice that he was shaking slightly, or that the tips of his fingers were turning blue from the cold. He would not tear his gaze from her, as though looking away would mark the final onset of the cruel reality of her death.

She was covered up to the neck with a light-blue sheet, the same color as the infirmary gowns.

His mind flashed back to all the times he had woken up in the infirmary, and Vala had been right there next to him. Sure, she had most often been the reason why he'd ended up unconscious in the first place…

Daniel passed his fingers through his hair, wishing the dead weight on his chest would just crush him. He had no idea how long he had been down there with Vala, it seemed like forever. He wished it would be, and then he could just watch over her until the end of days, pretending that his world had never frozen.

Frozen. Frozen. He played the word over in his mind. That was what he had been feeling every since Carolyn Lam had called the time of death. Frozen. His mind could not process that information, his heart refused to beat to that new, cheerless rhythm of a world suddenly devoid of her. The sharp-witted swindler-turned-honest who owed him a priceless coin from P3X287, an apology for twenty-eight bruises, half a dinner date and a new pair of glasses.

He just wanted to tell her he would let the coin and the glasses and the apology pass. He still wanted main course and desert at that restaurant, though. He only wanted to make that clear.

A shiver shook his body, and Daniel realized he had been staring at her face so intently that he had forgotten to blink. Tears were forming in his eyes already. That must have been why. He had to wipe them away, or Vala might actually think they were for her, which they were definitely not. He wasn't there to cry, he just…he just wanted to say goodbye.

But Daniel found that even to someone who could speak over twenty languages and decipher virtually every written text in the galaxy, goodbye was not easily said. He couldn't think of the right words…he couldn't even think, at all! It was all useless, anyway. Late, and useless. No one would hear him. The dead didn't care much for goodbyes. And no matter what he said, he couldn't change anything. Death was final. Irreversible.

Final.

That was when Vala gasped loudly, and sat up on the metal table, looking thoroughly disoriented.

Daniel's eyes widened and he jumped back in shock, knocking the chair down.

"Daniel…?" the woman rasped, giving him a confused glance.

It took him twice as long as usual to fumble in the breast pocket of his jacket and put on his glasses. He measured her through the lenses, still a respectable distance from the slab. His throat felt suddenly dry, and once more the twenty languages failed him.

"W-what…"

He stared at the woman in front of him, taking in her pale face, her wide eyes, her lips slightly parted in shock, her…

He brusquely averted his eyes.

"Eh…sheet…"

Vala looked down on herself.

"Oh!" She pulled the sheet to her chest, clutching at it tightly. Her hazy mind was trying to put the pieces together. "Uhm…oh…I didn't mean that…I mean, of course I remember, Daniel, it was…"

She looked around the desolate morgue room.

"Did we do it…here?"

He was still staring agape, still speechless.

"I would've chosen something less gloomy…and…" Vala suddenly sighed tiredly and shivered, "warmer…"

Seeing her clutch the sheet even tighter helped Daniel snap out of it.

"Of course!" He clumsily took off his jacket and wrapped it around her shoulders. The contact sent shivers through him as well. It was real. "How…how are you…feeling?"

She managed to whisper between faintly chattering teeth.

"Bit warmer." She was still shivering slightly. "Daniel...what…" Suddenly, her respiration accelerated. "The bracelets… Daniel…"

He soothingly rubbed her shoulder blades as fragments of the previous days flooded through her confused brain.

"Shh…it's alright…you'll be fine…"

As the quivering had not completely subsided, he slowly pulled her against him and held her gently. Slowly, he felt her body relax against his.

None of them could tell how much time it had been when a familiar voice came from the door.

"Daniel, please come ou—"

Vala raised her head from his shoulder.

"Colonel Carter…?"

"Oh God." Sam breathed out. She looked at Daniel. "I don't know whether to call security or infirmary…"

As he gave her a meaningful look, she grabbed the phone on the wall.

"Infirmary! I need a medical team to the…uh…morgue…? Just get Doctor Lam in here!"

Placing the phone back, Sam smiled at Vala who was still holding Daniel.

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AN: Sooo? Liked it, hated it? Let me know! (I'm sorry for any mistakes in the text…I've had to type it with my 'shift' and 'space' keys not working! Evil keyboard, and I know I haven't spilled anything on it for at least three weeks! Okay, maybe coffee once. Or, you know, a couple of times or so.)

Just one more chapter to go to the end. So, good time as any to tell me what you thought of the story!:)

Myosotis