Disclaimer: All recognisable characters are the property of MGM/Amazon. No copyright infringement intended. I am simply taking my favourite two Gaters for a walk in an Alternate Universe.

Rating: Still T...

Episode Tags: Takes place in Season 7 after 7.16 Death Knell.

A/N: Trigger for alcoholism and depression. Contains bad language. I have no beta, so all mistakes are my own.

Chapter 7: Sleeplessness

Blood… on my hands, her chest, my arms, her hands, my face, her face, the ground… rivers of blood… blue eyes turning grey… green BDU's stained red… brown soil turning black…

"CARTER! NO! Sam… honey… please…" – sobbing, rocking, screaming, hearts beating, fingers grasping, blood flowing… sticky, congealing… "Don't leave me Sam…"

"Jack… so-so-sorry…"

Gasping – crying – choking – shaking – wheezing – cold and hot – golden, green, red, blue, brown, grey, black… blood and blood and blood…

My Sam… the taste of blood, smell of burnt electronics, sounds of death and pain…

I – lo-love you Ja-Jack… silence… deafening silence… anger, pain, despair, hopelessness…

I woke with a start. My mouth dry, face damp from tears and dog tongue. Pushing Buddy away silently, I got up carefully and made my way to the darkened bathroom. I wasn't surprised by my brains inability to let the pain go. Just another set of nightmarish memories in my arsenal waiting to deprive me of much needed sleep – Iraq, Charlie, Ba'al's house of fun, Sam – fucking great work O'Neill! This is why I drank. Cursing Daniel for his steadfast insistence that I get through this without the memory killing qualities of a good Irish Whiskey, hell I'd take a bad Scottish Whiskey instead of this unending cycle of sleepless hell.

Flicking on the light, I took in the drawn and pale visage covered with five days of salt and pepper facial hair that stared back from the mirror. Mirror. Sam wanted me to go to her. Why? Because she thought I'd be happy with another Sam. Another Sam. Yeah right. Like she'd want my bitter arse now. How was I supposed to replace my Sam, even with another reality's version of her? It was my Sam's decisions and experiences that made her the woman I fell in love with. But then, the alternate me fell in love with his Sam as well. A definable constant. That's what Daniel said we were. That no matter where we were, differences in reality's, timelines or circumstances were irrelevant. True love finds a way. I looked down at my hands, they were gripping the edge of my basin. Yeah right. Not in our case. Our way backfired. After 7 fucking years of playing it safe - being good little officers, we finally did it - bucked the trend, ignored the regulations, had an illicit affair - finding pure happiness without restraint as a result and now she was dead. Gone. What if… there was that pointless fucking game again. The game I played in my mind over and over. What if... we stayed true to the path defined for us by the Air Force, what if... I went with her off-world as security detail, what if... I kept Jonas Quinn as a fifth member of SG-1 instead of allowing him to return to Kelowna where he was mind raped by Anubis… what if, what if, what fucking if… Balling up my fist, I smashed it into the mirror, the splatter of red from several cuts seeping into the cracked glass. I looked down at my fist, then as if by rote, washed and wrapped it in a hand towel. It hurt, but nothing compared to the pain in my heart.

"Fuck this!" I cursed again. I needed something, anything to help me get through this. They had all tried, but nothing worked, not even the silent support from Cassie and Buddy. Dammit, it had only been 5 goddamned days. Every single one of them with less than 2 fucking hours of sleep. I still had 7 days to get through before her funeral, plus the inevitable 'chat' with MacKenzie which Hammond had insisted I attend, tomorrow of all days. Just what I fucking needed, a shrink poking at my bleeding wounds. Calling on all my well-honed blacks ops experience, I stalked through the darkened house as quiet as possible. Before Teal'c started on tretonin, there would have been no way I could sneak past him. Now that he had taken to sleeping some nights instead of his normal Kelno'reem, getting past him was easier. Cassie was a typically teenager where sleep was concerned, and Daniel had never been a problem. The man slept like the dead. I stopped at that thought. The dead. Sam. Sam was dead. I closed my eyes and breathed, willing myself to regain control of my mind. I was on a mission. A mission to get good and drunk. A mission to forget.

Opening my eyes, I resumed moving towards my objective. Daniel had cleaned out my kitchen, but my premium stuff was locked away. Locating my copy of Sun Tzu's 'The Art of War', I withdrew it from the shelf and carefully unfolded the dust jacket. Sure enough, the small, unassuming key was still there. Taking it, I moved across the room to my coffee table. The drawer on the underside of the table facing the window side of the house contained three very nice bottles of aged whiskey and some tumblers, kept there purely for my poker nights. Carefully removing two of the three bottles from their prone position, then relocking the drawer and returning the key to its place, I snuck back to my room and stashed one in my laundry hamper.

Walking back to my bed, I cracked open the other and took a sizable swig. Feeling the intense burn of good whiskey, I winced and sat down with my back against the headboard where Buddy's head found my lap. He nudged the bottle with his nose, but that was the extent of his disapproval. My fingers found his ears as vivid images of Sam's deathly white face, my blood-soaked clothes, and the sounds of her gasps and my screams assaulted my memories. Asleep or awake, I could not shake them. I downed another swig and another, until my swigs turned to gulps, turned to swallows. The pictures on the wall of my room blurred and my vision dulled to shades of grey.

"O'Neill!" I called from beyond the closed door. It was unlike a warrior such as he to slumber beyond the rise of the sun. Knocking on his door yielded no response. I knocked again a little louder. Nothing. Opening the door, the vision of the man who took a chance on this jaded Jaffa so many years before slumped sideways on his bed was not unexpected. The near empty bottle of fermented sugar and water balancing precariously on the edge of the mattress, his fingers wrapped tightly around the neck was also not unexpected. Daniel Jackson was under the misguided impression he had purged O'Neill's abode of all such inebriants. I knew better, though chose not to inform Daniel Jackson of his miscalculation. The right of a warrior of O'Neill's calibre to mourn the loss of his kalach-tek [1] in whatever way he deemed necessary was immutable.

Flicking my eyes to the red numbers on O'Neill's clock, I noted that Daniel Jackson would no doubt return momentarily. Striding forward, I removed the bottle from O'Neill's grasp and replaced the cap after retrieving it from the floor. Scanning the room, I noted the laundry hamper contained nothing but a grey bath towel. Knowing that O'Neill routinely dumped his used attire and linens directly into the washing machine, I approached the unused receptacle to deposit his ill-gotten gain. Finding a second full glass bottle, I smiled. O'Neill was most resourceful and - as he put it himself - sneaky. After carefully arranging both bottles within the towel, I returned to his side. He remained unmoving, though observance of the continual biological functionality of his body confirmed he was indeed alive.

Adjusting his slumped form into a prone position of recovery, a useful initial response skill imparted to me by Major Carter during a field training exercise some years ago, then drawing his discarded bed linens over him did not rouse him from slumber, though did afford his sleeping form the ability to sound comparable to that of Daniel Jackson.

"Teal'c? Jack?" I turned my head slightly at the sound of Daniel Jackson returning, though maintaining eye contact with O'Neill, noting his troubled facial movements and occasional jerking motion.

"Teal'c? You in here?"

"I am Daniel Jackson."

"How is he?"

"His sleep remains troubled."

Daniel Jackson exhaled. "At least he is sleeping."

"Indeed."

"It's better than drinking himself nearly to death every night."

I turned to face the young archaeologist. He truly believed that O'Neill would survive this without intoxication. I turned back to O'Neill, casting my eyes over his hidden cache to ensure it remained concealed. It was not my place to insinuate my beliefs on a grieving warrior such as O'Neill, nor was it my place to inform my brother-in-arms that his method would not assist O'Neill.

"Let us leave, Daniel Jackson."

"Yeah. I'll start breakfast. Feel like bacon and eggs?"

"Indeed."

The sounds of birds and the smell of breakfast filtered through my foggy brain, I smiled and reached out to her side of the bed where I hoped she would still be. The stark coldness of the mattress and absence of her scent allowed the sickening memories to return in vivid flashes and surround sound, which gave way to a burgeoning headache of massive proportions. I groaned. I could still taste the sourness of old whiskey on my tongue combined with the furry feeling after eating a whole bag of salt and vinegar chips the night before. I hated salt and vinegar chips. That was just one more thing I was willing to endure to keep the memory of Sam alive. Partaking in things I normally disliked, just because she had enjoyed them. It was the same with her insistence on ordering pizza with pineapple, or even worse, pineapple on a hamburger – a taste preference she discovered after serving alongside some Australians in the Gulf - and consequently argued with me about to no end.

"Ugh!"

The rays of golden sunshine streamed through my curtains, but the morning sun did not bring me joy. There could be no joy now that I had been deprived of her golden hair and bright smile. I had dreamt again, this time my brain had given me a dreamscape of Sam's in various situations that I longed to experience with her – walking hand in hand along a beach with white sand and water as blue as her eyes, me holding that same hand as she laboured for hours to deliver our first child, her bouncing that child – an angelic girl with golden curls and brown eyes – on her knee, kissing her good morning in our shared bed before making love to her the way I had had the privilege of doing for three glorious weeks.

I swallowed down the pain of her absence, the pain of missed opportunities. Standing, I made my way to my ensuite to brush away the stale flavours, though I knew nothing but time, or the use of a fish descaler would remove the salt and vinegary blanket that had taken up residence on my tongue. After relieving myself, I hit the shower and stood under the scolding spray, willing it to burn away my pain and my hangover. It would not do to show up to the appointment with MacKenzie noticeably hungover. It did neither. Barely 10 minutes later, I was making my way to the kitchen, the smell of bacon, eggs and coffee carrying me forth. I guessed that was one bonus, after 5 full days of barely eating, I was ravenously hungry, though I owed most of that feeling to my body's need to metabolise last night's medication.

"Hey Uncle Jack."

"Morning Jack."

"O'Neill."

They all spoke at once, their combined voices reverberating through my sound sensitive brain. I fought to not show it on my face, though based on the look Teal'c was giving me, he knew my current state. Daniel and Cassie seemed oblivious, but that was not unusual.

"Hey guys." I replied, taking my seat as Daniel passed me a plate and a coffee. Buddy swaggered up and plopped his doggy face on my thigh. I scratched his ears and noted the tell-tale look of sadness in his eyes. Bringing my hand back to my thigh above his nose, he nudged me and whimpered until I lifted my hand to scratch him again. I gave him a sideways smile.

"Thanks Buddy. You're a good boy." I said to him. There was a reason why dogs were my favourite kind of people. They inherently knew when you were sad. They gave you comfort and love unconditionally no matter how dark your soul was. I gave him a piece of my bacon, then turned to my plate just as Daniel loaded it with more bacon and two pieces of toast buttered the same way that Sam did it, slightly cooled so that the butter did not melt and make the toast soggy. Why did everything have to remind me of her? I cursed inwardly.

"Thanks Daniel." I murmured. I looked up at each of my friends – my family – but I could not bring myself to smile at any of them. It wasn't their fault. I was beyond broken now and nothing, not even MacKenzie, or another Sam was going to fix that.

[AN#1]: 'Kalach' meaning soul, 'Tek' meaning friend. I have cobbled this together based on a number of Jaffa language websites in place of the word 'soulmate'.