"Asylum" by Alli Snow

Title: Asylum

Rating: PG-13

Timeline: Set late-second to third season; heavy for Point of View and Forever in a Day

Archive: S&J, Heliopolis. Others please ask.

Category: SJ UST, SJR, drama/angst, alternate timeline

Status: Finished!

Disclaimer: Not my show. Landseth, Ian Kelly, and all unrecognized characters are sole property of my insanity, however.

Notes: "Asylum" is the conclusion to "Exile" and "Suspension".

***

A man, a woman, and a child.

More importantly, me, my wife, and my daughter. Jack, Sam, and Bridget.

She wasn't my wife, not technically, but in my heart and mind that hardly made a difference. She was /mine/, and I don't say that out of pure machismo or protectiveness. I say it because it was true, because we were in love. I doubted that the universe had ever seen such a thing, and was pretty unlikely to see it again, but we loved each other, and we knew it, and despite the fact that we were all but walking into a war zone, we were happy.

Maybe it was stupid. We both knew that the intelligent choice would be to stay on Ma'at'a... if not indefinitely, then at least until the battle with Lel'tan ended for good. It was an argument that Krivin and Emiko had presented many times, not able to truly understand where we were coming from. And under other circumstances the planet might have been more tolerable, might have been a nice place to stay until things settled down... but it represented too many things to us, too much heartache and hardship, anger and frustration directed as much at ourselves as at the members of the Council.

There were some things that Ma'at'a would always be identified with, good things. My burgeoning relationship with Sam. The friends we had made. Bridget's conception and birth. But there were still too many hard feelings, too many things that kept me from being totally at ease at any point. I didn't want my daughter to have any memories of this world. I didn't want her asking any pointed questions before she was old enough to understand and accept the truth.

That she had been born on another planet.

Still, with all these deep, dark thoughts chasing themselves around my skull, I couldn't remain downcast. We were going home, and we were happy. Happy to have survived all that had been hurled at us. Happy to be in one another's company, and to have a goal to work towards. Happy to finally, after a year, be looking towards asylum, safe harbor, again.

I held our bag, Sam held Bridget, and we trekked intrepidly down the street to the market square. From there we'd take a side-street that led further into the guts of Ankh'ij before eventually twisting around and leading into the woods. I had a halfway decent memory of the area, a good sense of direction, and a map sketched out by Emiko - from one of her mother's documents - to guide us. I could see the map in my mind's eye as I walked: the jumbled mass of rectangles that were the buildings, the squiggly line that was the road, and the concentric circles labeled "Sungate" in the Ma'at'an language I was finally becoming adept at reading.

The market square was empty; it had been for some time, ever since it had finally dawned on the natives that the Lel'tan people had a good chance of holding off the militia. Doors were closed, as were most windows, but every now and then I saw the flash of eyes, glimmering in the late afternoon sun, peeking out from under sills. I shivered involuntarily, glancing around the deserted street. Déjà vu; apparently, we'd leave Ankh'ij the same way we entered it: under the population's supervision.

We pulled out of the square, onto the side road, and I placed a hand on Sam's shoulder. She rolled her eyes but remained silent. This was the older part of town, the seedy part of town, where the Accountant had his offices and thieves and vandals waited in the shadows, eager to attack the newly-destroyed. I did have a scalpel-like knife - a parting gift from Krivin - tucked into the side of my boot, but as we marched boldly down the curving road, I began to wish it was a little closer at hand.

As my eyes automatically scanned left, right, and far ahead, my mind wandered back to the woman beside me. It was possible that she wouldn't be immediately recognized as a woman: her hair was pulled back into a short ponytail and she wore a gray tunic and pants, the same as me: clothing a little more practicable in a possible combat situation. And as I watched her out of the corner of my eye, noting her straight posture and attentive features, that already she had regained some of her military bearing. Already she was becoming Captain Carter, right here, before my very eyes. If it wasn't for Bridget - lulled to sleep by the motion of the walk - I would have hardly recognized her from the woman I had come to know over the past year.

The topic of 'what happens when we get home' had been another subject that had never really been broached. Another touchy area that neither of us wanted to jinx by assuming it would come to pass. But now that we were well on our way, I let myself consider it.

It wasn't as though we could simply claim that Bridget wasn't ours, that we had adopted her or some other such nonsense. Janet - or whoever was awaiting us in the SGC infirmary - would be able to tell right away that Sam had recently given birth. Which would lead to the question: 'Who's the father?' Hammond - or whoever had replaced him - would immediately suspect me, and I wouldn't deny it. The very concept of denying that she was mine, just to escape what was sure to be a difficult situation and long explanation nearly made me sick. So we'd be forced to admit that we had conceived a child while on the planet together... and then what? Would The Powers That Be waive it, as I had predicted months ago? If they did, would Sam want to leave the program - temporarily or otherwise - to care for her daughter? Could I actually expect that from her? And what would she expect out of me? What was I willing to give... what could I afford to?

We'd spent the last year pining away for Earth when all we'd really been longing for was for things to go back to normal. At the same time, we'd irrevocably changed them so that they never, ever could. When we stepped through that Stargate, nothing would be the same. Telling myself 'this was the path you chose' didn't help much.

I loved Sam, and I was happy to be with her. But all these decisions had been made, all these paths chosen, on /this/ planet. By /this/ set of rules, not the set we had left behind. By leaping back into the fray, we were changing things.

How much would change between /us/?

*

Jack was quiet. I was quiet. For once, even Bridget was quiet.

We left the winding road and stepped down into the woods, and I relaxed at once. I shouldn't have - there was more danger out here than back there - but the small, dark streets had been oppressive, almost suffocating in their narrowness. Like the apartment here in Ankh'ij, like the cottage in Depa'ma, like the alley I'd been attacked in. The trees and craggy cliffs of the King's Woods towered over me, but didn't press in, didn't make me feel as though they would suddenly topple down upon me. And Jack kept his hand on my arm, which was also very... nice.

I was still attracted to him, obviously. Some of that tension had dissipated, but what had replaced it was even better and just as indescribable. I felt close to him like I never had before, like I'd never felt with anyone else before, not even Jonas. Jack and I, we were compatible, which surely came from working closely together for so long. Even before Ma'at'a, we had respected each other, trusted each other, been friends to each other. And that was the most important foundation of all.

Still, it wasn't until arriving on this world that we'd built upon that foundation, taking advantage of our freedom from the military restrictions and sharp-eyed sycophants that would have scared us away from ever pursuing a relationship on Earth. And though I knew I shouldn't worry myself with 'maybes' until we were stepping through that event horizon, I was a thinker. A planner. I couldn't help but look ahead - even if that was only two miles ahead - and be troubled by what could very well be in our future.

The old rules. New circumstances.

Shading branches stretched overhead in a mesh of canopying limbs, creating a barrier to the sky. It was a good ten degrees cooler as well, which felt good now but would become more and more of an annoyance as time wore on. I shifted Bridget gingerly in my arms, hoping not to wake her, and draped her blanket up over my shoulder, covering her bald head.

"Are we just cutting straight through?" I asked in a hushed tone of voice, taking one last glance over my shoulder as the buildings of Ankh'ij faded from view behind entangling foliage. It had been our prison, perhaps, but it was also the last remnant of civilization in sight. I faced forward quickly, wary of tripping on the treacherous terrain and unhappy with my sudden reluctance to leave the city behind us. We'd been hell-bent on getting home from Ma'at'a for a year, and in the process Ma'at'a had /become/ home.

"It's a good a plan as any," replied Jack, equally quiet, as aware as I was that there could be colonists and militiamen all around us. "These woods are crawling anyway. The less time we have to spend in them, the better."

I nodded my whole-hearted agreement with that sentiment. "No one's going to be 'expecting' us there, are they?"

"The Council members know where we're from," he reminded me with a shrug. "But Clera's not expecting me to be hanging around here. She probably thinks I'm either dead or I went back through to Earth without you." His voice was hard as he mentioned the prospect, and I fought back a smile. He could be sweet in the strangest ways.

"They've got bigger problems anyway," I pointed out. "Assuming this truce is for real." I pitched my words low - no reason to announce our position to all present - but I also knew, as did Jack, that if there were troops out there, of either side, they were already watching us... closely. By acting furtive we'd only be casting further suspicion upon ourselves. "Personally, I think it's more likely that they're just stalling... for time to bring in more militia and weapons."

"Or they're trying to lull the colonists into a false sense of security," Jack added, lending me a hand to cross a shallow ravine. "She's not getting too heavy for you, is she?" he asked, nodding down at Bridget.

"She was a lot easier to carry when she was still in the womb, I'll say that much," I told him with a grimace that ended up a smile. "I'm fine. If she wakes up we can switch."

Jack shrugged. "She likes me better anyway."

I raised an incredulous eyebrow, even though I knew full well that he was joking. "You're going to be one of those fathers who spoil their kid rotten, slowly but surely turning her against the mother, aren't you?"

"That's the plan."

"Please," I beseeched dryly. "She's going to get enough pampering from Teal'c and Daniel."

"And Hammond."

"Hammond?"

"Oh yeah. He's a sucker for little kids."

"Well, that explains why he put up with /you/ for so long."

He snorted, and I grinned, and we continued on for a while in silence, saving our breath as the ground tilted sharply upwards. At the top of the bluff, that was where we would start to loop around a bit, heading towards the water again... and therefore, moving towards the Stargate. We'd enter the clearing at a different angle then we had the first time around, and I carefully planned every action I would take once we were unprotected, unconcealed.

Once bitten...

The continued silence of the woods had a deceptive quality, as though we were being watched by those with ill intentions who were waiting for up to get as close as possible to our goal before gunning us down... out of shear spite. As we rested at the crest of the bank, with night beginning to fall and - predictably - Bridget beginning to wake, a macabre thought spirited into my mind. "Jack?"

"Yeah?" I could only barely see him in the twilight; his clothes, and mine, seemed to blend into the dulled evening colors perfectly. It was by outlines and impressions alone that I was able to trace his movements as he opened the satchel and withdrew the water canister.

I accepted it from him wordlessly and took a long drink before returning it to him and continuing. "If anything happens to me... you take Bridget and you get off this planet."

He stopped mid-swallow and stared at me as though I'd gone mad. Finally, though, he nodded, and we both knew the reason why. We had something more important to worry about than the other's safety and the repercussions of their loss. We had a child, a baby, our daughter, and the only thing that mattered now was /her/ protection. "Same here," he said solemnly, as though reading my mind, as though knowing that I still felt indebted to him for putting his life on the line for me back at the beginning.

We stood there a moment longer, the only sounds our heavy breathing and Bridget's fussy murmurings. Even with the canopied branches parted and two half-moons rising over our heads, it was so damn /dark/. "We should... find a place to spend the night," I spoke up, knowing just how unappetizing that sounded. "One of us is going to break their neck if we try to get down this hill in the dark."

Jack grumbled to himself, looking around the lightly forested summit. It would have been smarter to start out earlier, but we hadn't wanted to waste even a day before setting out, in case the conflict started up again. Now I realized what a mistake that had been. If the fighting /did/ begin again, tonight, we would be caught right in the middle of it. No protection. Nowhere to hide, and no allies to fend off the enemy. It seemed that on this last stretch of the journey, we'd be truly alone.

I opened my mouth to suggest we find a more sheltered spot to camp out when I heard it: a foot snapping a dry branch. It was a deliberate sound, too; I knew because it was /close/ and if this unknown person had managed to sneak this far up on us, undetected through the leafy debris, he wouldn't have made such a stupid blunder, giving away his position. I stiffened, catching the whites of Jack's startled eyes in the starlight and willing him not to do anything rash.

"Are you carrying weapons?" came a voice immediately, somewhat hushed, definitely male, and closer than I had expected.

"No," lied Jack.

"Unlikely. What about you?" demanded the voice, this time directed to me. "What are you carrying?"

"My daughter," I answered, more shakily then I would have liked, scared to death that the disembodied speaker wouldn't believe me, would assume Bridget was in fact some sort of weapon. What would happen then?

There was utter silence for a long moment.

"Sam... Jack? Is that you?"

I started in confusion at the conversational tone, but Jack gave a laughing, relieved sigh. "Jerdess?"

The stout man crept out of the underbrush, hardly more than a shadow in his dark clothes, swallowed up by the night. A Slade weapon, hanging by his side, gleamed dully. "I don't believe it," he announced incredulously. "The last I heard... you two were sent to Depa'ma."

"We couldn't stay away," Jack confided. "And not to sound paranoid or anything, but... are there more of you guys out there?"

"Of course," the other man chuckled. "These are /our/ woods, Jack... that's the only reason we've been able to hold out so long against the militia. Speaking of them, they're out here, too. Let's get the two - the /three/ of you - somewhere safe."

*

He led us off the bluff in a different direction than we'd been headed, further from the Stargate, but I wasn't about to complain. Especially when I saw the cave carved out of the base of the hill, saw the firelight and heard the voices coming from within.

"It's not an easy life," Jedress was saying. "But it /is/ worth it. It's me!" he called out as we passed over the wide, rocky threshold, and I noticed two men crouched in the underbrush on either side. I was impressed, to say the least.

"Thank you," Jedress laughed when I told him so. "We've... learned from our past mistakes, you might say. And it doesn't hurt that there are people officially in the service of the Council who are willing to take a few risks for us."

We emerged from a narrow, declining tunnel into a low-ceilinged 'room' -- for lack of a better word. It was a cave, probably a natural one, but far larger than I had expected. Torches spaced along the walls gave the impression of a medieval banquet hall, and the way the population sprawled throughout reminded me of the Central Hall back in Ankh'ij. Faces turned towards us as we entered, not panicked, simply vigilant. Most were unfamiliar, but there were a few here and there that I thought I could place.

One of them, a slender, graceful figure, leapt from her place at the hearth and picked her way towards us with all the haste she could muster. "Halsi!" exclaimed Sam as soon as the woman was close enough, and I took Bridget so that she could greet the other woman with a nervous hug.

"We never thought that we would see you again," the woman gushed, taking in Sam's clothes with a measure of bewilderment. "I've never known a person to return from Depa'ma."

"We were kinda... unorthodox about it," I admitted.

Halsi smiled at me, and her beautiful hazel eyes widened when they landed on the bundle in my arms. "Is that...?"

"Ours? Yeah," I replied, shy and proud at the same time as Halsi peered into the blanket. "Her name's Bridget."

"She's absolutely beautiful." Sam beamed.

A tidbit of information popped into my head. "Hey, Halsi, didn't you have one too?" At her confused expression, I clarified. "A baby? Weren't you pregnant?"

Her eyes, so much lighter than the others, darkened, reflecting the flickering patterns of the torches. "I was," she said softly, and then turned, not meeting our eyes, and went back the way she had come.

"She lost the child... gave birth to it over 100 Réys too early," said Jerdess sadly, as soon as she was out of earshot. He readjusted the weapon on his shoulder, a bit of neurotic action, and sighed. "And before you ask... Bob is dead. He was killed in one of the first battles. Halsi... she wanted to name the child after him... to honor him, but..." He sighed. "She's alone. All Ciarrah and I can do is be her friends."

So, I was right. These people weren't big on second marriages, even when the spouse was dead. No husband, no child. How awful for these people. How patently awful to lose a child and then a... I stopped the thought before it fully formed.

I was /not/ going there.

I'd already /been/ there.

***

"SG-1, you have a go."

Landseth nodded up at Hammond, and then at me. I looked over at Teal'c, and he glanced at Kelly. "Everybody set?"

It seemed we were. The Colonel led the way up the ramp, letting Teal'c proceed her into the Stargate, and then Ian Kelly. The Captain was the newest member of the team, replacing Aaron Barrette, who had replaced Sam. He was no scientist - he even made Jack look pretty smart - but he was easy to get along with /and/ he was someone I had known since the beginning of the project: a bonus. Hammond had simply counted his lucky stars that he wouldn't be fighting me all the way, as he had while appointing Landseth, and transferred Kelly from SG-3 to SG-1. Makepeace wasn't pleased - the two teams had a definite tolerance/hate relationship - but eventually he quieted down, especially when Kelly's old spot was taken by a certain Lieutenant Fallon. She had a much better body than Ian.

Landseth also waited for me to make my way up to the event horizon. She didn't smile, didn't nod... she didn't have to. This was no special mission. This was standard recon to a boring old swamp planet, our first legit assignment since the deaths of Sha're and Aaron. Hammond had never brought up returning to Ma'at'a. Neither had Landseth. Neither, I'm ashamed to say, had I.

I don't know how Teal'c felt about any of this. We didn't talk as much as we had before; even after Sha're's death it had been Janet I had gone to, not him. It was sad and I felt like an ass doing it, considering the fact that the Jaffa didn't have many good buddies on base or off... but spending time with him was hard. Maybe because he reminded me of the old SG-1. Maybe because he'd never spoken up while I was killing myself trying to get an okay for a return trip to 984. Maybe... and a thousand other possible reasons.

I looked over at Landseth only briefly before stepping into the Stargate, ignoring the short pat on my shoulder as she followed me.

***

The sound of hushed voices brought me back into the waking world, blinking sleep away with some reluctance as I strove to remember where I was and why the hell I was so sore. Slowly, the cavern came into focus and my blurred memories became sharper. Jerdess. Halsi. The colonists.

I was laying on my side on a thin cot that passed as a bed around here, which was to blame for the pain arcing up my side. Sure, a year ago sleeping on the ground was no big thing, but I'd grown too used to the soft mattress we'd called our own at Krivin's. This lifestyle took some getting used to.

I lay on my side, facing Jack, one arm in its customary position looped over my waist. Pillowed by our bag, which we'd used to cushion our heads, his face was calm, his expression tranquil and almost childlike, a muscle in his jaw working lazily. We were such different people when we slept, I reflected. For a short time, our worries and fears and hopes melted away, sneaking back into some hidden compartment that would spring open as we woke, but thankfully remained shut as we rested. I wondered what I looked like when I slept... the same? Oblivious to the world? Content?

I'd come to be content... and on this world, no less. Months ago, admitting that fact would have hurt. Having to confess that I had grown comfortable on Ma'at'a, that it had somehow evolved into less of a prison and more of the home would have cost me dearly. Even now, the notion sent a pang through my chest as I thought of Daniel, Teal'c, Janet... and my family, my biological family: Dad, Mark, his wife and children. All back on Earth with no idea of what had become of us. I knew. I had been on the other end, of having no control of the situation, able only to sit back and hope for the best possible outcome out of a handful of bad choices. I could imagine all too well what the others were going through... while Jack and I had become closer, started a family, started a life, without them, on this planet whose existence they most likely cursed.

They would have stopped looking, I knew. Rescues, when they came, came quickly, and there had been none. If it had been an SG team in the King's Woods the night Jack had been shot, all the more reason to believe that that had been one last ditch effort and that they were all moving on with their lives. Maybe they counted us lost. Dead. They had most certainly replaced us, found others to take the positions we had so proudly filled.

Maybe they even talked about us. Maybe Teal'c and Daniel told old SG-1 stories to new team members around the campfire... or, more than likely, the EKG monitor. They had to have a lot of good memories. I sure did.

And I was determined to make more.

For so long, I had lived each day with the dream of returning to the SGC, to the flabbergasted stares of my old teammates and friends, to breathless questioning: What happened to you? How did you get back? How did you do it? Every night, painfully aware of the body beside me, I'd held onto that vision, that talisman, that goal.

But even with that distant star to reach for, the days had passed agonizingly slowly, the interval between sunrise to sunset so torturous that I wondered if perhaps Ma'at'a's orbit wasn't so Earth-like after all. The star, the dream, simply seemed too distant, too impossible, and when I realized that, it had lost most of its strength.

I turned in Jack's slack grip, looking out over the cavern. We'd been given a spot near the wall, and a woven basket that we had used as a makeshift crib for Bridget. Peeking inside, I noted with relief that my daughter was still out cold, blowing bubbles of saliva in her sleep. I smiled and returned my head to the cushioning bag. She'd cried out only once during the night, but had gone back to sleep, thank God.

I'd floundered for some time, with no goal that seemed even slightly achievable, afraid to reach out for help because the only person who could help was Jack and that didn't seem quite fair. It wasn't his responsibility to hold my head above the water, to give me pep talks, to worry about me when he had concerns of his own. Even when he /tried/ to be there for me, I refused to see the signs, and pushed him away. Until I just couldn't any longer. Until I had surrendered and realized that what I had been fighting was the only thing that had saved me.

Across a sea of sleeping bodies through the dim lighting - firelight mixed with strains of early morning sunshine filtering through - I saw two men talking in muffled voices near the entrance. One, I could tell by the stature, was Jerdess. The other was a taller man who nodded once at something Jedress had said, waved goodbye, hitched his weapon up on his shoulder, and left the cave.

Carefully, cautiously, loathe to wake Jack, I slipped out of his arms. He must have been exhausted; his limbs were a dead weight, slapping back onto the pallet torpidly. I paused to make sure the motion hadn't been enough to draw him from his much-needed sleep, nodded as I saw it hadn't, and stood.

Dust motes waltzed in the dim light, dirt and bits of ash from the fires, and I waved the airborne debris away as I picked a path across the floor. Most of the prone bodies I passed lay in pairs, gray-donned frames huddled together, arms wrapped around shoulders and backs and waists, faces tucked against cheeks or chests. Children either snuggled with parents or siblings in such wrinkled heaps that they could have been mistaken for a pile of laundry, or maybe a litter of puppies clustered together against their harsh new world. I wondered what kind of food they hoarded or grew, how they stored it or kept it fresh, if they had any bathroom facilities besides the great outdoors. I wondered how good their chances were and what the morale was like and what the Council would do to these fine people if they lost. Relocation again? Somehow I doubted it.

When I reached Halsi's thin mattress, I wasn't at all surprised to see her beautiful eyes open and fixated on the ceiling. Something told me that she hadn't slept at all, that she'd been laying like this, in a faux catatonic state, since wandering off the night before.

The loss of a child, I thought, a marrow-deep shudder reverberating through my chest. It was something I could envision all too well now; I felt a deeper sympathy for the father of my own child, the kind of compassion that can only come from a parent.

The loss of a husband, I added, glancing back in the direction from which I'd come. Finally, I was able to comprehend something that had alluded me for some time: what it meant to be husband and wife. Not like what it would have been with Jonas, controlling and domineering. Not like what it could possibly be with someone like Narim or Graham Simmons, whimsical and full of childish delight. No, it seemed to me now that 'marriage' was nothing more than a legal term, a bit of ink on paper, a truth or, in our case, a lie. It didn't matter what some Accountant had jotted down, and it didn't even matter what we ourselves had assumed we'd known. Being married to someone, at least in our day and age, was about trust and attraction and love, and love was about admiration and respect... and so maybe, just maybe, I'd been married to Jack O'Neill before I'd ever set foot on Mat'at'a.

"Your daughter is beautiful," said Halsi hollowly.

I sat down next to her, on the very edge of the pallet, near her slippered feet. "I'm sorry."

She didn't look at me.

I sighed, knowing how empty and meaningless those words must seem to her, and trying to remember how it had been when I'd feared that Jack had been killed. The awful void in my life and my soul, the constant presence of dread and depression that lurked in my mind like a sinkhole, ready to pull me into bottomless doubt if my thoughts dare stray in that direction. Despite the horror of it, I tried to imagine Bridget dead, Jack dead, nothing before me but a long and lonely future. Nothing but a cause, a job, some task that would take my mind off what I had lost, through no fault of my own.

"We're going home," I said softly. "Through the Sungate. Come with us."

The request jolted a second of emotion from Halsi; she lifted an eyebrow and glanced briefly in my direction. "And what would I do there? What kind of use would I be to you? I cannot fight, I cannot be strong. I cannot lose anyone else, and this... this is everything to me now." She shook her head. "They feel sorry for me. Your people would pity me as well, and those are sympathies I don't deserve."

"You are strong. You're one of the strongest people I know. And you /would/ have a place. You could help me take care of Bridget," I pressed. "You wouldn't be pitied... you'd be welcomed. Maybe... maybe you could even find someone else."

Her voice had a chilling ring of finality to it. "I don't /want/ anybody else."

I wanted very badly to protest, to explain, to tell her how Jack had been married and had lost, and now how he loved me, how he wanted someone else after all... but I didn't. It wasn't just that we were keeping silent of his marriage to Sara. It was the determination in Halsi's eyes, the resolution, the stubbornness I recognized and knew could not be buffered down with a few pathetic platitudes.

I put a hand on one of her bent knees, and sat there with her until the others woke.

*

Before I was even fully awake, I was reaching out, filled with panic, for Sam and Bridget. The mat beside me was empty - warm, but empty - however, my daughter's basket was still within an arm's length. I jostled the makeshift crib as I pulled myself into a sitting position, and the infant squealed and gurgled, as though to say, "now you're gonna get it" and launched into one of her most splendid renditions of 'cat in a rusty blender'.

Heart still pounding with the anxiety that follows such a hasty waking, I lifted Bridget from her bed, held her against my thumping chest, and realized a suspiciously wet warmth against one hand. Suppressing a sigh, reminding myself of how glamorous fatherhood was, I set her back down, this time on the mat, stripping off the soiled stopgap diaper - a folded cloth - and reaching for a clean strip of fabric. All the while, I kept glancing up, scanning the room. There was tension in the air, a pressure any military man worth his salt would notice at once.

Most of the adults were up, though some of the older children still huddled on their mattresses, squeezing their eyes shut against the noise, the shifting morning light, or the strain in their parents' voices. Words were mostly murmured in hushed tones, but now and then someone would lose control and let out an angry shout.

I tucked in Bridget's "diaper", picked her back up and stood, better to see the room and gauge the changing situation. My eyes were drawn immediately to Sam, to her hair, and I saw she was deep in conversation with Halsi and Jerdess. All three looked dismayingly glum, and, hoping against hope, I hurried over to them.

Jerdess was breathing hard. "We should have... suspected treach... treachery. Why did... we not? This is the /Council/, we should /know/ better by now."

"Don't blame yourselves," said Sam firmly, and then she turned to me. "The negotiation team they sent to Ankh'ij is missing," she explained. "One of the scouts they sent this morning is claiming he heard gunshots."

Unconsciously, I held my daughter closer. "Clera had them killed?"

"I doubt they are sitting down for breakfast together," said Halsi frostily. "Seeber and the others knew what conclusion we would come to if they did not return at the correct time. If they were alive they /would/ have been at the meeting place."

Sam squinted in confusion. "Seeber... Seeber was part of the negotiations team?"

Halsi raised her chin. "He was very good at it."

"Not good enough," Jerdess growled. "We must retaliate."

A few of the colonists milling fearfully around the cave began to take notice of us, and our conversation. Their frightened expressions did nothing to quell my own growing anxiety. These weren't soldiers, not even poorly-trained ones like the Council employed. These were men who had brought their wives and children to this place to escape tyranny, but had they ever foreseen this fate? These were families who had chosen hardship and freedom over more comfortable oppression... but just how uncomfortable were they willing to get? How chivalrous were they willing to be? How much were they willing to risk?

Two sides of me seemed to battle for dominance. The fighter, the reasonably-well-decorated army man, demanded that I join the battle, that I follow my conscience and do whatever I could to help these people. A year or so ago, that voice, while not the only deciding factor, would have overwhelmed the others; I would have grabbed and a Slade and would have been leading the charge to Ankh'ij without a second thought. And, ten to one, Sam would have been right behind me.

But now that things had changed, the soldier's voice wasn't quite as loud. And there were other thoughts. Not counting the brief skirmish against Lel'tan months ago, the one I'd deserted, I hadn't /been/ a fighter in quite a while. What I had been was a father, and it was the voice of the parent that spoke above the others, telling me that I wasn't in the same boat as the rest of these people, that Sam, Bridget and I didn't have any part in the freedom fighters' cause. Sure, we might support it, and we might agree with it, but surely that didn't mean we were required to lay down our lives for it? Or that we could look on as our lives were laid down for us?

When I spoke, I did so carefully, aware that many eyes were on me. "Jerdess, I need to ask you something important."

His expression was guarded. "What is it?"

"If you blow this thing against the Council wide open... if you start a war, /today/, what're your chances of winning?"

The question was poison. The room fell as silent as a graveyard; the air was as heavy as a corpse. It was as though every soul in the natural hall had taken a breath at the exact moment I'd posed my question. Jerdess squirmed.

"Good?" prodded Sam. "Or hopeless?"

The other man glanced around the room. "Neither one nor the other," he said warily. "But I do know one thing. With our level of experience, and our supplies, and our manpower, we can hold out against Clera for some time. But in an all-out battle, an offensive, I can't imagine we would last long. /She/ isn't afraid to throw her men in harm's way, and she has a good many of them."

"It's hopeless," announced a man near the back of the room, identity kept secret by the crowd. As a result, I couldn't see the speaker's face, but his tone said all I needed to know. The voice didn't waver. There was no timid or bitter edge to the words. As thought 'hopeless' was less of a condemnation and more of a challenge.

So maybe I hadn't given these colonists enough credit, I thought, wryly.

*

I had a bad feeling about this.

It was nothing I could put into words exactly. It was emotion gleaned from the tense atmosphere, the trepidation that was less a condition and more a physical /thing/. The room nearly vibrated with something insidious, and the wide-eyed way the colonists stared at our little group seemed a bad omen in and of itself. Last night, walking with Jerdess, they had all seemed so in control, so prepared for any eventuality, even this one. Now it appeared that hadn't been the case at all, that the refugees were still alive because of luck more than any other factor.

But that couldn't be it, could it? Clera's forces were disorganized, but there were also frighteningly large. I'd seen close up some of the injuries the colonists had inflicted upon the militia, and I felt like a doctor venturing out into the field for the first time, seeing what inhumane actions had led to a person falling under my care. Because they were all people. Every militiaman. Every Council member. Even Clera had borne a child for nine months, just as I had.

Aquatinting oneself with the enemy was almost always a risky business. War, when you get right down to the bare bones of it, is about killing. We had somewhat of a lucky break, finding a home in the SGC, because our enemies /weren't/ people, not in a sense, anyway. We could justify the fighting and the deaths in a way we never could during Vietnam and the Gulf War, and all other, less recent, armed conflicts: these were hostile aliens, and they didn't just want to rule other countries by offensive means. They wanted to kill and enslave us, and we were duty-bound to stop them.

Here, we didn't have that luxury. Not only were the militiamen very human, they had also been impressed. They were doing this because the Council was threatening their families' lives. On the other hand, if the colonists /didn't/ fight, and injure, and kill, they would lose definitively, and little mercy would be shown to them.

There was a reason I preferred science to combat.

My bad feeling remained.

Jack paused, and his downcast eyes glittered: a sign he was doing some serious thinking. I wondered if he still realized that he was holding Bridget - swathed in a blanket and fretting to herself - or if the military mind had already taken over. The ominous presence that had settled down over us told me that I already knew what he was thinking, and what he would say to Jerdess, Halsi, and the rest of the anticipating throng.

/We'll stay. We'll help you try to even those odds. We'll try to not make it so hopeless./

Because that was Jack personified. /I'll grumble, I'll bitch and moan and complain... but seriously, what can I do to help?/ My throat went unexpectedly dry as I waited, with the others, for him to make that inevitable announcement. I was less sure about what my own reply would be... but only slightly. I would offer to go with him at once. We would give Bridget to Halsi, entrusting her with our daughter's safety and - perhaps - future, and we would be the duty-bound soldiers, following the lead of our consciences and doing what we could to keep an extraordinary people free and alive.

When I snapped out of my dejected reverie, and looked over at Jack, I was surprised to see him staring down at the bundle in his arms.

***

I weighed the stone in my hand, rubbing the pads of my fingers across it's water-smoothed surface, testing its mass in my palm. Just a rock, the kind of stone that could be found on any coast or lakefront or riverbed on earth. Deep brown in color, laced with darker strata. Leaning away to gain leverage, I pulled back my arm and let fly, loosing the rock in the moon-spangled darkness, hearing only a subtle 'plop' and a vague motion on the starlit water.

There was another, larger, motion beside me, one I recognized as Kathryn Landseth even before I turned towards her. The Colonel shuffled down the shallow slope and then sat down at my side, her boots, like mine, only a few inches away from the water's edge. It was the same lake that we had circumvented earlier, after coming through to this planet in late afternoon, walking to the nearest village, making nice with the populace, and then excusing ourselves for the walk home. Kathryn had decided - and the others had agreed - that it might be prudent to spend the night planetside; there were far more treacherous places on the lakefront than the spot where we'd set up camp.

The same body of water... but it looked so very different. So dark, so angry, so all-encompassing, a black force that could swallow all of us as easily as it had swallowed up that faultless stone.

Landseth had shed her jacket in favor of enjoying the breeze, although her weapon was still a conspicuous bulge in the holster at her thigh. The same light wind fingered strands of hair that had come free of her bun; in the navy darkness, they seemed less wine-red and more raven-black. Her eyes were dark as well, staring out on the water intensely, as though sharing some special communion with it, cheekbones aglow with moonlight, her dogtags sparkling with it.

So eerie was the specter that I nearly started when she spoke, and her voice was normal. Rich, throaty, and invigoratingly frank. "When are you going to stop looking for them, Jackson?"

I dug my heels into the bank. "I don't know. When I find them, maybe."

"And if you don't find them?" /Them/. It was like a talisman.

"I won't accept that," I replied stubbornly.

Landseth drew up her knees and rested her elbows on them. "What if you do find them, and they're dead? Are you going to be able to let go? Give up?" She answered her own question. "Because I don't think you can. I think it's become such a part of your life that even if you found them ALIVE and well, you'd still be... compelled to keep looking."

"We KNOW Sam's alive," I said patiently. "Sam said so... physics says so."

"And how many times has physics been proved wrong at the SGC?" Landseth countered, earning a nasty glare from me. I had my own doubts and insecurities to deal with; I didn't need hers on top of it. "Look, I'm not saying you're wrong. That Samantha was just as smart as you've told me. And I'm sure that O'Neill more than lives up to his stories. I WANT to believe that you're right, Daniel, I honestly do. I wish I could FEEL it like you can, because then I wouldn't be stuck here trying to play devil's advocate."

The use of my first name earned her another glance, and I was shocked by the earnestly in her expression.

"Now," she began with gusto, "you were the one with the GDO, right? Which explains why they haven't tried to return before. Even if a tech recognized the planet, he'd probably be ordered to keep the iris shut."

"In case they had the codes tortured out of them by the Ma'at'ans," I said flatly. "Even though the natives were terrified of the Stargate and not close to our level of technology."

"There's also the fact that the Gate's been buried for some time," Landseth said, heedlessly. "How long, who knows? Not to mention the fact it's a damn war zone in that area."

"There was no fighting in the immediate vicinity of the Gate."

"Good point. Holy ground?"

"Something like that."

"So... what? You saw Carter go down, didn't you? And as far as I know O'Neill wasn't much for medical training, beyond the basic field courses."

"Maybe she got medical attention in Anhk'ij."

"It's a possibility," said Landseth slowly.

Her tone caught me off guard. "What are you thinking?" I asked, warily, knowing that when the Colonel went into this kind of Deep Contemplation mode, it usually wasn't a good sign.

She brushed the windswept strands off her face. "That there's only one way to know for sure, for certain."

I swallowed down hope, stomped on it, locked it away... and still it rose, a balloon in my throat, clamping off my air supply. "What's that?" I squeaked.

"We go back. Tonight. Now."

"What are you talking about?"

Landseth leaned towards me, eyes bright and expression exuberant and suddenly intrigued, as though she hadn't been the one to bring it up. "I'm talking about putting an end to this, Jackson," she said smoothly. "About finding whether or not you've been right all this time. About ending this chapter of your life one way or another so you can move on with Janet. You say you love her, and yeah... I'm sure you do or you would never have proposed. But such a big part of your life is devoted to O'Neill and Carter. If you don't find them or find out what /happened/ to them, you'll never be happy."

I remained silent, trying to absorb this outburst. Landseth had always been brisk and straightforward, honest to a painful point, but where I was concerned and where Sam and Jack were concerned, she'd been a little more careful... even danced around the subject at times. And now here she was, coming up to me and out of nowhere suggesting a plan of action that was very... unlike her. "You care if I'm happy or not?" I stammered, confused by the sudden change.

"Or course," she said scornfully. "Right from the start you were determined to make me hate you as much as you hated me. All that did was make me more determined to like you. And it wasn't hard. You're a good man, Jackson, even when you're trying to be an ass."

I ignored that last bit. "I don't hate you."

She grinned brilliantly. "Glad to hear it. Now. What do you think? We aren't due back to the SGC for another ten hours. That gives us more than enough time to do a little investigating on old P2F-983, don't you think?"

The situation was so absurd that I stood, trying in some small way to regain control I'd never really had in the first place. Our camp, where Ian Kelly and Teal'c sat guarding the tents and feeding the fire, wasn't far away, but was thankfully out of earshot. I glared down at Kathryn. "Hammond would kill us."

She stood as well, and met me eye-to-eye. "IF he found out, he'd kill ME. I'm the C.O., and I'm perfectly ready to take the blame."

"IF?"

"If we don't find anything there, he never has to know, now does he? And if we do..." She gave a disgusted grimace. "Well, I don't care. I WANT to do this."

"You're assuming the Gate's still unblocked."

"I am."

"We can't use the MALP to check, not from here."

"I will go first, Daniel Jackson."

For a big guy, Teal'c was unnervingly quiet. The sudden sound of his voice caused me to jump a step back; my heel caught on something and I would have fallen backwards into the soggy bank if Ian Kelly hadn't grabbed my sleeve. The captain stood beside Teal'c, almost hidden by his shadow, silent and stocky.

Landseth frowned, seeming not at all thrown off by the two men's unexpected appearance. "Can't ask you to do that, Teal'c."

Teal'c face appeared to blend into the darkness, leaving only the whites of his eyes gleaming resolutely back at the Colonel. "If the way is indeed clear, I can inform you by reopening the Stargate to this planet."

"No, Teal'c. I'm not letting you go alone. Hostiles --"

"Then I'll go with him," said Ian glibly.

The stout captain stood beside Teal'c, backlit by the campfire several meters away, the moonlight casting deformed globs of darkness over his small features. I remembered a conversation I'd had with Janet about Ian Kelly's fitting in, where I'd mentioned how painfully affable and eager-to-please the Captain was. Unlike Kathryn, Kelly understood the weight of the role he had taken, and was leaving us plenty of leeway to hate his guts because of it. For that very reason, he was impossible to dislike, but he had overzealous tendencies that were slightly disturbing. Nothing worried me more than a blindly loyal, furiously-dedicated follower, whether he be human or alien, because that kind of indiscriminate devotion was what put people like Hitler and Stalin and Apophis in power. Ignorance and fear.

Not that Ian was unintelligent. He /was/ stupid in the same way Jack had been stupid: profoundly, proudly, in his own words "a flaming idiot". But he was also astute and discerning in that same O'Neill-ish way: quietly, reluctantly.

I liked the kid. But even if I hadn't liked him, I wouldn't have been able to take him up on his offer.

I grumbled loudly and trudged back up the slope of the bank, towards the camp, noting with pleasure how the others followed almost hesitantly. I grabbed my jacket from where it sat on the ground, shook out any insects that might have moved in, and shrugged it on, turning back to Landseth, Teal'c, and Ian as they warily approached. "If we're going to do this," I decided, "I'm going to be the one to do it. Me and the Colonel. I'm a civilian and... well, it was her idea."

Kathryn gave me an unexpected grin. "That it was," she quipped. "Come on. We've got ten hours. Let's break down camp."

***

"I'm going to ask you something very selfish."

To his credit, Jerdess didn't walk away from me, and he could have, very simply. This was war, and in war, there was little time for conversations and requests. Especially selfish ones. But the other man held his ground, merely sneaking a discreet glance at Halsi before prodding me. "Go ahead."

I couldn't seem to form the words. "I realize this is a difficult time for everyone here, and this might make it even more difficult..."

Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Sam, alternately staring at me and Bridget with an unreadable expression.

"Say it," demanded Halsi.

"It's going to take us an hour or so to make it to the Sungate," I blurted. "That's only if we're lucky. Now, we're right in the middle of a fight here, a fight you're not sure you can win." I saw Jerdess wince, and a couple of our 'audience' murmured, but I plowed ahead. "Basically, if you start a retaliation now, if you start /fighting/ now... we'll never be able to make it back."

Sam's expression had slipped into surprise, even amazement, and as I looked down nervously at my daughter I thought I understood the reason. The old Jack O'Neill's MO would have been to automatically offer himself as a soldier for their cause, to don himself in their camouflage and hoist up their weapon and call himself one of them for the remainder of his life. Because these were a people I agreed with, as I'd agreed with Thomas Jefferson when he'd said that resistance to tyrants was obedience to God, and the Council of Ma'at'a /were/ a bunch of lowlife, lying, cretin tyrants as much as Hussein or any of those other creeps. A kind of universal enemy. Jerdess and Halsi and the others... they were the underdogs. The kind of people I could root for. The kind the old Jack O'Neill could fight alongside.

But, damn it, I'd changed. I'd /been/ changing, certainly since becoming a father again, probably since realizing my stay on this planet would be a bit longer than planned. I couldn't play by the old rules here any more than I could live by the regulations once we got back home. And to do my duty as a /father/, to make sure my daughter and her mother /got/ back home, I had to have the balls to make a purely selfish request. And it was hard, especially when the person you were asking knew you as a pretty straightforward, upright kind of guy.

As it was, Jerdess didn't seem a bit confused. He was a father, or at least he'd been one. Just as I empathized with him as a soldier, he had to empathize with me as a parent, right? That was what was so great about the SGC, about dealing with transplanted humans more than exotic aliens. No matter what world they called home, or what values system they had grown up on, there were just some things that all humans shared. That they could connect with. "You want me to delay the counterstrike," he repeated, flatly. "Long enough for you three to get to the Sungate."

He didn't need me to acknowledge that what he said was the truth. I remained silent. Sam remained silent. Bridget kicked and flailed against my chest, but also seemed to understand the gravity of the situation and kept her fussing to a minimum.

Jerdess's face told me nothing of what he was thinking or feeling. "You know that for every moment we wait, Clera's reinforcements grow closer. Our enemy becomes stronger."

Halsi's gaze was chilling.

"We know," confirmed Sam.

"And that as they strengthen, our chances for success grow dimmer. And that this is greater than any one family."

My jaw ached; I realized I was clenching it. Didn't that just figure? The one time I went a little greedy, I was the one who got the lesson in the needs of the few and the one. "Yeah, I know."

Halsi's voice had a monotonous, almost dead quality. "But if we didn't put the family first, we would be no better than the Council. Holding comrades as hostages, as prisoners. Trading lives for victory."

Jerdess cocked his head in concession. "I know," he echoed me.

A moment passed. A moment of deliberation and decision, and then Jerdess nodded to an unseen member of the crowd. "I will do my best to get in contact with the group on the other side of the hill," he said dryly. "Now get your things and go. You don't have all Réy."

***

"Mind telling me something?"

"Probably."

Landseth actually smiled at my answer. "Yeah, you probably will. But I'm going to ask you anyway: why fight me on this?"

For a few moments, I didn't answer, trudging along, watching my footing, creating just enough of a pause to get her wondering if I planned on replying at all. In truth, I wasn't sure what to say. When she had suggested returning to The Planet, why hadn't I leapt to my feet, sprinted down the lakefront, yelling that I would meet her there? When all my dreams had been answered, why hadn't I acted as though they had been? "Why not?" I muttered.

Landseth sighed, resting her hands on her MP5. "You think I was just yanking your chain? What? Why argue?"

Ian and Teal'c walked side-by-side only a few feet behind us, but from the way the wind blew, I knew my words would be taken away from them. "Because... it's what I've been doing for the last /year/. Arguing. Fighting. Disagreeing, either about Jack and Sam or else just for the sake of... of..."

"Of being contrary," the Colonel finished. "To make everyone else as miserable as you."

I glared at her for knowing exactly what I was feeling.

She just laughed, and directed her face at the moonlight. "You act like you've got a monopoly on pain and suffering, Jackson. Like no one else but you has ever been through this. /I/ have. /I've/ lost people I've cared about with all my heart. Not in such a spectacular fashion, and I didn't grieve for them so spectacularly, either. Because I knew they were gone. And you still have hope. I guess that's why I'm doing this." Her tone because clipped, sharp, capable of drawing blood if I listened too closely. "You have hope. You kept hoping. You've practically kept your life at a standstill because you didn't want your friends to miss out on too much. That's a little overboard, but it's still... honorable." She shrugged, ducking her head. "I thought I was the one who'd asked /you/ the question?"

"I answered it."

Another shrug, a more confident one this time. "I guess you did."

***

No more than ten minutes later, we were on our way, armed with a Slade and a word of advice from Halsi: "There is a rough clearing surrounding the Sungate. It has become a holy land, a neutral spot, a place of refuge for both our side and theirs. Make it to that place, and Ma'at will keep you safe."

How patently ironic that the area of woodland that had been our undoing long ago, as we'd retreated from this place, would now be our sanctuary.

A young girl of nine or ten look me to an alcove where I could change from my ill-fitting tunic and pants to a slate-colored, knee-length dress, more utilitarian than feminine. It had been another bit of advice from Halsi. "The clothing of men is easier to move in, but it might also lead to your being /mistaken/ for a man. Two soldiers carrying bundles are much more suspicious and likely to be attacked than a husband, wife, and child."

Husband and wife...

Halsi, Jerdess, the other colonists... they had all been so outrageously helpful that I felt more than simply indebted to them. I feel that I had /stolen/ from them. Not just their clothing and weaponry, but their time and their one chance to remain alive and free.

'Live free or die'. It looked a lot nicer on paper than coming from the mouth of your leader.

I knew that we could never thank Jerdess and Halsi and the others enough, so we let our appreciation be shown in our good-byes. By the time we were ready to leave, most of the colonists were distracted by their own duties, gathering up their children and their belongings. Even Jerdess was gone, outside with some of his civilian contingent, preparing for the battle that would follow as soon as our time limit had passed. So it was just Halsi, waiting to see us out, looking timid and alone, as though this was the only duty small enough to fall beneath her notice. It was untrue, of course. It had to be. Look how she had assisted in convincing Jerdess to help us.

"You're sure you won't come with us?"

For a split second, even less, Halsi's face betrayed her feelings. She /did/ want to come with us. She wanted to escape all this, and see the world I'd told her about back in Ankh'ij. But she also couldn't, or wouldn't, or wouldn't let herself. She had a responsibility to this world as I had to Earth. Just as intensely as I knew I had to return to my home, she knew that she had to remain on hers. "I am sure."

Jack still held Bridget, whose fretting was - naturally - more pronounced now. He also still carried with him a vague sense of embarrassment that probably stemmed from his earlier request. To ask a people to put themselves on the line for him... that went against his grain, and it had to rub painfully. To know that increased numbers of colonists might die in order to secure safe passage for us... that was something /I/ didn't even want to contemplate. Even knowing that our biggest obligation was Bridget, and this was the one way to keep her safe. "Halsi..." he began, with more uncertainty than I had ever seen from him, "I don't want you to think any less of us... of me... but... I had another wife. Named Sara. And a son... a son named Charlie, who died. Here, and with..." - he seemed to lean unconsciously closer to me - "I had a second chance. You deserve one, too."

The woman brushed an oily strand of hair out of her eyes, and stared at us with some mixture of horror and hope. In response, I put my hand on Jack's, the one that supported Bridget's back, hoping to show Halsi that we didn't mean any less to each other, that I wasn't a second choice, that he wasn't in some way damaged. Balancing Bridget against one arm, he captured my hand in his own, threading our fingers together. A thunderclap of ill-timed lust jolted through me, and I banished it.

"I see," said Halsi in a way that told me she didn't, not yet. "You have to go."

All business. I could deal with that. Halsi moved aside, and we were confronted with the gray morning light. And trees. Some things never changed.

*

It didn't take long for me to realize that an hour was a optimistic assessment. It was perhaps a mile as the crow flew, but from this direction, over this terrain, with our precious cargo, it was a different story. Panic spurred my every step, fear that our time limit would pass, that the Council would start the fight, that we would be deemed suspicious by the soldiers that had to be concealed by the foliage, that we would be gunned down.

My breath came in wheezes, and sweat began to bead at my hairline. I barely noticed when it started to rain, tiny drops commingling into larger ones in the canopy above, then splashing down upon us. I didn't really pay any mind until my brain resurfaced and I realized that my clothing was sopping, clinging to me in sodden bunches. Sam was only a foot or so behind, and I looked back at her. "Bridget?"

"She's good," she huffed, meaning our daughter was warm and dry and not unduly irritated by our present conditions.

And then we were Colonel O'Neill and Captain Carter again, trekking through the deep woods in unfavorable conditions, me armed with a weapon and her with a package of unmatched importance. Not so long ago, I'd reminded myself of what a great thing the SGC was. And that was just it. Suddenly, it became apparent that I was still a part of Stargate Command, that I hadn't left it behind as fully as I'd thought when I'd 'married' Sam and found a new home with her. The realization was frightening and awe-inspiring, striking me not so much a feeling of homecoming as one of loss. When I went through that Gate, I would lose what I had gained here.

In response, the heavens opened up upon me. Lightning carved the sky fiercely. Bridget whimpered.

I thought of my daughter's namesake, and all the other gods that these people believed in. The different deities that so many other cultures worshiped. During that brief stroke of light and subsequent clap-crash of thunder, I could sense them. Staring down at me disapprovingly. Telling me to turn back.

***

In the moonlight, by the lakefront, framed by darkness, reflecting the stars, the gate was particularly monolithic. In this setting, it looked more like the massive alien structure that it was and less of the conventional piece of machinery I'd become accustomed to seeing and using every day.

Before I could think twice about my motivation, before Kathryn could question hers, I punched in the symbols for Ma'at'a, forever etched in my mind. The plasma rushed at us, snapping back like a dragon's maw, but it only served to remind me that we were walking in blind. What if the war had gone right up to the Gate, and the militia was waiting for us? What if it had been reburied? Jesus, what were we thinking, going into this kind of situation?

Ian looked as though he was wondering the same thing. "So you two go through... then what?"

Landseth seemed to be sizing up the event horizon, as though challenging an opponent. "We have ten hours," she said conversationally. "Give us half of that. Whatever you do, don't come after us. Five hours and there's no word, you get yourselves home and make sure the General understands that I /ordered/ you to let me go, and that I /made/ Jackson come along, against his will."

I snorted.

"You're right," she grinned. "Hammond wouldn't believe that either. Leave out that last part, Ian. But don't even /think/ of coming after us."

"Yes ma'am," he said unconvincingly.

"Captain..."

"Yes /ma'am/."

"Teal'c?"

The Jaffa said nothing, and Landseth scowled. I nudged her. "They wouldn't have listened to Jack, either."

She seemed to take it as a compliment. After a moment of thought, I realized that was how I had intended it to be taken.

"Come on, Daniel," she entreated. "Let's do this."

***

The 'clearing' was atrocious.

It was a different place than the one I'd been run into and carried out of a year ago, hardly recognizable as that same indefensible field. The surrounding brush had taken over, pressing in on the center, where the Stargate had to be. Trees, vines, and overgrowth tangled themselves in a thick organic carpet that was only somewhat marked by narrow, meandering pathways. It certainly said something for the plant life on Ma'at'a.

On top of all of this, there was the storm to contend with. What had begun as a sprinkling, a light spattering of raindrops against the trees had morphed into a full-fledged torrent. The clouds high above, peeking through grizzled branches, were vaguely luminescent, set aglow by the morning sun hidden behind them. It was our only boon: at least it wasn't dark.

Not /yet/, anyway.

With no option but to continue to plod along, in search of shelter, the three of us were soaked to the skin, burdened by our soggy clothing. Bridget was decidedly unhappy with these accommodations, and let us know, refusing to be soothed or quieted.

Wordlessly, determined only to keep the other in sight, Jack and I fought our way through the lashing branches and slick, overhanging vines, edging past trunks of trees and the cold stone outcroppings that I remembered so well. A sixth sense told me we were almost there, that we had nearly made it. Maybe it was the naqueda in my blood, an echo of Jolinar, singing out that our goal was near. Maybe it was just me, and my remembrance of this fated place.

Bolts of lightning charred across the sky, arcing; heaven's party streamers. I flinched at the resultant thundering, a noxious, dooming sound, and brushed my dripping hair out of my eyes. /Don't think about it, not how uncomfortable you are, how the rain and cold air could affect Bridget's health or yours or Jack's, don't think about how your legs hurt, and how close you must be and why aren't you there yet? Just one foot in front of the other, don't think, just walk, just keeping moving.../

I was so committed to my task that when Jack stopped abruptly in front of me, I crashed into his back. He turned to me, his skin glistening with rainwater, his hair plastered to his head, a rather damp smile splitting his face; he moved to the side, to let me see what he had seen.

I /knew/, intuitively, what he had seen; there was only one thing that could get him to smile like that in these miserable conditions. And I knew what it would look like: dark, round, solemn, an unlikely talisman of hope and longing. What I didn't know, what I didn't expect, was how it made me /feel/. Exhausted. Pained. Relieved.

The Gate. Our ticket home, our passage out of this place once and for all.

The clearing the Stargate now occupied was considerably smaller than it had been on our last visit. At an all-out run, it would take less than two minutes to reach it, only seconds to dial in Earth's address. With any luck at all, Hammond and the others at the SGC would be curious enough to open the gate from their side, and send a probe through. There we'd be, and they'd open the iris for us, and then we'd be home.

Ten minutes and we could be home.

I felt Jack's body tense; looked up and saw him regarding the Stargate almost hungrily. Before he could break into that all out run, I grabbed his elbow. "Wait!"

*

I stared at Sam dumbly. Wait. Wait?

Why wait? We were here, we were as good as home! From our friends and family and all the things we had fantasized about returning to back in Ankh'ij: showers and junk food and television and computers and hockey. Why wait?

As though reading my mind, Sam tilted her head up, indicating the sky, and as though reading /her/ mind, I understood. The storm. The lightning. And before us, a metal object standing alone in a field. Already not a good combination. And then if we were to use the Dial Home Device, which routed power to the Gate...

"If it was struck while we were in transit..." Sam trailed off grimly, her words broken and strewn by the increasing winds. She didn't have to finish. Every bone in my body remembered Antarctica, being flung so fiercely through the Gate that I heard the crack of the ice in my skull. At least that time, we'd been lucky enough to land on the same planet. If the Stargate was hit by lightning while we were inside the wormhole... well, I didn't know much about this stuff, but I knew we might end up just about anywhere. "We'll have to wait out the storm," she continued, using her slender frame to shield Bridget from the stinging rain.

It was easier said than done. There were numerous trees in the area, but they were all small, young. We ended up retracing our steps back into the thicket, watching keenly for any spot, no matter how small, that was somehow protected. We found it at the base of a bluff, a jutting bit of stone that appeared to protrude directly from the hillside, sheltering a small bit of ground that the overhang had kept mostly dry. My mind raced: maybe I could even use some of the brush to start a fire, to keep us going through the storm, through the night. And hopefully it wouldn't be blown out or spread by the wind, and hopefully no one would see us and decide to come visit...

By that time, Sam was shivering violently, and I helped to guide her down a slick embankment to the leaning bluff, ducked her head down so she wouldn't bang it on the low ledge. Then I climbed in after her, trying not to realize that my sodden clothes were increasingly more uncomfortable now that I was out of the downpour. The overhang shielded a plot of about five square feet; the 'ceiling' wasn't much taller than that, so even sitting, it brought back old claustrophobic feelings from past missions. Hunkered in a crevice, hiding in a ditch... ah, memories.

The foliage that had managed to grow, even under the ledge's shade, wasn't as dry as I had hoped, but the disappointment of that realization was short-lived. In fact, it faded completely from mind as soon as I had blinked away some rainwater and brushed away a few stray leaves and something that looked suspiciously like a cricket.

It was an innocuous circle in the ground, framed by medium-sized and multihued rocks, a shallow depression filled with charred wood and - most of all - ashes.

Sam, still shivering, drying off the whimpering Bridget as much as possible, looked from the hearth to me, an expression of good, old-fashioned amazement on her features, an honest scientist's interest in her eyes. "A campfire," she murmured, her voice barely audible over the sounds of the rain. "Someone's been here before."

And not too long ago, if I hadn't forgotten /everything/ I'd learned as a soldier. "Halsi said this was a... sacred spot. That colonists and militiamen and people from Ankh'ij have been coming here to pray to Ma'at and - "

But she wasn't listening to me any longer, I knew that when I looked up and saw her face. Again it had changed, first from misery to interest and now from interest to down and outright fascination. I looked where she did, searching for the cause of her sudden preoccupation, and found it quite easily.

Halsi had been right.

From this angle and this height, a new world had emerged. Through the rain-soaked forest, between the waterlogged saplings and shiny-wet rock, I could see lights. Flickering lights. One here, one there, two over there. Tiny spots in different directions and at different distances, somehow sheltered because the flames seemed to dance in spite of and even /defiance/ of the smothering storm. If I squinted, now and then I could make out a huddled shape beside the light, see it rise or slump or shift. It was entirely eerie. The woods surrounding the clearing had felt so empty, so deserted, like a ghost town. Now we could see that they were more populated than we had even dreamed.

The Sungate had a lot of fans.

Bridget didn't exactly appreciate the discovery of our new neighbors; she began to bawl again, this time with purpose, and Sam muttered something about her needing to eat. She ritually turned away from me, and I automatically undid the top few clasps of her dress, trying not to notice the skin that was exposed, because it was skin I hadn't touched or even seen in some time and would only lead me to distraction. So as she shrugged one arm out of its sleeve, I studiously turned away, leaning through the dark morning, trying to pinpoint the exact position of the campfires.

And all of a sudden, I was staring at a pair of legs.

I jerked back, my neck snapping up and my hand reaching instinctively for the weapon. It was Clera's people... it was some of the colonists who didn't know us... it was a straggler, a vagrant, a robber, a murderer... I backed up against Sam, who let only a small gasp escape before hunching down and away, concealing and defending Bridget as best she could against this new threat.

"Welcome."

The 'threat' seemed less than impressed by the barrel aimed at his face, and also appeared less than threatening himself. He was of medium height, a little on the skinny side, drenched, as we were, from head to toe. The familiar gray tunic he wore was too waterlogged to even cling to his body; his hair was jaw-length and matted to his scalp. One hand continually wiped water out of his eyes. The other hung by his side, and in its grasp was a handle, and attached to the handle was something metallic, something roughly the same size and shape as a liter of soda.

"You are wise to take precautions!" he told us over a pummeling burst of thunder. "Not everyone here is well intentioned!" Our visitor didn't attempt to enter our shelter, but he thrust the metal canister toward me. "I sense that you are fellow travelers on this path of enlightenment, and I pass the flame of Ma'at on to you this night!"

I started at the engraved container for a few embarrassing seconds before realizing what the man was talking about. He was offering us fire, warmth for the night, in the name of a Gou'ald. No, not a Gou'ald, not exactly. In the name of their God. Was our visitor searching for enlightenment, some kind of Ma'at'an New Age? Was he a theologian? . Or was he just... just some guy, some average Joe, looking for spiritual solstice in a holy place? Slowly, not completely willing to listen to the instincts that said this man could be trusted, I lowered the Slade, and with my free hand took the proffered handle.

"Open it," said the man hastily, still not coming any closer, still letting the storm rain down on him. "The flame must have air, or it will die!"

I glanced behind me at Sam, who had risen out of her protective, mother-bear crouch and covered both her bare shoulder and her satiating daughter with one of the less-damp blankets. She met my eyes squarely, without fear, and looked to the canister. "Open it," she all but whispered.

Setting the weapon on the ground between us, I felt for a seam in the near darkness. My fingers connected with a metal hinge, and I pulled back on the container's top, splitting it in half and revealing a spasmodically flickering tongue of fire burning on a piece of cord, like the oversized wick of an oil lamp. I brushed dry, leafy debris into the ashy hearth, cleared away the area around it, and then touched the flame to the refuse. Immediately, miraculously, the incandescence spread to the make-shift fireplace, and remained there, as though confined by the surrounding stones.

When I handed the canister back to our visitor, I found him smiling at us, water dribbling off his lips and chin. "You are not from here."

I felt Sam shift in surprise. "No," I answered carefully. "We're from Ankh'ij."

The smile deepened. "You are from the Sungate," he said reprovingly. "I have heard the stories."

"For crying out loud..."

His dark eyes slipped behind me, to Sam and Bridget, silent, shrouded. "Many have wondered when you would return, and what message you would take to Ma'at for us."

"What message would you like us to take?" I answered quickly, before our new friend could sense hesitation, and before Sam could habitually correct him.

He answered equally quickly, which told me he had prepared himself for this moment, and labored over this answer. "Her flame burns bright," he said, face alight with pride, even in the cloying darkness. "And her people are strong."

*

"What a character, hmm?"

Leaning against the back wall of the dugout, I smiled gently, not at Jack's comment but at Bridget. My little daughter was finally asleep, mollified by the new warmth and a full stomach, her tiny features relaxed, lids twitching and lips pouting in an incomprehensible baby dream. Firelight played on her face. "That character might have just saved us a nasty bout with bronchitis. Bridget especially."

"Yeah," he relented distractedly, wringing water from a shirtsleeve and then, after a moment of consideration, peeling the tunic over his head. His shoulders, chest, arms... they were all as impressively defined as I remembered, from familiarization from our nights together, or when I'd seen him bathing, or even from those few times, back at the SGC, when I'd managed to spy my commanding officer shirtless.

It shouldn't have been such a big deal, seeing him like that. The damp sheen highlighted as the light from the fire crisscrossed his body shouldn't have affected me so strongly, I was sure. We'd been living together, we had a /child/ together, for crying out loud.

But still... still...

Not noticing my preoccupation, Jack took Bridget from me, gingerly, and I pulled the sleeve back over my shoulder, securing it in the back as best I could. When I looked back up, I saw him studying his daughter adoringly, just as I had. But maybe there was something different in his expression, just a little different, just the slightest tic. Maybe it was a shadow of sadness, Charlie's shadow, reminding Jack of holding his tiny son, his first child, his dead baby.

I shivered, and it wasn't because of the storm.

***

"Holy crap!"

It was the first sound I heard as I was thrust from the wormhole onto solid ground, and likewise, the first thing I felt was a viselike hand on my arm, yanking at me insistently. The darkness I'd emerged into was split in half by a glaring stroke of lightning, blinding me temporarily, and I allowed myself to be dragged away from the disengaging Stargate and into the wet, wind-whipped night.

By the time vision returned, Landseth had already released me, and was leaning against a gnarled trunk, breathing hard from the sprint. "Stargate in... an electrical storm..." she heaved, "didn't seem... like a real good idea."

I nodded my agreement, turning in place, taking in our surroundings. There was a strange luminance to the clouds that made me suspect it was either morning or evening beyond the storm. The rain slashed at my jacket and the gale-force gusts gnashed. Tree limbs swiped at me relentlessly. "See any armies?" I asked, leaning toward Kathryn.

"If we're lucky, they're having a rain delay."

"If we're unlucky, Sam and Jack are actually out in this."

The Colonel frowned. "Personally, Dan, I'd rather they be here than some city halfway around the planet. Or dead."

"They aren't dead," I grumbled.

"I'm just saying... this could be worse," she said pointedly, wincing as a flash of light underscored her words. "Well... we're not sending word to Teal'c and Ian while this storm's going on." She tugged at my elbow. "Let's go look around."

"Ooh, lets."

We picked our way into the forest, which had grown and thickened considerably over the year-long interim. Every now and then, Landseth would mutter something about a path, but the trail, if there really was one, was crowded with foliage, muddy, and almost impossible to follow. I wiped the rain out of my eyes and slogged along in the Colonel's wake, looking carefully for something, even though I didn't know exactly what.

It wasn't exactly the time or place for conversation, and I wasn't sure why I was initiating it. I knew only that I was, that the words were flying heedlessly from my mouth, not spoken loudly, only heard because Kathryn was walking so close. "Do you really think finding something here's going to help me... find closure? Move on with Janet?"

The Colonel kept looking straight ahead, but I could tell by the tone of her voice that she was surprised. "You're asking /me/?"

I felt flustered, transparent, but plowed ahead. "It's just that, what you said... back there... was pretty dead-on. I've been living with their ghosts, real or imaginary, ever since it happened. And it's... it's really been a strain."

She nodded, sympathetically, I imagined. "It's also what brought you and the doctor together," she pointed out.

"Yeah," I admitted, whole-heartedly. "She was the one I went to. I don't know. I couldn't talk to Teal'c about this, he just seemed so apathetic. Like it didn't bother him, like he didn't care. And I /know/ he was feeling everything I was, I know it was just him being strong, but I didn't need somebody strong. I needed someone to commiserate with, someone who felt those things /and/ expressed them. That was Janet. She got me though everything, through the initial shock of it, and through Sha're, and through..."

Landseth smirked when trailed off. Water dripped off her nose and plastered her hair to her neck, but still she managed to look haughty. "Through me?"

I tripped on a twisting above-ground tributary of a root system, and remained silent.

The colonel grinned. "I don't take offense, Jacks... Daniel. If I took offense, maybe you would've actually gotten rid of me. But I don't. So you didn't."

"You didn't care what an asshole I was to you," I observed.

"Of course I /cared/."

"Well, you didn't let it bother you."

She shook her head incredulously. "Are you kidding me? Sometimes I'd end up laying awake in bed at three a.m., thinking about it, worrying about it, being bothered about it! I'd go back over the day in my mind and wonder what I'd done wrong, and I'd remind myself, over and over again, what a terrible, terrible loss you had suffered. How you saw me as an intruder. Hell yeah, it bothered me. And it kept bothering me... 'til I met Samantha. Captain Carter. Until I got to know her and hear about O'Neill and about /you/, from her. She was the one that made me see that... that I wasn't doing anything wrong, and you weren't doing anything wrong, and nobody was the bad guy here. And she got me to understand that it could be a lot worse. Because like it or not, like /me/ or not, when it comes down to the wire, we work well together, Daniel. I've always respected you, and trusted you. It's okay if you can't say the same thing about me, I don't mind. I just want you to know that it /did/ bother me. I let it bother me. I just didn't let it make me leave."

I looked over at her, and stared, unable to think of a single thing to say. The rush of words, the outpouring of honest emotion as thick and drowning as the droplets that pelted our coats, was far more than I had expected in even my wildest expectations.

"I think the storm's letting up a little," said Kathryn mildly.

And then I saw it.

A fire, a campfire, in the distance.

***

I stifled a yawn and stared out into the unrelenting gray, watching droplets of water congregate on the spindly branches and folded leaves of trees, gaining cohesion and weight until they plummeted to the earth in fat drops.

Earth. It was almost as though the word had lost meaning. Ever since joining the program, learning about all the worlds out there now within our reach, I'd realized that I'd been taking my planet for granted. Taken my freedom for granted. After seeing the tyranny the Gou'ald inflicted upon their subjects, partisan politics had no longer seemed so corrupted. After spending days or even weeks on an unfamiliar world, one that never felt quite /right/, even the most rundown sections of Colorado Springs seemed welcoming, comforting. Home.

But now a year of my life had passed on another planet, so much time that it felt normal. That it nearly felt like home. And my world had grown considerably smaller, consisting of a few disgruntled workers or quiet rebels, and most importantly, Sam, and then Bridget.

In a way, I'd been forced to turn to Sam Carter; she was, after all, the only small bit of Earth, of home, that I had been able to hold onto, to see and touch. A familiar face and voice and mind in a maelstrom of new opinions and beliefs, strange attitudes and practices. While once I had never thought that I had much in common with Sam, now I had everything in common with her. I had relied on her through this, shamelessly, for friendship and comfort and companionship. Maybe it had only been a matter of time before I turned to her for more. Maybe this had been only a relationship of convenience.

The rain appeared to be lightening, and there had been no flashes of light or bursts of sound for some time, but I made no move to wake Sam. She'd fallen asleep not long after Bridget had nodded off, leaning back against the wall of the overhanging, breathing silently through her mouth. We'd had a good night's sleep, but the hiking over the past few days had been more difficult work than we were used to. It was going to be hell working up our stamina again, at least back to the point that Hammond would let us go back to work.

But that was another problem, wasn't it? Bridget. She was my daughter, my blood, and I loved her unconditionally, but the fact remained that her presence wouldn't make things any easier. I didn't look forward to explaining to Hammond - to anyone - how she had come to be, because I knew what would happen. I would get defensive. I would get angry. I would say exactly the wrong thing, and make somebody mad at me.

Provided I ever figured out exactly what I was supposed to say. As eager as I was to get home, I was also scared to death of leaving a life that I had just become comfortable with. And I was afraid of how jumping back into normalcy would affect what I had - what I /thought/ I had - with Sam. The truth was, after all, that our relationship would never have evolved to this point if we'd returned home safely all those months ago. What if it was something that would only work here? What if my feelings for her weren't feasible in a normal world?

A shuffling sound woke me from my ruminations. My eyelids, which had drifted half-closed, snapped open again. Sam still slept against the wall; Bridget was still snuggled soundlessly against my drying tunic. The fire had died down somewhat, but still gave off light and warmth.

The sound came again - footsteps through brush - and I grabbed for my weapon.

***

"Look at em all," breathed Landseth.

It was true; all of a sudden, the dead woods seemed to be dappled by firelight, by life. I couldn't see actual people yet, but that was only a matter of distance. I remembered what Kathryn had said about the battle being postponed... a rain delay. Was this where it was being staged? Was each one of those campsites home to a assembly of soldiers, the kind that had chased us away on our first trip, and injured Landseth on the second.

"Could this have anything to do with the Stargate?" the Colonel wanted to know.

I blinked, surprised that hadn't occurred to me. "Yeah... if it's some kind of holy icon. Especially if there's a war of some kind going on..."

"So these are... pilgrims?"

"Could be." It was certainly preferable to considering them all militiamen. "There's only one way to find out."

She nodded, understanding what I meant, and together we made our way around a shank of solid stone, towards the nearest flame.

***

The footfalls continued to approach and I froze, remembering our friendly, fire-bearing visitor, but also remembering his warning: "Not everyone here is well intentioned!" For every kind-hearted, welcoming person here, there was probably a contingent of criminals vying for the opportunity to slit their throats.

Just let them try.

***

"Excuse me... whoa!"

I jumped back when I realized that I was staring down the business end of some kind of rifle. Before I could even catch the glimpse of the man who held the weapon, Kathryn had pushed me down and out of the way, jumped in front of me, and had aimed her HK right back in his direction.

Two big, dark eyes stared up at us from their shallow crevasse in the ground, and the weapon's muzzle dropped to the ground. "Please," the man croaked hoarsely, his voice all but gone. "I have a child..."

Landseth didn't move. "Identify yourself," she directed calmly.

The man frowned, and then grimaced. Creeping closer, I could see that his right leg - which was nearly hidden under a mat of brush - was meaty, grisly, seeping blood through onto the plant life. "I do not know you," he spat, and then narrowed his dark eyes. "You aren't militia."

"We're not," I said quickly. "And we don't want to hurt you."

Landseth followed my lead. "I see you're wounded there. Looks infected. Must be pretty painful."

He glared, but the anger in his expression gave way to utter agony. "I have dealt with this injury for a long time, ever since I was separated from my group."

The bravery in the face of such pain seemed to impress Kathryn, though she still watched the man's weapon cautiously. "And how long ago was that?"

"Many, many Réys," he explained, staring down the Colonel's own gun. "I joined a group on the other side of the Sungate, but they could do nothing for me. I have been trying to return to Ankh'ij, but..." he trailed off weakly.

Landseth looked back at me, grimacing. Judging simply by the abundance of facial hair, I guessed that the dark-eyed man had been out here for some time, battling infection along with the enemy. It seemed nothing short of a miracle that he was still alive. But would he stay that way? How advanced was this planet's medicine? His face was gray and greasy, and his wounded leg carried a putrid odor. "What's your name?" I cajoled, looking away from Landseth's face and it's grim prognosis.

He hesitated, and then tossed his metallic weapon aside futilely. "Bob."

Kathryn's brow knit in confusion. "Excuse me?"

"My name," he repeated sternly, or as sternly as a half-dead man could, "is Bob." He seemed less than charmed by the amused look Landseth directed at me, but there was something else that seemed to capture his attention any more. "Your hair," he began, "is a very odd color. /Red/. Is that its natural state?"

"Afraid so," she answered distractedly, looking back through the forest.

Bob peered at me. "And your skin... yours as well... it's very fair, very pale..." He appeared just as preoccupied as the Colonel.

"I don't tan well," she said candidly, all but ignoring the injured man now.

I found it impossible to not be fascinated with him, because he seemed fascinated with /me/. With my hair and skin, and now, my jacket. His mouth dropped open in wordless wonder.

"SGC," he blurted.

Landseth whirled on him so fast that she nearly lost her balance and toppled into the crevasse. "What?" she demanded.

Bob stared back at her with equal amazement. "Do you know Jack and Sam?" he entreated.

"Do you?" I whispered.

***

The footsteps had trailed off into the ambient noise of the fading storm, but that didn't make me feel any better. I could hear voices now, far away, too far to be understood, but still somehow threatening. I trusted my sixth sense. If it told me that there was danger out there, I would believe it.

I touched Sam's shoulder lightly, and she awoke with a snap of her neck and a little gasp. Immediately she recognized the look on my face, and leaned forward vigilantly, long locks of hair hanging in her face. "Voices," she mumbled. I nodded once.

"Let's go," I mouthed, jerking my head outside to indicate that the thunderstorm had passed. Sam acknowledged me silently. One of the blankets near the fire had dried, and it was with this she lifted Bridget to her shoulder. The infant murmured, but didn't wake, and I let out a shaky sigh of relief, pulling my damp tunic back over my head. At the very least, it would help me to blend in with the surrounding woods.

We emerged from our refuge, flinching at even the smallest noise. The rustle of leaves beneath our feet seemed like a succession of gunshots.

***

"How?"

Bob recoiled at the vigor of Kathryn's tone. "I lived near them for some time," he explained delicately. "I worked with Jack. My committed was a friend of Sam's."

"Was?" I pressed, a heaviness on my heart.

He shrugged gingerly. "They were relocated a long time ago. Across the bay." He pointed.

The Colonel's face was set in stone; she wasn't about to give into hope. "Do you know if they're still alive?"

"No... I have no idea."

"Would you know where to look?" she pressed.

"Yes... probably."

Kathryn nodded and looked over at me. "This is it, Daniel. This is what we need to convince Hammond. We take this guy home, let Janet look at him, then come back and let him lead us right to O'Neill and Carter."

"My wife is out here," Bob protested.

"We'll find her, too," I promised, knowing that Landseth was right, this was the break we'd been waiting for. The next best thing to actually stumbling across Sam and Jack. "But you won't be getting very far on your own, not on that leg."

Bob grimaced at the brush-shrouded wound, and then tilted his head to face Kathryn. "Who are you?"

"My name's Colonel Landseth. Um... call me Kate, actually."

He turned to me. "And you?"

"Daniel Jackson. Just Daniel."

The indecision in Bob's face cleared instantly. "Daniel. Jack spoke of you often. I can trust you," he said confidently, forcing himself upright. "However I can help, I will."

***

I hadn't even been this scared a year ago, when I had been chased down and /shot/ down by the Ma'at'an militia. When I had woken in an alien hospital to an unfamiliar face. When I had been confronted with sharing my life - and my bed - with Jack.

I'd had good old bravado back then. Now, I knew what I was returning to.

The unknown.

To stiff military guidelines. To Captain and Colonel. To a world that had no place for Jack, Sam, and Bridget. I didn't want that world. I wanted to go back to Krivin and Emiko and people who maybe didn't know the whole truth about us, but accepted us, unquestionably.

What /I/ wanted didn't apply any longer, however. What was best for Bridget, what was best for all of us, was Earth. Home. Everything I had longed for, for as long as I could remember. Everything I was now, suddenly, irrationally fearful of.

We reached the edge of the clearing, and started across it.

***

"Someone's been through here," remarked Landseth.

Helping to support Bob's weight, walking in Kathryn's shadow, I only grunted. "Many come here to pray to Ma'at," our new companion explained sadly. "And sometimes, they come here to kill."

We walked slowly back through the forest; I trusted Landseth enough to continue the conversation. "Why are you fighting this war?"

"For freedom. From the Council, from their laws and lies and tyranny."

"Are you a soldier?"

"I am a worker. A man. It is my duty to fight for my committed and child."

I smiled at the pride and adoration in his voice. He had to mean his wife. "Son or daughter?"

He returned the friendly gesture. "When I left, my committed had not yet given birth. But by now, she must have. The gender does not matter, as long as the child is healthy."

"I hear ya," murmured Landseth. "What's your committed's name?"

"Halsi," he said brightly.

"What's she like?"

"Beautiful," he said at once. "Kind and caring, and smart. Perhaps not as brilliant as Jack's, but--"

"Jack's what?" I interrupted.

"His committed." Bob seemed confused by my puzzlement, and clarified slowly. "Sam."

I chuckled. It wouldn't be the first time those two had been mistaken for man and wife. With my laughter came the realization that things were finally moving in a good direction. My friends were alive, and back to their old tricks. "They aren't committed," I explained gently.

"But I saw..."

"What did you see?"

Bob shook his head. "It's not my place. I didn't see anything."

"Well, I do," said Kathryn sharply.

We had reached the clearing. Landseth pointed out into it, towards the Stargate.

***

It loomed tall, majestic, over our heads. The Sungate.

Stargate.

It was almost too easy, I thought, eyeing the DHD distrustfully. It made me worry that the rest of our half-assed plan wouldn't go so smoothly. What if no MALP was ever sent through? What if we never knew if the iris was open or not? I couldn't risk Sam and Bridget like that.

"Here goes nothing," I mumbled.

I heard the voice, the shout, come from the woods, but disregarded it, seeing it only as an indicator that I should get moving. I punched in the first symbol to Earth.

*

I stood in front of the Gate, cowered in front of it, and watched Jack approach the DHD. We were going home.

Weren't we?

Bridget murmured drowsily, and over her sleepy susurrations I almost didn't hear it. A single voice, an individual clamor in the preternatural silence. One man's urgent call.

"Jack! Sam!"

***

I felt their names being ripped from my throat before I even made visual contact. I abandoned Bob, left him hobbling on one leg, and raced past Kathryn, into the field.

There was a man at the DHD, donned in gray, and at his side, dressed in the same shade, a woman. Both seemed to have frozen in mid-step, mid-action, mid-thought, perfectly still and staring in my direction. I wondered distantly if I had gone utterly insane, if I was seeing a mirage as a man in the desert might conjure up the sight of an oasis. This was my oasis. My goal, my Holy Grail.

The cloud cover broke, and in the dubious sunshine I could see more clearly. The beams of light reflected off long blonde tresses.

"God!" I said - I /screamed/ - not an epitaph or a prayer or a condemnation, but a release of something that had been trapped inside me since I had returned home with only Teal'c at my side. The world spun crazily, the sky tipped and tilted, and then I realized I was running heedlessly, running recklessly, just running, running, through the meadow, running towards my lost friends.

***

Sam took one, then two, stumbling steps back towards the treeline. I watched her, horrified that she was about to pass out.

"God!"

I looked up, and was suddenly unsure of my own consciousness.

No. Daniel Jackson? Tearing through the field toward us? Hat flying out behind him like a drag chute? Almost flying over the brush and weeds, calling "Jack! Sam!" over and over again? No... it was impossible... it was inconceivable... I was going to wake up... right... now... Any time now, because this couldn't be happening, I couldn't be seeing this...

"Daniel," cried Sam, and she /was/ crying, choking out the syllables over senseless sobs, bumbling towards him, tears streaming from her face, still holding Bridget close to her chest.

I lurched away from the DHD, heard my own voice taking up the elated call - "Daniel! Goddamn it, Daniel!" - taking up the name of my friend whose presence here was unfeasible but undeniable all the same. My legs ate up the distance, so that I was the one to reach him first, the floppy-banged phenomenon in olive drab, the first to realize that this was actually /happening/; his ear-to-ear grin was as real and substantial as mine.

***

I threw myself at Jack, and was almost startled to find that I had actually made contact with him, that he was no apparition, that his voice jovially shouting my name was genuine. We slammed each other in a ferocious man-hug, which consisted of one quick squeeze and a lot of shoulder- and arm-thumping and tearful laughter. At first I couldn't get over how gray his hair was and how tan his face, but then I /did/ get over it, and turned to Sam.

Her face was smudged with dirt, and her hair hung in loose locks to her shoulders, but it was her; it couldn't have been more her. Grinning crazily, she embraced me with less abandon, with one arm; the other cradled something in a gray cloth. There were tears gleaming in her eyes, which were just as blue and just as loving as I had remembered; she pressed her cheek against mine and the moisture came off on my skin.

This was impossible, said logic. And yet, it wasn't, not at all.

***

I pulled back from Daniel, and cupped his cheek with one hand. The warm, soft eyes, shining with emotion more pure and honest than most other men would dare show. The hat, hanging from his neck by its cord. His hair, shorter now and with bangs that hung across his forehead. The smell of his shampoo, his BDUs... the smell of Earth.

"Daniel!" shouted a woman.

He turned towards the sound, and Jack moved closer, standing between Daniel and me, touching my waist and his shoulder. A slender female figure in olive green trudged through the field, and in her tow was a Ma'at'an colonist. A limping Ma'at'an colonist. A familiar Ma'at'an colonist.

"Oh, God," breathed Jack, genuinely shocked. "Is that /Bob/?"

Daniel looked ready to pass out from sheer happiness. "That's what he said."

"He's dead."

"Apparently not."

As the woman approached, I could see that she was red-haired, green-eyed, and strikingly attractive. Maybe she wasn't exactly /pretty/, but she had such an energy that it was impossible to look away from her. I stared at her, and she gawked at me.

"Captain Carter," she said, and her voice squeaked. She cleared her throat. "Colonel O'Neill," she continued, less certain, lifting the hand that had been dragging Bob to her temple in salute. "Um... Colonel Kathryn Landseth, USAF. It's... an honor... to finally meet you. Both of you." Wide-eyed, she turned to Daniel. "This is them?"

"This is them," sighed Daniel in deep satisfaction.

"It is... them..." gasped Bob, smiling, still trying to catch his breath from his trek through the field. "Sam... Jack..."

Bridget took precisely that opportunity to wake. The sun had been uncovered by the passing storm clouds. Sunlight streamed into her face, and she railed against it with one of her famous, high-pitched squeals, kicking at the blanket she was swathed in.

Jack swallowed... hard. Daniel's eyes actually crossed. Colonel Landseth simply gaped at the bundle in my arms.

"And baby makes three," she whispered, sounding amused.

*

Surprisingly, Daniel was the one to volunteer to go back and 'pick up' Teal'c and the fourth SG-1 member, my replacement, Ian Kelly, from the planet they had been left on. On second thought, maybe it wasn't so surprising. Seeing Bridget had appeared to genuinely shock him and, even worse, dampen his happiness about finding us. I'd expected him to not want to let Jack and me out of his sight. Now, he seemed eager to get away from us, for a little while at least.

So we waited for him and the others, deciding to return to Earth as one group. Jack used Daniel's first aid kit to treat Bob's badly infected leg as best he could, I tended to Bridget, and Colonel Landseth scanned the clearing for signs of approaching company. All the while, I talked to her, trying to dredge up a first opinion, to know something of her other than the fact that Daniel obviously trusted her, or he wouldn't have left us under her supervision. The woman was almost reticent at first, as though intimidated by us, but eventually I was able to coax a dialogue from her.

Sitting side-by-side, leaning in the shade of the DHD, Bridget was the definitive ice-breaker. "She's beautiful," praised Landseth shyly, tucking back the coarse gray fabric around my daughter's head and then smiling timidly at me.

I grinned, full of pride, and glanced over at Jack, but he was busy salving Bob's leg with every anti-biotic agent in the kit. "Thank you," I said appreciatively. /I'd/ always known she was pretty, but it was nice to have a second opinion, especially from another woman. "Her name's Bridget."

"Lovely," said Landseth gently, looking from the baby's face to my own. "She bears a great deal of resemblance to her mother," she added, and I blushed at the implied compliment. "She /is/... yours?"

"Ours," I said firmly, and this /did/ get Jack's attention; from the corner of my eye I saw him look up at me.

The negative, judgmental reception I had half-expected from the Colonel never came, and she didn't seem as disturbed as Daniel had been, either. Instead, she beamed at me, bolder with every word that passed between us. "She's... adorable, really. You're both very lucky."

I nodded, flushing again with the pride that came from the acclaim of a stranger.

Jack set to wrapping Bob's leg in a dressing. The bandages would come off as soon as he was in the SGC infirmary, of course; it was nothing but nervous action. Neither of us wanted to be the one to tell him the sad news: that Halsi thought him dead, and worse, that she had miscarried. I prayed that he wouldn't bring it up until I had thought of some tactful way to impart the information.

At the moment, the Ma'at'an revolutionary didn't seem like he'd be doing much besides trying to stay alive. His bronzed skin was an ashen tone, and the exposed muscle of his leg looked like ground beef. He'd been injured and separated from Jerdess's group during battle, he'd wearily explained, and had been spending all of his time, energy, and resources since then trying to get back home.

It was a familiar tale.

Presently, Landseth brought up Daniel. "His whole life, ever since you were lost, has been dedicated to finding you. Mostly everyone in the SGC... well, they gave up on you after a while. Counted you lost. But not Jackson. He's been /insistent/, to say the least, that you were still out here."

"He's pissed a lot of people off, hasn't he?" asked Jack candidly.

She laughed darkly. "He made more enemies than friends. But I'm happy to say that I count myself among the latter. He's a... rare man."

"Rare would pretty much describe him," said Jack, but he said it affably.

I hesitated for a minute longer, and then finally blurted out something that had been irking me since I'd started talking to Landseth. "Have we ever... met before? Before today?"

Her green eyes widened. "Why? You know me?"

"No," I replied. "But... you act like /you/ know /me/."

The Colonel chuckled. "It's unintentional, I swear. And... we /have/ met, but it's a long story. One I'd really love to share with you." She bit her lower lip thoughtfully. "A lot of stuff's happened since your last mission."

"I'm sure everyone will have a lot of explaining to do," said Jack grimly.

It sounded like a prophecy.

*

"Teal'c!" I greeted.

He nearly crushed me.

Somehow, I'd forgotten just how strong the man could be. As he proceeded to cut of the circulation to my brain with his shattering embrace, I wondered if hugging was something Serpent Guards did a lot of... or if it was just something nice he'd picked up on Earth. It was flattering to imagine that it was the latter.

Eventually, Teal'c released me and turned to Sam - who had handed Bridget off to Colonel Landseth - and enfolded her in a more subdued embrace, mindful of her smaller frame. Ian Kelly - a stout, sparky young captain I'd known before - grinned wildly and pumped my arm in an enthusiastic handshake.

Daniel hung a few feet away, and finally suggested that we dial back home now, for Bob's sake.

I watched him enter the first three symbols for Earth, and then a soft palm slid into my callused hand. Startled, I looked down at it, and then up the body it was attached to, and into Sam's face. Holding Bridget again, holding her close, swathed in fabric, Sam gave me a distinctly nervous smile. I returned it, and caressed her wrist with my thumb in what I hoped was a comforting manner.

"We're going home," she said tremulously.

"Yeah," I breathed.

Then, for the first time in far too long, I leaned forward and kissed her. The real thing was immeasurably better than the memory, but... different, as well. Sweeter. Courtlier. Sadder. A kiss from olden days, a gesture of good-bye from a suitor to a maid. As the Stargate rushed open, her lips played against mine, and I went so far as to finger a lock of her hair, but neither one of us made any move to deepen the kiss, to prolong it. When it was over, we both knew it.

We also knew that while Landseth was Kelly were sharing reproving smirks, and Teal'c looked temperately curious, there was an expression on Daniel's face that lingered somewhere between melancholy and nausea.

Colonel Landseth and Teal'c stepped into the wormhole.

Before I could think about it again, I pulled Sam and my daughter after them.

*

It was worse than I remembered. More dizzying, more disorienting, more sickening. Stepping onto the grated ramp, I would have stumbled over my own feet, if it hadn't been for Jack's support and the knowledge of my precious charge.

Teal'c and Landseth stood a few feet in front of us. Captain Kelly, Daniel, and Bob stepped - or limped - through behind us, and then the Stargate disengaged.

For five very long seconds, no one spoke. No one even looked up at us. And during those five seconds, it was eternally easy to pretend that the last year had never transpired. That this was just Colonel O'Neill, Daniel, Teal'c and I, returning from P2F-983 at last. We'd never been replaced. I'd never been blessed with a daughter. More than a year of my life hadn't been squandered on a hostile alien world.

Everything looked the same, or nearly so. A handful of techs stooped over MALPS in the corner. A few gunners sat behind their turrets: SOP in the case that a returning team brought back some unwelcome guests. A quadroon of SGC Marines were in conference at the far side of the room, decked out in their finest cammies, obviously awaiting the okay for their own off-world excursion.

And then, in the window of the first-floor control room, I saw someone stand. I saw that someone's jaw fall slack. Harriman.

One, then two, and then all four of the Marines turned, and for once were rendered speechless. Robert Makepeace was among them.

One of the airmen peaked curiously around his gun turret.

With slow, measured steps, Teal'c and Landseth stepped off the ramp. Kelly steered Bob around us, following his teammates. Daniel walked up to my side... and remained there.

I was rooted where I stood. I wouldn't have been able to move had the Sungate - /Stargate/ - been opening behind me.

One of the technicians - Siler - uttered a low curse, and then a lower prayer.

And then a figure appeared at the window before us, just beyond Harriman's shoulder. Pale-faced, bald, portly, dressed in blue and staring out at us unblinkingly.

General Hammond put a hand on the computer console to steady himself, and then fumbled for the intercom mike. "Wel-welcome back, SG-1," he stuttered. I'd never seen him so unsettled, so obviously shaken, as though he'd seen a ghost.

Or in this case, two ghosts.

"Thank you, sir," said Landseth.

Jack echoed her.

He squeezed my hand.

***

In the midst of all the welcome backs and general congratulations, it wasn't difficult to slip out of the embarkation room, to make my way with unsteady steps to the elevator. Infirmary, I decided franticly, stabbing at the button, wondering if I was actually physically shaking in my regulation boots or if it was only my skewed perception.

When the elevator's doors opened, I saw Janet standing alone in the hallway, awaiting the car. She answered my unspoken question. "God, Daniel, what's wrong?"

Wrong? Nothing was wrong! What in the hell could possibly be wrong? I'd just gotten back two of my best friends, just realized a year-long goal. There was no problem, none at all. If you didn't count the fact that there were now three of them. Sam and Jack... /together/... I'd been tearing my heart out, searching the galaxy for them; meanwhile, they'd been so wrapped up in each other that only now had they bothered to try and return to us. Why only now? Why not sooner? Had they just figured that it was easier to stay on P2F-983, where there were no Gou'ald, and no military principles to punish them for... having their ways with each other? Hadn't they thought about me once?

It wasn't fair, and it wasn't even logical. But at the moment, in my distraught frame of mind, it seemed to be both. Silently, I let Janet guide me into the infirmary, and sat down on the bed she indicated, rather than explain what had happened. When the voice on the P.A. requested that Dr. Frasier and SG-1 should please report to the infirmary, I didn't explain.

***

Just when I thought I couldn't possibly withstand another hug, couldn't tolerate another handshake, couldn't abide another salute, I realized that we hadn't even left the Gate room. Civilians and enlisted members and officers, faces well-known and unknown, a barrage of excitement, a tempest of enthusiasm.

Two stray sheep had at last returned to the flock.

At one point, I'd pictured this being a moment of utmost ebullience and eagerness, when I would traipse up and down the halls, throwing my arms around the necks of random strangers simply because they were human, my kind of human, Earth-grown, and I was back among them. I'd imagined smiling and laughing and... in effect, rejoicing over my homecoming.

But that had only been the girlish fantasy of one naïve Captain Samantha Carter, an attitude and a persona I barely recognized.

For a while, that title had been my only defense against other forces: mainly, my attraction to Jack, but eventually I had shed rank in mind as well as word. I'd abandoned my strong ingenuousness and the standards of conduct that came with, in favor of two arms to hold me, a mouth to kiss me, a man to love me through our trials. I'd evolved into another creature, a separate species, and now I looked back on that strong-willed girl with a mixture of pity and longing.

How much had I grown since then? It seemed impossible to measure. I'd set such strict guidelines for myself, vowing to never do 'this', to always do 'that', but the truth was that you never knew what you could or would do until you were placed squarely in that position.

Landseth began to clear a path for us towards the door. Ian Kelly gestured towards Bridget, offering himself as a temporary baby-sitter. Knowing that there would be plenty to sort out with Hammond and Janet and Daniel and Teal'c before the subject of my daughter was even breached, I handed her over... reluctantly. Kelly pledged vows of utmost care, and then fled the room ahead of us, before anyone could cut through the hysteria and realize that within that bundle was a living, breathing person.

At some point during the melee, Jack had dropped my hand. Knowing how improper it looked but not really caring, I grabbed his sleeve as we made our way into the corridor. Though peppered with faces I well recalled, the crowd was still somewhat daunting, reminding me all too well of the throng in the merchant's square, of being chased by the miscreant militiaman.

And I wasn't the invincible Captain Carter any longer.

*

Frasier's face was familiar... and then again it wasn't. For so long her features had existed only in my memory, and the recollection seemed to have warped and eroded over time. I was bound to be a little thrown off.

Hammond's face held the same quality. I almost felt like I was meeting a celebrity, someone I'd seen a lot of through television, but had never actually encountered, and now that we were face-to-face I was only starting to realize that he wasn't the character he portrayed.

The general had opted to meet us in the infirmary, where the rest of the SGC could be turned away more easily by Teal'c's unwavering glare, Landseth's authority, and Doc's sharp tongue. His first action was to extend his hand, take mine, and shake it ardently. "Jack... it's very good to see you."

"You too, sir," I responded, casually, as though I'd only been gone a few days, on a mission or perhaps on downtime, not considered dead, exiled to another p