Season 10 Episode 3 – The Pegasus Project

Episode summary: SG-1 (minus Teal'c) travel to Atlantis aboard the Odyssey. Daniel wants to search the Ancient database for details about Castiana and Sahal, and Sam has a plan to try dialling the Ori supergate from the Pegasus galaxy, using a black hole, a stargate and a nuclear bomb. Daniel uses Atlantis' user interface, which manifests as a hologram of a Lantean woman called Gannos Laal, to search for details, Vala goes frustrated with Daniel's slow methods and convinces him to just ask the question straight out. He does, and is shocked when the hologram immediately gives him gate addresses for both worlds. This makes him suspicious, because it shouldn't have worked, and further questioning reveals that the hologram is actually an ascended being, Morgan La Fay. He tries to convince her to give them more information, but when she tries she is stopped by the other ascended beings and disappears. Meanwhile, with McKay's help, Sam's plan to connect to the Ori supergate works, although they end up doing it by detonating a bomb aboard an attacking Wraith ship. The unstable vortex as the Supergate activates destroys an Ori ship.

[ABOARD THE ODYSSEY, EN ROUTE TO ATLANTIS]

Sam looked up from her calculations as Daniel frog-marched Vala into the room and deposited the raven-haired woman in a chair opposite Sam's workstation.

"Tag, you're it." He said to Sam with a forced smile, and fled the room.

"He's overreacting." Vala assured her, although she said it with a nervous glance in the direction of the doorway Daniel had just exited.

Sam sat back from her work with a sigh. She could use a break anyway. "What happened?"

"It was just a teeny tiny accident. No one was hurt – not seriously, anyway. Honestly, it's not like I intentionally try to stop Daniel from reaching Atlantis, the first time I didn't know who Daniel even was, and the second time I didn't know how important Atlantis was to him."

Sam frowned. "You're not saying that we're going back are you …?"

"No! That's my point, it was just an accident, everything's fine!"

"Perhaps you should start at the beginning."

Vala bit her lip. "I may have played a practical joke on Daniel involving a small electric shock and his personal coffee-maker."

"That doesn't sound like an accident."

"No, the accidental part was what happened next. He jumped backwards when the pot zapped him, and collided with Airman Johnson, who was carrying a big heavy crate … the doctor says we were lucky neither of them broke any bones."

Sam closed her eyes briefly and nodded. "Maybe you'd better steer clear of him for a while."

"Hmm." Vala twisted her body over the workstation to see Sam's screen. "What are you doing?"

"Re-checking the yield calculations."

"Haven't you already done that a couple of dozen times?"

Sam nodded tiredly. "Three weeks is a long time when you have nothing to do but check your own work and hope you haven't got it totally wrong. As much as I hate to say it, I'm looking forward to getting McKay's input. I need a second opinion."

"I'm sure you've got it right." Vala said. "I'm glad I'm not the only one getting bored on this tedious ship."

"I think we'll all be happy to get there." Sam agreed with a smile.

Vala jumped up. "Let's get some lunch. I hear they're serving something called 'Macaroni cheese'. Mitchell says it's to die for."

Sam's stomach rolled, and she clapped a hand to her mouth, squeezing her eyes shut. A moment later Vala's hands settled on Sam's shoulders.

"Samantha? What's wrong?"

Sam relaxed as the wave of nausea passed, and she let out the breath she'd been holding slowly. She looked speculatively at Vala. She needed to talk to someone.

"Can you keep a secret?"

Vala nodded earnestly.

"I think I might be pregnant."

In the first week aboard the Odyssey on their three week hike to the Pegasus galaxy, Sam had missed her period. She hadn't thought much of it at the time, putting it down to some sort of lingering after-effect of the sleep-inducing parasite they'd encountered on Vagonbrei, or the treatment developed to kill it.

Then the nausea had started, at the start of the third week.

Telling Vala was exactly the cathartic release Sam had been hoping for. Vala was exactly the right combination of cautiously excited for her, and sympathetic to the uncomfortable reality of early-pregnancy symptoms aboard a space-ship.

"You should go to the infirmary and get it confirmed." Vala said sagely as they discussed it over a cup of tea.

"Not yet." Sam said. "This ship's a bubble, if I go to the infirmary for a pregnancy test the entire crew will know in less than a day. If I am pregnant, I want Jack to be one of the first people to know."

"But what if you're not and you have some sort of horrible virus that needs treatment?" Vala asked reasonably.

Sam smirked. "I'm not that sick. It's just a bit of nausea."

"And the missed period."

"That could mean anything."

"Do your breasts hurt? Mine did when I was in the early stages." Vala said matter-of-factly.

Sam flushed at both the question and the reminder of Vala's less than pleasant experience in the not too distant past.

"A little, maybe."

"Are you tired?"

"Exhausted. Constantly."

"Well then, in my expert medical opinion," Vala winked, "you're probably pregnant."

Sam smiled ruefully. "Trust me to get into this mess when we're on a six week mission."

"It could be worse. At least we're not likely to get shot at on this mission."

"True." Sam conceded.

She looked at Vala uncomfortably for a moment. "Look, is this ok? My talking to you about this, I mean … I know it might be bringing back some bad memories …"

Vala waved her hands at Sam impatiently. "Don't be silly, it's fine. My situation was completely different. I'm happy for you."

Sam smiled and gave Vala's hand a squeeze. "Thank you."

"Hey! Maybe you could see the doctor in Atlantis, I bet he could confirm it for you."

Sam thought of Dr Carson Beckett, the softly spoken Scottish gentleman. Maybe that wasn't a bad idea.

"If there's time." She said.

Sam knocked tentatively on Carson Beckett's office door.

"Colonel Carter! What can I do for you?" He asked solicitously in his comforting Scottish accent, standing.

"I was wondering …" She faltered, not sure how best to put it.

"Colonel?" He asked with a concerned expression.

She shook her head and started again. "Can I ask you a hypothetical?"

"Ok." He agreed slowly, confused.

"Hypothetically, if a military officer who wasn't based in Atlantis, but was based in the SGC and was just here for a visit, wanted to have a quick medical test … would that person get back to the SGC before the results reached that person's commanding officer at Stargate Command?"

"Probably not – for that sort of thing any pertinent medical results would be forwarded in the next scheduled gate contact with Earth."

Sam winced. She'd been afraid of that. General Landry would know weeks before she'd get home, and of course he'd forward the information to Jack. That's not how she would want her husband to find out.

"And I don't suppose you would consider holding the results back for three weeks?"

"What's this about, love? Are you feeling alright?"

Sam held up a hand in reassurance. "I'm fine, really. I'm sorry to have wasted your time."

"Colonel …" Beckett stopped her with a hand on her arm. "Just tell me off the record, what's going on?"

Sam bit her lip, considering. It couldn't hurt to have a discussion off the record. "It was a pregnancy test, that's what I was going to ask for. But you would have to report the results immediately, right?"

"Yes, I'm afraid so. Would that be a problem?"

"If it's positive, I want to tell the father in person. If you reported the test results, he'd find out weeks before I would get home." She shook her head. "It's ok Doctor, it'll keep. I'll get tested when I get back to Earth."

"Wait, I have an idea." Beckett exited the office and went to a set of drawers on the far side of the infirmary. He pulled out a plastic-wrapped package and passed it to her. "It's a home test. You can do it yourself, with complete privacy."

"You don't have to report that you gave me this?" Sam checked.

"No, it's part of the discretionary supplies. We don't have to report who it goes to, just that it's been given out. As far as the records are concerned, it could have been given to any one of the fifty women in Atlantis right now."

Sam nodded. "Ok. Thank you Doctor."

"You're welcome, Colonel." He said with a warm smile. "And good luck."

Sam pushed at the food on her plate listlessly. They were eight days into their journey home, and she hadn't taken the test yet, had been afraid of the results, but she could think of almost nothing else. Daniel, sitting opposite her, was expounding again on the idiocy of the ascended Ancients in refusing to act even to defend themselves, working himself into a rage.

Cameron, sat beside her, had his head on the table. She wasn't sure if he was asleep or just trying to block out Daniel. She rubbed his back briefly. "Are you ok?"

"I'm beat." He said, sitting up and yawning. "I'm going to bed."

"Night."

Daniel had paused in his diatribe, and rested his chin on a fist moodily. "I hate this ship." He complained.

Sam smirked. "Why?"

"I either want to be in Atlantis doing more research or at home so we can start searching these two planets. This three week limbo is a nightmare."

"Tell me about it." Sam muttered. She was bored – they all were. On the way to Atlantis, they'd all had projects to occupy their attention, in preparation for the work they would do in Pegasus. Now … they were redundant until they got back to the Milky Way.

"You seem better." Daniel commented suddenly.

"What?"

"You're over that stomach bug."

"Oh." So he'd noticed the vomiting. It had eased off in the last week, which she was grateful for.

"I think Mitchell's coming down with it now." Daniel said. "I caught him puking his guts up after breakfast this morning."

Sam looked up at him sharply. There wasn't actually a stomach bug going around, was there?

"I've gotta go do something." She said. "See you tomorrow."

"Ok."

Sam knocked on Vala's door firmly, and then did it again when there was no answer.

Vala opened the door looking dishevelled, her bushy black hair a mess, and her skimpy satin pyjamas twisted almost indecently.

"Samantha." She said with a tone of surprise.

"Sorry to wake you. Can I come in?"

"I was having a very pleasant dream." Vala said airily as she let Sam slip inside. "Is it morning?"

"No." Sam paced a little in the small space.

"What's that?" Vala asked, pointing at the plastic package in Sam's hand.

"It's a pregnancy test."

"Have you taken it?"

"No, not yet."

"Are you going to?"

Sam sat down, and looked at her friend. "Did you know there's a stomach bug going round?"

"Nope." Vala cocked her head. "Is that why Colonel Mitchell's been so moody the last couple of days?"

"Yeah, apparently he's got it. Vala – what if that's what I had? Maybe this 'pregnancy' thing was all in my head?"

Vala looked at her sympathetically. "I guess there's no way of knowing until you take that test. I take it that's why you're here?"

"Is that ok? I didn't want to do it alone."

"Of course darling. Go use my bathroom."

With a big, tense exhale, Sam went into Vala's bathroom and shut the door. She peed on the stick, washed her hands, and left the horrid little thing in the bathroom to go and sit with Vala in the bedroom area.

"Well?" Vala asked.

"I have to give it a few minutes."

Vala slipped her hand into Sam's and squeezed tightly. "Even if it's negative, if you want a baby that badly you could try again, right?"

Sam smiled at that – she realised she was being a little ridiculous. She actually knew for a fact that she would at some point in the next five years have two kids. It was silly to work herself up so much over one pregnancy test. "Yeah, you're right. Either way, it'll be fine."

The couple of minutes passed, and Sam reluctantly got up and went back to check.

One blue line. Not two. Not pregnant.

Just a stomach bug then.

She dropped the test in the trash can, and flopped onto Vala's bed with her hands over her face. Vala curled up next to her.

"I'm sorry sweetie."

"It's ok."

It would happen eventually.

A few days later, the stomach bug hit Vala in earnest, and she confined herself to her quarters in misery. Sam appointed herself Vala's caretaker, coaxing her into eating a little and making sure she kept drinking plenty, taking her temperature and dosing her with medicine.

She was on one such visit when she found Daniel sitting in Vala's quarters, watching the black-haired former thief sleep.

"Daniel?" Sam whispered.

Daniel looked a little disturbed. He got up and led Sam outside, down the corridor a little way and into a storage closet.

"What are we doing?" Sam asked, bemused, as Daniel shut the door behind them with a click.

"I think Vala's pregnant." Daniel said in an urgent undertone.

Sam flinched a little at the reminder of her recent humiliating episode. "What makes you think that?" She asked carefully.

"She's tired, and throwing up a lot …"

"She's got the stomach flu." Sam said, eyebrows raised.

"I found a pregnancy test in her trash can."

Oh. "You did?" She asked nervously.

"Yes. I didn't even know she was seeing anyone, did you? And it hasn't been that long since she had Adria …"

Crap. There was no way out of this other than to tell him the truth.

"Daniel, Vala's not pregnant. She's just sick, like a dozen other people on this ship right now."

"But the pregnancy test …"

"It's not hers." Sam said.

Daniel frowned in confusion. "What?"

She looked at him significantly, and his eyes widened as he realised what she meant.

"It's yours?" He asked, scandalised.

"Yes. I took it in her bathroom a few days ago. I didn't want to do it on my own."

"You're pregnant?"

"No, it was negative."

"Oh." That took the wind out of his sails a bit. "I mean, uh, I'm sorry."

"Yeah, well, that's the way it goes sometimes."

"I didn't know you and Jack were trying."

Sam nodded. "Not getting any younger, you know?"

"Right." He stared at her with a funny little frown for a moment, and then opened his arms. "Come here."

She accepted the hug with a sigh. "It's ok." She said reassuringly.

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah. I just … I missed a period on the outward journey, and then I started getting sick, so I thought maybe …"

"You thought it was morning sickness."

She nodded against his chest and pulled back with a wan smile. "I feel pretty stupid but other than that I'm fine."

"I can't believe I thought Vala was …"

Sam cocked her head and studied him. "It bothered you. That she might be."

"I guess."

"That's sweet." She teased him, punching him lightly on the arm.

He rolled his eyes. "Whatever."

Sam opened the door of the storage closet and stepped out into the hall. "I was going to sit with her a while, get her to eat something."

"I'll do it." Daniel said.

"You sure?"

"Yeah."

Sam smiled. "You're a good friend, Daniel."

Daniel smirked, and let himself back into Vala's quarters. Sam stood looking at the closed door for a moment, and then walked away.

So, maybe she wasn't pregnant with Beth right now, but they had time. And at least it seemed that Daniel and Vala were right on track.