She visits the tree every day of her life. Sometimes the children come with her, sometimes not.
Inside, she knows it's nothing more than a relic to a life lost and a people gone.
But she needs it now more than ever.
With her belly swollen with her second child and her first being cared for by Jason, she picks her solitary way down the path to the tree.
They told her not to come here today. This pregnancy has been hard - harder than the first in physical pain and discomfort, if not in emotional trauma. But this is a ritual which she enacts daily, no matter how busy she is or what things threaten. She comes down to the tree every day of her life.
Every day of her life save the day her son was born.
The glint of silver catches her eye, the wind streaming past her in an invisible torrent and catching on the decorations of the tree. The tags swing in the shadows, silent windchimes singing a voiceless chorus for the dead. As she walks under the branches, one hand reaches up to caress the silver faces that flutter past her cheekbones. And she remembers each man or woman who wore them.
Her penance, every day of her life.
Sergeants, Captains, Airmen. Lieutenants, Scientists, Ambassadors. Doctors, Colonels, Majors. And specifically one Colonel, one Jaffa, one Kelownan, and one General.
She doesn't count the billions who died. Her mind cannot comprehend that magnitude of loss, so she remembers the people she knew and worked with. The people she knew and loved.
The people she misses.
She remembers them here, under the tree, immortalising them in her memory and in the stories she tells the children who sometimes accompany her.
In particular, Jason loves hearing the stories. His blue eyes shine with wonder as she tells him about the SGC and about the places she visited in her time.
"Someday, I'll go through the Stargate," he tells her, slipping his hand into hers trustingly. "Someday, I'll visit planets like you did."
She remembers his father telling her about the legend of the Argonauts many years ago. The Greek heros, lead by Jason, who went on a quest for a golden fleece.
Jason's a lot like Daniel. It's in the tilt of his head and the planes of his face, in his expression as he thinks and in his eyes. Melosha barely gets a look-in as far as the genetics of appearance go.
But Jason isn't the only son of a member of SG-1.
There's her son, nearly two years old and a handful and a half. The act leading to his conception was as unexpected as her pregnancy. But even in his childhood, he resembles his father.
Rya'c comes visiting sometimes. He's a man grown now, finding service not in the armies of a Goa'uld System Lord, but among the Jaffa rebellion and among the Tok'ra remnant. He usually arrives with her father and goes to visit Bra'tac's grave while father and daughter catch up. Then they all stand under the tree and remember the dead.
She can feel them with her here.
The tug of their love, of their concern is strong under the tree. Sometimes too strong.
And if she closes her eyes, sometimes she can feel *his* mouth on hers, his hands on her body, his voice crying out her name as he came...
Lately, she's not sure if it's just her imagination. She kept coming to the tree even once she started her relationship with another man. Moving on with her life - but never forgetting her past. She owed them that - both the moving on and the remembering.
And, in a way, she owed him that honesty. To let him know that she had found someone else to love, even if a part of her would always love and remember him.
The baby kicks - strong and powerful. She reaches up and takes hold of the last branch, gasping.
The dog tags swing as the branch shakes. And with that movement, she feels their presence around her, close by. Surrounding her like a shield.
She was never superstitious until she came here and hung the tags up on the tree of memory.
A world lost.
One woman saved.
Guilt presses down upon her like a stone. She survived and they did not. And now they live on only in her memory and in what she can convey to the children to whom she tells their stories night after night after night - a penance for living.
And her daily pilgrimage to the tree.
Remembering the dead.
When she brings him here, her son falls silent under the tree. When she lifts him up in her arms, his hands reach out for the dogtags, tugging gently at the chains and pouting when they don't give way.
God, she misses them!
She's learned to love the people here, but it's not the same as the people who understood her, who shared her history. She wants them back, sometimes so intensely that it stifles the breath from her lungs and makes even living a torment.
Today, she finds herself crying. Wanting everything to be the way it was with the warm glow of old memory washing over it.
*I miss you.*
The leaves of the tree rustle around her like voices and she hears their voices whispering in her ear, fragments of conversations long faded into fragile air.
*We miss you too...*
* * *
feedback is always welcomed
Story Notes: AUTHOR'S NOTES: This was partially influenced by Denise and Adi's 'Fini' fic, although theirs was an actual story while this is just a vignette! A note: in 'Fini', the son is called 'Liander' but I called him 'Jason' instead. Apparently a sequel to 'Fini' is in the works... This fic is just...weird. A mood piece rather than a story.
DISCLAIMER: All publicly recognisable characters, settings, etc, are the property of their respective owners. Any original characters and plots are the property of the author. No money is being made from this work. No copyright infringement is intended. ... [ read more ]