It was another thirty minutes before Sam started to wake up. She was confused for a moment when her eyes first fluttered open and she saw the ceiling of the infirmary above her. She turned her head to see Jack sitting nearby. "J-Jack?" she barely managed to say. Her throat felt like sandpaper.

He instantly stood, still holding Abbie. "Hey."

"W-what happened?"

He'd known that she probably wouldn't remember, and had been preparing himself to tell her, but now that the moment had come, Jack found that none of that made it any easier. "You were in an accident, Sam."

She frowned slightly. "An accident?" Sam tried to cough in an attempt to make breathing and speaking easier, but that abrupt exhalation felt like a bomb going off in her chest. Jack saw her eyes go wide in pain.

"Take it easy," he told her. "Breathe slowly; just relax."

"Oh, God," she whimpered as the white hot pain started to fade. "Broken ribs?"

"Yeah, three of them. And a punctured lung."

After a few more careful breaths, she was starting to feel better. "What kind of accident?"

"You went out to the store…" And then it started to come flooding back.

"The car… Jack, where's Jake? Is he okay?"

"He's in surgery. It's…it's not that good, Sam."

"Tell me," she demanded, trying to sit up. He could see her wince, but she wasn't going to let the pain stop her.

"He's got a fractured wrist, and I think there's something with his leg, too. The big thing… they had to do surgery to relieve the pressure in his head. Janet wouldn't give me a prognosis until they were finished with that."

She forced herself to keep breathing slow and evenly. "How long has it been?"

"A few hours… I couldn't stop thinking about the fact that I might lose both of you."

Sam closed her eyes, imagining his anguish. She'd never wanted to put him through something like that again. "I'm sorry."

"No, don't be sorry… You want to hold the princess?" She nodded, so he laid Abbie down on the bed beside her. Sam gently kissed the sleeping toddler's forehead.

Janet approached them a moment later, pulling her scrubs cap off of her head. "How's Jake?" Jack instantly asked.

"He's a tough little boy. We finished surgery; unfortunately now the only thing we can do is wait to see what the results are."

"Can I see him?" Sam asked.

The doctor shook her head. "No, you need to stay in bed."

"Please, Janet!" This wasn't just about her. Her child – for that's what Jake had become – was more important than herself. Janet had also once been charged with the little boy's care and understood the instinct. It was something the women would always share between them.

"Let me go get a wheelchair," she finally said. "You're definitely not walking."

It was probably a good thing that Carolyn had gone home for the night, or else she likely would have had a fit. Sam was barely able to get up, but stubbornly did. Janet wheeled her across the infirmary to where Jake was set up in the corner. His bowl-cut brown hair had been shaved off for the surgery and it made him seem even sicklier than he already was. A suture line ran across the right side of his skull, and his face was bruised and had a few small lacerations. The tube from the ventilator ran down his throat since he still wasn't breathing on his own.

Sam carefully took his left hand in both of hers; the right one was now encased in a blue plaster cast that stopped a couple inches below his elbow. "Hey, buddy," she whispered to him. "I'm right here, okay? You're going to be all right, Jake. You…" She trailed off, and Jack saw a tear roll down her cheek. "I'm so sorry, Jake. I'm sorry."

Jack put a hand on her shoulder. "It's not your fault, Sam," he tried to tell her. It was the other driver – who was now in a morgue somewhere – that had messed up. She'd just been in the wrong place at the wrong time.

However, Sam shook his hand off, and she didn't answer.

Janet soon returned and insisted that Sam go back to bed. Guest quarters had been set up for Jack and Abbie so that they didn't have to leave the mountain. Everyone had the chance to get a few hours of sleep, but it wasn't exactly peaceful rest for Sam.

In her dreams, she was back at the crash site. She was awake and aware of the commotion around the car. A few good Samaritans who had been on the street were calling for help or trying to check on her. She wasn't hurt as badly as she'd been in reality, and wasn't trapped inside of the car. "Where's Jake?" she asked one man as he helped her get out.

He seemed confused. "Who?"

"The little boy in the car. Is he okay?"

"He's gone," he told her.

She froze. "What?"

"The woman took him."

"What woman? Where?" He pointed down the street. Jake was a few blocks away, being led away by a figure that Sam recognized as Janet. "Wait, stop!" she called as she ran after them. "Stop!"

They finally did, and turned to face her. Jake was a bloody mess, staring up at her hauntingly. "I should have known better," Janet said.

Sam shook her head. "I don't understand."

"I never should have brought them here. I never should have trusted you!"

"Janet – "

"He would have been better off dead by the Ori's hands than here with you," she added before turning around and continuing to walk away. Sam tried to follow, but her legs wouldn't cooperate. She was frozen in place.

"Janet, please! I'm sorry. I tried…" She had no idea how to finish that sentence. What did it matter what she'd tried? Jake was still fighting for his life in a hospital bed. And it was all her fault. "Please, I'm sorry!" she cried as they got farther away. "Don't take him, please!"

Sam suddenly shot awake, the pain in her chest reminding her that she had in fact been seriously injured in the accident. Terror flowed through her as she remembered her dream. She couldn't lose Jake, not now. Ignoring her pain, she got out of bed and headed across the infirmary.

When Jack arrived in the infirmary after getting Abbie some cereal for breakfast, he was surprised to find that Sam's bed was empty. A few worst-case scenarios ran through his head before he realized that he could hear voices coming from another section of the facility – voices that he recognized. He found that Sam was once again beside Jake's bed, but this time she hadn't waited for a wheelchair. And she'd been caught by Carolyn.

"You need to be back in bed and getting some rest," the facility's CMO was arguing. "You had surgery roughly 12 hours ago!"

"I'm fine," Sam protested, but she sure didn't look fine. She had a death-grip on the bed's railing in order to remain standing, was white as a sheet, and her eyes were rimmed with dark circles. It was obvious that she was exhausted and in a lot of pain and in no condition to be up and about – or having this argument.

Abbie's little bag of cereal fell to the floor as she started whimpering, her arms outstretched to Sam. "Mama," she cried. "Mama sick!"

Sam absolutely froze. "I'm okay," she started to tell the toddler, but her legs suddenly gave out and Carolyn was just barely able to catch her. Abbie was REALLY crying now. "I want to be near Jake," she quietly told the doctor. "Can I get a bed over here?"

She nodded, knowing that was probably the best way to end this standoff with her rebellious patient. Jake had been put in a quiet corner of the infirmary that was close to the OR in case it was needed again.

Abbie was still whimpering by the time that Sam got settled on a new bed. Jack sat the toddler down so that Sam could hold her. "I'm sorry, sweetheart," she whispered. "I didn't mean to scare you." She could feel how much that small amount of exertion had exhausted her and wondered how bad she really looked.

"She's not the only one you scared the crap out of," Jack softly pointed out.

Sam looked up at him. "I'm sorry. I just needed to see Jake. I needed him to know he's not alone." I needed to make sure he was still here, she silently added. Jack slowly nodded. "He looks a little better this morning, doesn't he?" she asked. "Not as pale?"

Jack turned around and glanced over at Jake. If the little boy's pallor had changed, he couldn't see it, but wasn't about to tell her that. "Yeah, maybe… You hungry?"

"Yeah…" A thought suddenly occurred to her. "Did you and Abbie have dinner last night?"

"I heated something up for her, but I kinda forgot about eating once we got here."

Sam looked to where the toddler's breakfast had been dropped on the floor. "I guess she needs something else now."

"Yeah, I'll go grab some stuff for all of us from the mess." She nodded, and looked to Abbie once he was gone. The little girl was carefully watching her, her eyes still big and wet.

"Mama okay?" In that moment, Sam wondered what – if anything – Abbie remembered from her home reality. Had this triggered some memory from seeing her real mother injured and dying? She'd never meant to hurt or scare the little girl like that. She was messing up everything!

Sam leaned down and kissed Abbie's forehead. "Yeah, sweetheart. I'm gonna be okay."

Out in the corridor, Jack took a minute to just lean against the wall and breathe. This was the last situation that he'd ever, EVER wanted to be in again, but somehow it had happened. And he couldn't let himself fall apart because Sam needed him. He'd always been afraid of ending up in some horrible mess where she despised him for his inadequacies, but now that they were right in the middle of such a disaster, he wasn't willing to let it happen. For right now, they still had Jake, and that was all he could let himself focus on. That was the only way he could keep it together.

Jack took a few more deep breaths, and then continued on his way. I can do this, he told himself. I have to.

TBC...