TITLE: Nightmares lived - Jack

AUTHOR: SJR

STATUS: Complete

PAIRING: Hints of Sam/Jack

RATING: PG 13?

ARCHIVE: SJD. Please email for others.

DISCLAIMER: Stargate SG-1 and its characters are the property of Stargate (II) Productions, Showtime/Viacom, MGM/UA, Double Secret Productions, and Gekko Productions. This story is for entertainment purposes only and no money exchanged hands. No copyright infringement is intended. Concept of and storyline are author's original work. This story may not be reproduced without permissionof the author.

SUMMARY: SG1 return from a planet grief stricken and shocked.

SEQUEL: Parallel Stories: Nightmares Lived, Nightmares Lived - Sam, Nightmares Lived - T'ealc (to come), Nightmares Lived - Daniel (to come).

SPOILERS: None

I can still feel the burning. The shot had made contact with my shoulder first and I spun even as I heard Carter yelling out to me and Daniel. The impact spun me round and I pulled the trigger, knowing it was a futile act, but refusing to leave without some act of defiance, of survival.

The second blast took me in the chest, and the blackness had closed in quickly. All I felt was a faint regret, there were so many things...

... I didn't do. Wait. I thought I was dead. My hands went to my chest, then to my shoulder. I twisted round and saw the Stargate behind me, the pool of light shimmering slightly before it made that sound like a water tunnel, and vanished. I turned back, really confused now. The DHD was there, Daniel was several steps ahead and T'ealc was near him, though, as I watched both turned. T'ealc looking as confused as a stoic Jaffa can.

Carter's next to me, and I feel her hand grip my arm as she spins me toward her. She reaches out, running her hands down my chest, over my shoulder, a shocked look in her eyes. I'd normally appreciate the contact, espcially from a leggy blonde like Sam, hey I'm human! But right now I'm more conerned with why I'm not floating above some cloud with and stuff, or being barbequed slowly over a bonfire.

All thoughts flee though when she grabs me and pulls em into a fierce hug. I feel her shake slightly, and I put one hand on her back. "Easy Sam." Hearing my voice she pulls away, looking up at me.

"Wow. I thought you... we... were all dead. But you're... It's amazing" "It's confusing is what it is." "Wait a sec. Didn't I die?" That was from Danny. Tha man can speak dozens of unknown languages and can tell hundreds of cultures from the next. He knows more mythology than an entire history department, and he's still a few seconds behind at times. "Yeah... me too," I say vaguely, aware Sam still has a grip on my arms. T'ealc simply stands there, looking puzzled, and finally states with duely considered precision. "As was I." "So... we're back at the Stargate again? Did we imagine it?" "I don't think so sir." Carter's coming round now, and she releases her death grip on my jacket. "We all seem to agree on what happened. I saw you shot in the chest and shoulder..." "Yeah..." "...and Daniel's still rubbing his throat. That would indicate he was shot there, exactly as I saw him. I don't think we're imagining this Colonel."

This is all feeling vaguely familiar and a sense of dread hangs over me. I've done this before, but this time seems a whole hell of a lot worse, and I'm not keen on being shot every few hours for three months or so until someone figures out a way to break this again. So, ultimately we decide to find the device causing this, if it is a timeloop, and shut it down. With a little luck, it won't have a nutter at the helm like last time.

"Let's move out then kids." So we do, in search of a desperate man and an artifact, we think.

I didn't even see them, let alone their weapons. I felt the heat and wind of the shot as it flew past me, burying itself in Carter's chest. The impact made her fly backwards, and she landed in a clump of bushes, the charred hole mixing shreds of her fatigues with her blood. I half ran backwards, weapon raised. Daniel and T'ealc took up flanking positions automatically, guns raised, scannign the bushes as I dropped next to Sam. If this was a timeloop, it wasn't happening the same the second time around.

She was concious, her eyes wide and bright with the pain. Another wave must have ripped through her, for she arched her back, gasping for air as I pinned her arms down, trying to make her keep still.

"Lay still Carter!" "Col... Jack, Jack..." Her voice was high and breathless and I realised she was near the end. A trickle of dark liqquid ran from the corner of her mouth and her eyes began to glaze. "No dammit. Hang in there Sam. Sam!" I called her name, but it didn't make a damn bit of difference. Her eyes began to lose their light, like an old tv shutting down slowly. "..." I didn't hear her. Her last breath crossed her lips, and I didn't even hear what she wanted to say. the last spark winked out of her cerulean blue eyes, leaving her staring vacantly at me, through me. She was gone.

I was angry I admit, and I barely remember the next few minutes as the firing started again. I saw my own bullets take down three, as Daniel fell beside me. T'ealc took a hit to the leg, and I watched fall to his knees as he kept firing. The repetitive sounds of my own weapon sounded in my ears, and the foliage ahead exploded as bullet after bullet impacted, showering the vicinity with torn leaves and bark. A burning started in my shoulder as I saw another go down by my hands. Then the world began to darken...

*************************************************************

We sat around the coffee table. The quiet grey room perfect matching the dismal mood of my team. T'ealc stared off into space, as did Sam. Daniel was slumped in his chair, and I knew what he was thinking, He had asked for a team to be sent to that planet. He thought the co-ordinates were for the same planet he had found mentioned in some ancient text or another. So, he blamed himself. I sat, listening to the dull metallic sounds of the base activity outside and waited for soeone to speak.

it didn't take long. Sam was the first, and she tried to apologise. I knew why, she had watched me die several times over, my chest blown open by a blast of orange light, she wanted to check that I was alive, and whole. In some teams I suppose that would be conduct unbecoming, the way she acted. But I had done damn near the same thing when I saw her torn open by those weapons. My team was different, we were different. She knew it, but we felt the need to have something to say.

Daniel joined in after a moment, trying to apologise, but I shut him up. It wasn't his fault, he wasn't to know. I felt a brief flash of anger at myself. There was a time back there when i did blame him. I remember grabbing him by his jacket and screaming at him, he hadn't really reacted at all. I think he was in shock at that point; especially after what he saw happen to Sam and T'ealc. We got away that time, him and me. And, though I desperately wanted the nightmare to end, I wished for one last loop, one last chance, to save my team and get them off that damn planet.

I'm not sure I could have taken it if it had all ended there. As it turned out though, it didn't, nor was there any danger of such. The repeats continued until we left the planet; no doubt by now Carter's working on a way to break the cycle, preferably by not going back there. If she has too, then we'll all go. But I hope to God she finds another way first!

I smile then as I lean next to her on my wooden porch, the smell of barbecued meat filling the air. Only Sam could get blasted by the natives on that planet, and die several times over, and still want to help them. Ok, maybe Daniel too. Sometimes I admire their ideals, other ties its a pain in the proverbial.

I grin as I turn to her, clinking our bottles of beer together, then raising mine in a return salute to Daniel. I think I might my telescope out later, sit on the roof and watch the stars disappear one by one as the dawn rises. T'ealc stands straight, not quite having gotten the trick of relaxing with a few beers and your mates. My side is warm where I stand next to Sam, and Danny smiles at us, before returning to his contemplation of the sky where the barbecue smoke rises silently into the stars.