Nuclear Facility - 1997

Jack's eyes were fixed on the wall as he checked his watch once again. He wasn't a fan of this whole situation, something deep inside him kept nagging that he should've gone down there himself. Death was part of their job, but accepting the death of a child to save the world...?

During his years in Black Ops, he had followed orders like this. He'd taken the lives of entire families, including a child. And the years of therapy that followed, the countless nightmares, or the sleepless nights spent watching Charlie sleep just to calm his mind, had never been enough to heal the wound those actions left on his soul.

He should've gone instead of Sam. She wasn't even 30 yet. She was too young to deal with a situation like this. Even if everyone agreed she was the best soldier they'd seen in years, she didn't deserve the psychological burden the USAF was placing on her right now.

Daniel suddenly interrupted his thoughts. "Jack, she's going back down."

Jack turned his head to the elevator numbers. "The hell she is." He immediately pressed the intercom button to communicate with her. "Captain Carter."

Only silence greeted him, and a cold panic gripped his chest. "Captain Carter!" he tried again. But once again, only silence answered.

At that moment, Jack realized two things: Captain Carter was, indeed, capable of disobeying a direct order, but more importantly, he wasn't going to recover if he lost the woman he loved like this.

"Sam!" he shouted into the intercom. "Do you read me?"

Meanwhile, Sam had just reopened the door separating her from Cassie. She reacted instantly upon hearing Jack use her first name; they were treading dangerous territory with that kind of behavior, and she knew it.

"Colonel, I'm staying," she said into the intercom, re-establishing a barrier between them.

Jack's response was immediate. "Negative."

"Colonel, she's awake," Sam whispered into the intercom.

Jack removed his cap and ran a hand through his hair. This was exactly the kind of situation he'd wanted to avoid by going instead of Sam. He didn't want her to live with this weight on her shoulders.

"Captain Carter!" he tried again. "I am ordering you to get back up here right now."

She could hate him for as long as she wanted. He could live with that far more easily than living with her death on his conscience. But Sam remained silent.

"Right now!" he yelled into the intercom.

Clenching his jaw in frustration, Jack looked up at the ceiling, taking a deep breath before checking his watch. Only one minute remained. And if this was the last minute of Samantha Carter's life, he needed to tell her something.

"All right, why don't you guys clear out?" he asked Daniel and Teal'c, turning toward them. But the looks on their faces told him that they, too, were on the verge of losing someone dear to them, and asking them to leave now would be selfish. "Right," he muttered. Of course, they wouldn't want to abandon Sam like this either.

The seconds ticked by in an odd way. Jack felt like time was racing by, but also that each second lasted an eternity. His thoughts raced; he suddenly saw Sam laughing by a fire in Ireland or explaining astrophysics to him while they made love... He recalled the breathtaking sight of Samantha Carter, illuminated by the morning sun in white sheets, and his breath caught as his heart tightened.

The countdown reached its end, and Jack held his breath, listening intently for any sound within the facility. But everything remained eerily silent.

"I don't feel anything," Daniel remarked.

"We could have been wrong about the time," Jack suggested.

Daniel raised his eyebrows. "We could have been wrong about what would happen."

Jack immediately turned back to the intercom and tried again. "Captain Carter, can you hear me?" But faced with silence, he abandoned all military distance and tried one last time, his voice nearly breaking. "Sam..." he took a deep breath, "can you hear me?"

Feeling like he was losing his grip, Jack made one last attempt. "Sam, please..."

He refused to look at his watch, refused to think about the report he would have to write, detailing Captain Carter's death. It couldn't end like this—not when they still had so much left to say to each other. Not after all the sacrifices. Only Daniel and Teal'c's presence kept him from screaming into the intercom, from punching the wall, from completely falling apart. Because even in the worst circumstances, he remained the leader he had to be.

Sam's voice finally came through. "We're okay, nothing happened," and Jack felt as though air painfully filled his lungs, like a newborn taking its first breath.

"Cassandra's fine," Sam said. "I'm fine. Nothing happened. I just... I couldn't leave her, Sir," she tried to justify.

Jack bit his lip, resisting the urge to yell at her. That would only be fear talking, and it wouldn't help anything. "How did you know, Captain?" he simply asked.

"It occurred to me that she first slipped into the coma when we brought her close to the Stargate," Sam explained quickly. "As soon as we got her far enough away from the Stargate, she woke up. And I... knew."

Jack frowned. "You knew?"

Sam didn't respond, and Jack turned to Daniel, his expression questioning. "Parvati!" the archaeologist replied, as if that explained everything.