Almost there! Enjoy!
M.
Chapter Twenty-Four.
When she reached the end of the road, Sam gasped. The market was a whole city. A live one. Buildings and tents mixed in an endless sea of produce, trinkets, and people. The cacophony of the loud exchanges and different languages mixed up nicely with the smells. And sometimes both were incredibly overwhelming.
She walked by dozens of posts as she tried to find someone who sounded remotely like the languages she knew, or at least similar to those she could try to identify. She was fairly sure that a game of charades could easily create havoc in a place like this.
On the second day, Sam calculated that the walk between her last position and the puddle jumper was far enough to cost her a lot of time. And curiously, she reached a place where the deal seemed to be beds and baths. She attempted asking about the prices in three different languages, but at the end, someone just pointed her to a board in which described the basics.
She raised her finger to point the place in which a bed and a bath were pictured, and the one who pointed her to the board looked at her and extended his hands to ask for the price. Sam frowned, it didn't say how much it would cost, so she took a couple of the different materials she found in Semayati and presented them to the alien. Four of his eyes widened as he eyes the rocks she had on her hand. He grabbed one middle sized black rock, which for Sam was something common from Semayati, and were used as conductive materials for the few powered things they had.
The interface had suggested her to find plenty of gash'ma to use as a trade coin. He mentioned that by its properties it should be quite valuable for exchange. She was now capitalizing the information and apparently, the interface wasn't as precise in the value of the ordinary rock. She was led to a giant room, with a king-sized four poster bed. And there was a private bathroom, with a bathtub big enough to fit four. There was some food on a table and what looked like wine and water along with it.
The alien left the room quickly, closing the door behind him and Sam took a couple of strides to get to it and lock it. Then, she untied Naysa from her position around her placing her daughter on the floor and lowered the backpack she had, in it, she had packed food and water she knew they could consume for at least four days.
Sam smiled as her girl wobbled around gratefully. She understood the desire to walk around since it was the second-day Naysa was only hanging from her mother, and her little legs were sore of the lack of activity.
The Colonel walked towards the tub area and fidgeted with the instruments on the wall until water started to pour from the floor filling the small pool. She checked the temperature and surprisingly found it was just right. Leaving the tub slowly filling with the warm water, she started to get her clothes off.
"Naysa, come… we are going to get cleaned," She called the girl over, and her daughter half wobbled half crawled back and clapped her hands happily when she saw the steamy water in which her mother was.
Sam tested the things surrounding the bath first on the floor, then on herself to finally check it on Naysa when there was no severe reaction on any of them. She used the product carefully and washed her daughter's hair and body and then she did the same with herself leaving Naysa to float happily under her watch.
She found two pieces of cloth that she used as towels and then dressed both of them with the clean pair of clothes they had. Her daughter's eyes were barely opened by then, but she hadn't eaten in a good while. Placing Naysa softly on the bed, Sam grabbed a ration and carefully laid it open for them to munch. The girl's eyes widened when she noticed the food was a sign of how hungry she was and the fact that the little girl had not only eaten her part, but Sam's was an indication that the girl was getting bigger. She left a couple of nuts only because her little eyes won the battle and she finally fell asleep.
Sam caressed her little girl's cheek and hair lovingly, wondering what would Jack do when he meet her, and how he would take her back in. She imagined the warm embrace and the passionate kiss and lots of unshed tears. But shook herself to the work she still had to do, she dropped their dirty clothes into the tub and proceeded to hand wash them and hang them to dry close to the window they had.
When her stomach growled, Sam looked at her backpack and then, at the food on the table. She could try it but not knowing what effect could have on her. And without anyone to take care of Naysa if something happened to her, she decided against it. The Colonel grabbed the few nuts her daughter had left and picked a few others from her morning ration, hoping that the tiredness of the day would take over the hunger she was feeling.
It did, she figured when she woke up to the bright rays of the sun. They picked all their stuff and walked out of place. Days three and four, weren't any different from what they already had experienced. A lot of walking and sweating. Being pushed and shoved and the feeling of despair of not finding what you need and getting closer and closer to the last available option.
They found another version of the alien B&B to spend the night, it looked like the placing of those was just right, with a bunch of them placed close together on what seemed like a day long walk. And her gash'ma continued to give her fairly nice rooms.
But on the verge of the fifth day, she had to decide whether to keep walking and test the local food and risk getting sick or die. Or keep walking but back to the ship to get more of the edible stuff. And then, someone made a choice a little easier. A dark-skinned giant grabbed a fruit from one of the tents, took a bite and fell cold dead just inches away from her feet. She turned around and walked towards the general direction of the parking lot, hoping to get to her ship before it was too dark to see it.
They managed to get to their jumper thanks to the light provided by other customers who were returning to their own ships. And she decided that sleeping in a bed and having a bath daily were highly overrated as they accommodated to sleep on the floor of the ship as they had during the flights.
Sam understood better now what it was feeling dead on your feet. She was bone tired, and hungry. Her rations now of half the size they used to be. She knew she was risking it, but her daughter was first. And then, something woke her; it was a rattling sound coming from nearby.
A sound she could swear she heard thousands of times before, yet it felt more like a dream than a miracle. Her eyes closed again, and she was about to fall deep into sleep when she heard it, loud and clear.
"Jaffa, Kree!"
She sat on the floor, in the fastest movement she had done in a while. She had kept her training going, but she took it slow as Teal'c had shown her. Her training routine was looking more like tai chi than to any other hand to hand combat she had ever taken before, and even if her training was based on slow movements, she was grateful she continued doing it. Since, apparently, she would need it.
She waited until the classic sounds of Jaffa armor were lost in the distance before risking looking out from the window and she laughed when she saw their ship parked in front of her.
"Naysa we are going home!" She whispered to her still an asleep child. Then she sat to observe whatever she could find before heading head first into stealing their tel'tak.