Sunday, May 9
Reality A001
Danny was dead. Daniel was dead. Jack was in the care of two shrinks because he was basically catatonic now. Samantha had been told to go home, but she hadn't. She couldn't. Instead, she'd gone to Makepeace's office and demanded a task. Literally.
So now, because she was one of the few with full clearance as well as the technical knowledge to understand the details, she was going through Hammond's secret files on all the various realities they'd scouted. They'd had two teams doing the surveys, and all of the members were currently under close confinement with Berman, Coburn and a few others whose connections to Hammond were of a suspicious nature.
Each numbered file contained the report of the survey officers, a cost-benefit analysis, and notes on the controller settings used to reach it. She'd had no idea just how many realities had been scouted and rated for their 'Daniel accessibility.' It was mind-boggling.
The earliest files were less well organized because they were created by Jack when he was on his first downward slide, just after he'd killed Danny. They weren't numbered, and there was less detail. On the one that had later been designated A008, the whole cost-benefit analysis consisted of one word. "Bupkis."
But they'd now taken Daniels from six realities, A016, B941, D463, G298, H382 and L583, the last Daniel, the one Hammond had killed. She had trouble thinking about him without tears coming into her eyes. There was nothing they could have done. As fast as the colonel was, he hadn't been able to stop Hammond from pressing that button.
Resolutely, she went back to the file drawer and stared down at the files in astonishment. Their surveys had reached reality M527. On the label was the reality's numerical designation and a rating. 'X' meant no Daniel at the SGC, 0 meant that the mirror was still on P(string) in that reality. Numbers 1-9 represented the level of security on the Daniel and the SGC. All the ones they'd abducted, apart from the first one, had come from realities designated as 1. Chillingly, there was another 1 in the 'M' section where some Daniel was working innocently away, unaware that he would have been their next target.
Most of the realities fell into the 2 or 3 categories. She wondered how soon would Hammond have started on those.
"Lieutenant?" Samantha rose and turned to great Lt. Colonel Maybourne. He acknowledged her salute absent-mindedly and came across to her. "Sit, sit," he said. "There's hardly any need to stand on ceremony."
She sat down. "Can I help you, sir?" she asked.
"How close are you to being able to start sending Daniels home?" he asked.
"I could do it today if I had access to a mirror," she said.
He raised an eyebrow. "Let me know when you're ready and we can start getting the Daniels sorted out."
"You do realize that the people we go to visit aren't going to be too happy to see us, don't you?" she asked.
"I do," he said. "But we have to get them sorted. It's our responsibility, so let me know when –"
She picked up the relevant files and stood up. "Fatigues, undress blues or dress blues?"
It had been months since she'd done anything with the controller or the mirror. After a fairly rocky start, the first three realities proved to be almost too easy, apart from the guns pointing at them and other minor inconveniences, like pantyhose. Dress blues were more earnest and considerably less threatening, but they weren't the most comfortable clothes to wear.
They skipped the first one from which Jack had stolen a Daniel, A016, because Samantha didn't want to go there without either a Daniel to return or news of their Daniel at the very least. Instead, they started with the second one, B941, but when they got there, they found that the folks there had managed to return the Daniel that didn't belong to them after about two months. Within several weeks, their own Daniel had been returned from D463. Unfortunately, that reality had waited closer to three months for their Daniel's homecoming, but he was, nevertheless, home. They had nothing to do in those realities but extricate themselves with grace after telling the people that the threat from them was gone.
With three realities under their belts, and her stomach roiling with guilt given the reactions they'd received from the people who'd been so badly wronged, Samantha turned on the mirror and tried to set the controller for G298. As soon as she hit that spot, the mirror turned itself off. Blinking with surprise, she turned the mirror on again. The controller had reverted to the previous setting as soon as the power had gone. She tried to set it for G298 again.
"What does it mean?" Maybourne asked after her third failed attempt.
"I don't know for certain," Samantha said, feeling very out of her depth. This had never happened before, so far as she knew.
She flipped open the file for G298 and started looking at it more closely. She'd done no more than scan the contents of the files because she had trouble reading the details. More often than not, after the first few, the mission log portion of the file was written by Kowalski. He was still offworld. Makepeace hadn't decided what to do about the teams that were still out there. She hoped he wasn't committing terrible atrocities.
Focusing her thoughts on the file, she started reading. Near the end of the log, she saw something that made her heart stop. The word 'bomb' in the typed text of Kowalski's report.
I placed the bomb on the mirror in G298 and set it for fifty seconds as per orders. When I came through the mirror, though, I couldn't get it to disengage. O'Neill had already taken the prisoner away, so I was alone, and nothing I attempted was successful. I sent for Lt. Carter, but she wasn't on base.
After fifty seconds, the bomb went off, sending shrapnel through the mirror. I dropped to the floor, and when I rose again, the mirror was no longer on. I reactivated the mirror and attempted to set it for G298, but it lost power every time I reached that setting. Going past it took some effort, so I would advise against any more attempts to destroy the potential means of pursuit.
She stared at the words that Hammond had written in black ink beneath the last paragraph of the report. First attempt produced mixed results. No further trials will be made.
"What is it?" Maybourne asked impatiently.
It was probably the third or fourth time he'd asked, but this time she didn't hush him. She looked up at him and said, "We have a problem." Looking down at the pages. "I didn't read this as closely as I should have, I guess. It never occurred to me . . ."
"What?"
"They destroyed the mirror in that reality," she said.
Maybourne goggled at her briefly, then shook his head. "That doesn't make sense."
"What do you mean? It was destroyed. Kowalski set a bomb, and then he had the same results every time he tried to activate the mirror that we've been having. The thing is destroyed."
He pursed his lips. "Unless Kowalski did that weeks after the abduction, by which time we would have had a different Daniel, it's just not possible."
"It wasn't weeks later," she said. "It was clearly the same day." She stared unseeing at the mirror, remembering the odd looks they'd gotten as the people in D463 had told them about their Daniel's return, and the images that the video tape had captured while she and Jack had been occupied with the death of Hammond. She hadn't seen it then, but she'd seen it now. They hadn't left the room to seek out the mirror, which hadn't been on base at that time in any case. Captain Carter had reached to something on her shoulder that appeared to be attached to a backpack, and a field of energy had taken them away. "The SG-1 who tried to rescue Daniel didn't use a mirror." Maybourne nodded, eyes narrowing. "We thought it was because they had found another method of reality hopping and preferred the stealth. Maybe it's much simpler than that."
Maybourne's eyes widened. After a moment, he nodded slowly. "Maybe they don't have a mirror," he said.
She nodded, closing her eyes. "But that would mean that . . . not only do they not know they've got the wrong Daniel, but we can't return their Daniel to them when we find him."
"Because we can't contact them without a mirror."
"Exactly." She dropped her chin to her chest. Every time she thought things were getting better, the mountain of wretchedness just got higher. Those people would bury Daniel and never go out looking for their own. Why would they bother with the man apparently dead?
"So what do we do?" Maybourne asked.
Samantha shook her head. "This isn't our decision."
"Makepeace, right," he said.
She stared at him. "No, that's not what I meant! This is their decision. The Daniels. They've had enough decisions made for them at this point, don't you think?"
Maybourne pursed his lips dubiously. "I see what your point, but I still think we ought to bring this to Makepeace first. He is the acting base commander."
"Of course, sir," she replied. It was nearly six in the afternoon. She had a feeling that spelled the end of visits for today. What were they going to do about the Daniel they couldn't send home?
Reality L583
Jack put the fish food into the tank and sat down across from it, just watching the fish swim back and forth. It would have to go home with him, he supposed, when the apartment was packed up. He had enough space for an aquarium, and keeping his pets alive would be a more fitting memorial to Daniel than sending a wreath of flowers through the gate.
The phone rang, but Jack didn't move. He just sat still, staring at the fish. When the machine picked up, Daniel's voice rose tinnily from it. Jack buried his face in his hands as Daniel told his caller to leave a message and he'd get back to them as soon as possible. The beep sounded, signaling the end of Daniel's recording, and it lasted awhile, indicating that there were quite a number of messages. Jack wondered who they were from.
After the beep stopped, Jack heard Carter's voice. "Sir? Sir, are you there?" She paused and Jack considered the logistics of getting up. "Colonel, if you are there, or if you get this message, we need you to call the garage. We . . . we're worried about you." There was a sigh followed by a click.
After a moment, Jack popped his mobile off his hip and turned it on for the first time in days. It beeped, telling him that he'd received at least one message since he last checked. He pressed the button that shut it up and dialed the base switchboard.
Carter picked up her lab phone on the first ring. "Hello?"
"What's up?" he asked.
"Sir!" she exclaimed. Her voice went quiet for a moment, and he could tell she was talking to someone else. "It's the colonel," she said, and Jack grimaced, closing his eyes and thumping his head into the back of the chair. Her voice came back full strength, then, as she said, "Are you all right?"
"I've been better," he said. "Why all the concern?"
"You vanished from the base on Friday and no one's been able to locate you since."
He shrugged. "I turned off my phone and went for a walk."
"For two days?!"
"Technically, it's only a day and a half."
"If you want to get technical, sir, it's more than a day and three-quarters."
"How do you figure?" he asked irritably, knowing he shouldn't be arguing numbers with an astrophysicist.
"7:45 p.m. Friday to 3:15 p.m. on Sunday, sir. Do you want me to do the math?"
He ignored the remark and got back to essentials. "I'm fine, Carter. Who's there with you?"
"Teal'c and General Hammond."
He nodded and sat forward. "Let me talk to the general, would you?"
"Sure," she said, handing the phone off.
"Colonel, are you all right?"
"I'm fine, sir," Jack said. He took a deep breath. "I thought it only fair to warn you. My letter of resignation will be on your desk first thing Monday morning."
"Jack!" Hammond exclaimed, but Jack didn't give him time to say anything more.
"I'll see you in the morning, sir," he said and flipped the phone closed.
Reality G298
Daniel had managed to filch some scrubs from the main room of the infirmary while no one was looking. He pulled them on. Yes, he still felt a little light-headed, yes, his legs still felt a bit rubbery, but he was damned if he was going to give up the argument because Janet had banned the people he was arguing with from the infirmary.
He waited until there was no one in that room again, then walked out into the halls. No one called after him or said anything, and Daniel reveled in the feeling of walking through the halls without restraint. He got funny looks from the few people who were on base on a Sunday evening, but no one tried to stop him. He headed straight for the room that was Hammond's office in his own reality.
The secretary stared at him open-mouthed and made no move either to alert the general to his presence or to stop Daniel from going in. He opened the door and walked inside to find the general sitting at his desk with a mound of paperwork in front of him.
Hammond looked up and his eyes widened. "What on earth are you doing here?"
Daniel flinched from the angry tone, but he walked in and shut the door. "I see your office is in the same place," he said.
"How did you get out of the infirmary?"
Daniel shrugged. "I walked out," he said. "They were kind of busy, I guess. I hope nothing's wrong."
"Something of a flu epidemic," Hammond said. "Nothing serious. But why did you come here?" The phone rang and Hammond picked it up. "Hammond." His expression grew sour. "Yes, doctor, I know. Your information is a little late . . . Yes, he's in front of me now . . . thank you, doctor."
Daniel flushed, knowing that Janet was probably a little annoyed with him right now. "I need to speak with you, sir, and it can't wait."
"Very well," Hammond said. "Have a seat."
Daniel sat down. "I need to go back," he said without preamble. "They're going to grab another Daniel."
"No, Dr. Jackson," Hammond said. "You're not going back."
"You don't understand," Daniel exclaimed. "If they grab another Daniel who doesn't match with their expectations, horrible things could happen to him. I match with what they want, and –"
"Dr. Jackson, if there was a serial killer who was torturing someone and we got them back, I would not send them back to be tortured so that the killer wouldn't select a new victim. Would you?"
Daniel bit his lip. "I would go back myself," he said.
Hammond stared at him in silence, then spoke, his voice firmer than before. "Yes, I believe you would. I'm not sending you back."
"Jack was getting better, and it was partly my influence. Besides, my people know where I am there, they're working on getting me home."
"We will get you home, Dr. Jackson. Captain Carter is already working on it. It may take some time, but we will –"
"How much time?" Daniel asked.
"A few weeks, perhaps."
"Weeks!?"
"It took awhile for her to work out how to send the other Daniel back to his home, but he is now safely home and well. I promise you, we will get you home before we go looking for our own Daniel."
"See, if I go back, you can start looking for your –"
"Absolutely not!" Hammond growled.
Daniel shrank back in his chair, eyes wide with shock at the sudden shift in the man's tone. "I'm not suggesting you abandon me to my fate. I just . . . they need me . . ." He trailed off, unable to put coherent words together.
Hammond stood up with the clear intention of coming around the desk, and despite his effort to stop himself, Daniel flinched away. "Son, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to shout at you."
Daniel shook his head to dismiss the need for the apology. He'd started trembling, and he strove to control it, not wanting to seem like there was something wrong with him. He had to convince Hammond that he was right. "Please, sir, you've –"
The door behind him opened and Jack came rushing in. "Damn it Daniel, what are you –"
The yelling and sudden approach made Daniel cringe even deeper in the chair. He pulled his knees up to his chest and buried his face in them, aware that he had to look like a nut, but he couldn't help it. How long was this going to last?
Jack put a gentle arm around his shoulders and pulled him close. "I'm sorry, Daniel, I shouldn't have yelled, but you scared me." Daniel made no response, just pulled in tighter. He felt like a fool, but he couldn't help himself. His brain seemed to have turned to so much quivering mush. Tears began to pour down his face and he couldn't stop. Jack sat on the arm of the chair and pulled him close. "It's okay, Daniel. It's okay."
Hysteria was fast taking over. He turned into Jack's embrace and let himself weep.