Sam was the first up the next morning, quite unusual, but then she had kept her former CO up for most of the night while she thought about their situation. Unfortunately, those thoughts hadn't led to any good and she'd fallen asleep without coming to any great revelations. Luckily for her, her subconscious mind had been working while she slept, and she could remember something about how they had gotten to Atlantis. Sir, you awake?

No.

Oh, that's too bad. I think I know how we got here.

You're not going to stop it, are you?

Sorry, sir.

So, how did we get here then, Carter?

I remember bright lights and somebody touching my forehead and then getting a really bad headache, and then the person said something about stimuli and how we had to go to Atlantis, and then falling out of the 'gate.

I remember the bright lights, the headache, and the falling out of the 'gate part.

Not anything about somebody being there, telling us those things?

Nope.

They met in the area that had become the commissary, silently picking up the food items they wanted and finding a table; in their heads there was the continuous string of banter that had become commonplace. They got a few looks as they ate their breakfasts, sitting and laughing occasionally even though nothing was said.

"That's really weird," Sheppard said, taking a seat next to Jack.

"Colonel Sheppard, good to see you," Jack said, taking a bite of his oatmeal. "You've got good food here."

"Thank you sir," Sheppard smiled, picking up his spoon and taking a bite of his own oatmeal. They were soon joined by the rest of the Colonel's team; McKay seemed to be deep into an explanation of something he thought of as important, boring Teyla and Ronan, though both nodded when it was appropriate.

"We don't even know what the zed-PMs are made out of, let alone how…" Sam cut him off.

"Sure we know how the ZPMs work…" She started.

"No we don't… wait, you guys do and you didn't tell us?"

"What?"

Sir, how do I know how ZPMs work? We've been working on that for months and we still haven't gotten anywhere…

Maybe that had to do with the whole light and flying out of the stargate stuff.

"Hellooo? Are you going to share?" Sheppard interrupted their thoughts.

"Sorry, I don't know where I got that from, but, I could make a ZPM if we had all of the stuff…" Sam got up, leaving her half eaten bowl of cereal behind and walking towards the science department.

You're starting to remind me of Daniel… Jack complained, grabbing her cereal and putting it and his oatmeal on a tray to be washed.

Actually I'm starting to remind me of you when you had the Ancient's knowledge downloaded into your brain.

Lets hope that's not what happened.

But there were lights…

I remember the lights, and they weren't the same lights as the one I saw when that happened.

I hope you're right.

Where did you go?

I'm in the science department.

How did you get there so fast?

I walked fast.

It's not going anywhere, you know.

Yeah, but what if I forget?

Forget what?

How to build a ZPM. He shrugged in response even though she couldn't see him.

Sheppard and his team stayed at the table, Rodney looking slightly put out while the rest just looked confused.

"Were they like this before?" Teyla asked Rodney, knowing that he had known them before the Atlantis Expedition.

"No," he shook his head. Grabbing a ration bar he followed the General to the science department.

Behind him, Sheppard just shrugged at his two remaining friends and concentrated on his oatmeal. "Why is the only thing we have to eat around here oatmeal and ration bars?" He grumbled.

…………………………..

Sam arrived in the labs slightly out of breath and her mind racing. Slow down, Carter! Jack complained, but she ignored him.

Looking around the room she was surprised to see that the Atlantis team had set up their own science equipment in one of the original science labs. She smiled and walked over to a dusty machine left over from the Ancients. "Nobody's been able to get that to activate, Colonel Carter. Rodney was at it for days before he gave up," Dr. Zolenka told her, watching her from where he was seated. His laptop was hooked up to an object that resembled a pen.

"What's going on?" Rodney asked as he and Jack entered the room. "Oh, I already tried that machine, Colonel, it doesn't respond, even if you have the gene."

Sam shook her head at him, looking at the pen Dr. Zolenka had been studying.

You think too much, Carter, why don't you just try it, see if it works?

All right, but it's your fault if anything explodes or something.

I'll keep that in mind.

Sam crossed the room, glancing at Jack as she passed him. "What…" Rodney started.

"Shut up," Jack ordered. Rodney pressed his lips together and glared at the General for a moment before turning to watch Sam. Jack couldn't help but notice the look he gave her when she passed him.

I know, sir. Sam groaned in his mind, noticing his train of thought. He smiled in response.

"Can I borrow that, just for a minute?" Sam asked Zolenka, taking the stylus from him and unhooking the electrodes that attached it to the computer.

"Uh, sure."

"Thank you," she went back over to the device in the corner and began poking different parts of the screen with it, hitting button combinations on the control panel at the same time. Before long the device flashed to life; things all over the room started coming alive, things that the scientists had been working without luck since their arrival.

"How did you…?" Rodney started, staring from Sam to Zolenka and back. To their surprise, it was Jack that started explaining the complicated inner workings of the machines that Sam was manipulating.

"What?" He asked when he noticed their looks. "I can read her mind, remember?"

"Oh."

"Rodney, what's going on in here? The control room picked up excessive energy…" she stopped, staring around the room. Sam was still at her console, adjusting things, while Rodney and Zolenka watched things react around the room.

Sir, can you check on that? Sam asked when a device across the room started beeping urgently at them.

Sure thing... He went over and started mimicking Sam's motions, adjusting things on the control panel; after a few seconds the beeping stopped.

The other people in the room stood back and watched the pair of them working. What they had assumed to be a tabletop began glowing in a definitely un-tabletop-like fashion; the center of the table rose out of the edges, the cylinder began spinning faster and faster. "General, what are you doing?" Weir asked, getting nervous as the spinning section of table glowed brighter and brighter.

"Making a ZPM…" He said distracted by a new bank of lights that began flashing.

"Whoa!" Sheppard said as he and the rest of his team walked in. "What's going on here?"

"They're making a zed-PM," Rodney said as though anybody should've been able to see that.

"They're making a ZPM?" Ronan repeated, not really believing what he heard.

"That's what I said," Rodney replied curtly.

Suddenly, all the lights shut off and the cylinder sank back into the table, becoming a flat surface once again. Ronan raised an eyebrow at the pair of them. Jack had gone to stand by Sam, who was fiddling with a drawer near where she had been standing.

"That's been stuck since we got here…" Sheppard told them, walking over to watch. Sam stood back reluctantly, giving Jack a nervous look. Jack gave the drawer a swift kick and it popped right open, revealing a ZPM.

"Wow…" Rodney cooed.

"Are you telling me that we've been able to make out own ZPMs this whole time and you didn't figure it out!" Sheppard glared at Rodney.

"Hey! Its not my fault I didn't think to try it with the stylus…"

"Yeah it is…"

"He wouldn't have been able to do it anyways, there are about a dozen different levels of security codes to go through before it will even start…" Jack told them.

"Okay, so how did Colonel Carter know them…?" It was Teyla's turn to speak.

"That's a good question…" Dr. Weir looked at the pair of them for an answer, Jack only shrugged.

"I have no idea…"

……………………………………………..

Sam and Jack spent the rest of the day wandering around Atlantis, various objects caught their attention, invoking memories that they didn't know existed. They ended up in the infirmary again that night when Dr. Weir found the pair of them unconscious in one of the more obscure tech labs.

"Easy, Colonel, you've been unconscious for nearly five hours…" Beckett tried to calm her when she woke up; on the other side of the curtain a nurse was doing the same to Jack.

Do you remember everything I remember? She asked him, laying back down on doctor's orders.

If you mean the whole Ancients thing and cheating… yeah.

We have to get back to Earth now.

I know.