If All Else Fails - Chapter 6
Chapter 6: Hope
“The thing about being on SG-1 is that you never say you’re fucked. That’s what first made me want to be a part of that team, you know? I wanted to be a part of that. I fought to walk again; I wanted a team who would have the same kind of determination to beat the odds. I never thought we’d face an enemy we couldn’t beat, but maybe that’s just my eternal optimism talking.”
~Interview with Cameron Mitchell
Sam woke all at once, her heart thundering in her chest, her breath coming in quick, silent gasps. She was no stranger to nightmares, but this one had been bad. She’d watched her team being tortured over and over again, powerless to stop it, and then she’d been forced to watch a laughing Ba’al slit Jack’s throat.
They couldn’t go back to Earth, Sam reminded herself. The gate was closed, and they’d been given their orders.
Jack would have ignored orders, though. If any of them had been left behind, Jack would have moved heaven and earth to get them back.
But Teal’c had promised to look, to get whatever information he could. Maybe Teal’c would manage the impossible.
Sam wasn’t just worried about Jack. Cassie was still on Earth, although Sam thought she’d be insulated from any real danger. Sam and Janet had both discussed what Cassie should do if something like this happened. If there was an invasion or foothold situation, Cassie knew to keep her head down, to go to class and pretend that everything was normal.
Technically, Cassie’s connection with the SGC had ended with Janet’s death. The Trust would have no reason to go after her. At least, that’s what Sam kept telling herself. Cassie was just a kid, just a college student still trying to find her way.
Vala suddenly rolled over and propped herself up on an elbow. “You okay?” she whispered.
“Fine.”
“Because I can hear you thinking from here.”
“Did you ever meet Cassie?” Sam asked, not wanting to talk about the dream that woke her up.
Vala shook her head. “No. She’s your friend’s daughter, right?”
“She’s at college,” Sam replied. “I haven’t been able to give her much thought. That sounds terrible, but-”
Vala put a hand on her arm. “When you’re off-world, you think of those you’ve left behind as safe.”
“I’ve been so worried about Jack,” Sam replied. “Cassie’s at college. There’s no reason for the Trust to go after her.”
“No reason at all,” Vala agreed.
“Teal’c will get her out if necessary, if he can.” Daniel’s voice floated across the space between the two beds. “And Cassie’s a smart kid. She’ll know to keep a low profile.”
“Yeah,” Sam said, knowing that Cam had as much reason to worry about his family as she did about Cassie. “I want to go back to Earth.”
“I know,” Cam said, speaking for the first time. “So do I.”
Sam closed her eyes. “We can’t.”
“No, we can’t,” Daniel agreed. “We have to do this. We have to follow orders this time, Sam.”
“I know,” she agreed. “God, I know.”
“Do you think you’re going to be able to go back to sleep?” Cam asked.
“No,” Sam replied, shuddering at the thought of her nightmare. “No.”
“Okay, then,” Cam replied, sitting up in bed. “Let’s get cleaned up and start gathering our supplies. Might as well use the time to our advantage.”
Cam and Daniel went to get cleaned up, leaving Sam and Vala alone in their room. “What do you think we can expect?” Sam asked once the guys were gone.
“Oh, I imagine they’ll shoot at us,” Vala admitted cheerfully, collapsing back on the bed. “But we can take them.”
“I think you spent too much time with the Marines while at the SGC,” Sam accused.
Vala grinned. “Oh, but can you blame me? They’re so delicious.”
Sam rolled her eyes, but she couldn’t help the laugh that escaped. “You’re incorrigible.”
“If there’s one thing I’ve learned, Sam, it’s that death can come for us at any time. Why not make the best of the time we have?”
Sam wondered how she’d gone for so many years without a female teammate. She still missed Janet terribly, and she loved the men on her team, but she was grateful to have Vala here with her now.
“Good point,” Sam agreed.
“Sorry,” Vala said. “I know you’d rather have your general.”
“I really would.” Sam sighed. “I hate this feeling that we’re leaving people behind, you know?”
“It’s one of the things I like most about you,” Vala replied.
“Are you okay?” Sam asked.
“Getting there,” Vala replied.
“You going to make a move on Daniel any time soon?”
“Getting there,” Vala replied, a smile in her voice.
Sam grinned. “He’s going to wait for you, you know.”
“And when I do make a move, as you so elegantly put it, he’ll throw it back in my face,” Vala replied.
“I don’t know. He’s been acting a little territorial lately.”
“Being protective doesn’t mean being interested.”
“I haven’t seen him this interested in years,” Sam replied. “You pose a challenge.”
“Bully for me,” Vala murmured. She sighed. “Maybe I’ll broach the subject on the way to Atlantis.”
“Just give me a warning,” Sam replied. “I’ll make sure that Cam and I are otherwise occupied.”
Vala grinned at her. “You’re a real friend.”
Sam returned the grin. “You know it.” They sprawled on the bed in companionable silence until Daniel and Cam reentered the room.
“It’s all yours,” Cam announced. “We’ll start gathering supplies as soon as you get back.”
Sam shared a look with Vala, and then began gathering whatever clean clothes she could put her hands on. She missed washing machines and hot showers, and she wanted nothing more than a set of clean BDUs-or even better, her favorite skirt and jean jacket.
“What do you miss?” Sam asked, once they had entered the washroom. “Clothes, I mean.”
Vala’s expression went a little dreamy. “There was this dress I had while I was a host. I loved it. I wish I had it now.”
Sam grinned. “You think there’s anywhere we could go between here and Atlantis to get some shopping done?”
“Unfortunately, no,” Vala replied. “I wish.”
Sam thought longingly of a day of shopping. She should have introduced Vala to Cassie while they were still on Earth; they could have had an old-fashioned girls’ day.
They would never get the chance now.
“We should get going,” Sam said. “We have a lot to do.”
Cam and Daniel had already packed up. All Sam and Vala had to do was to stuff their dirty clothing into the packs.
“We’ll need dried meat, dried fruit, and bread,” Vala said. “We might be on short rations, but between the ship’s stores and what we can purchase here, we should be good for a week and a half, maybe two.”
“Can we make it to Atlantis in that time?” Cam asked Sam.
Sam nodded. “If all goes well, yes, although I can’t make any promises. The ship appeared to be in good repair from what we saw of it, but that doesn’t mean something won’t go wrong.”
“There aren’t any guarantees in this gig,” Cam agreed. “We’ll do the best we can. You ladies know the plan?”
“We go in, we get as many of them together as we possibly can, and we drop the stun grenade,” Vala said briskly. “Yes, Cameron. We’ve gone over it enough.”
“Well, Vala, pardon me if I don’t want to get us all killed!” Cam shot back.
Daniel held up his hands. “Okay, that’s enough. We’re all under a lot of pressure. Let’s not fight about it.”
“How many men?” Cam asked.
Sam sighed and shook her head, knowing that Cam wasn’t going to stop pushing until he knew for certain that they all knew the plan inside and out. She didn’t blame him; if Sam had been the one left behind, she would be just as pushy.
“There were four that we saw,” Sam said for the fourth time. “We can get two or three in the same room at the same time. You and Daniel will prevent anyone from escaping. We take the ship, and we leave. We’ll dump the bodies out the airlock, or we’ll strand them on a planet.”
“I vote for stranding, if possible,” Daniel inserted, although he didn’t sound too hopeful.
“If possible, that’s what we’ll do,” Sam agreed. “But we may not have a choice.”
Daniel sighed. “I’m aware of that.”
“So, stun, zat, and otherwise incapacitate or kill,” Cam summed up.
Sam met his eyes. “We’ve got it covered, Cam. We’ll be fine.”
“I know you will,” he replied, and it was a promise.
Sam appreciated his faith; she knew she’d take it with her into the next battle.
~~~~~
Daniel grimaced. “I hate this.”
“You and me both,” Cam agreed fervently. “Damn those women for being competent anyway.”
Daniel shot him a dirty look. “Shut the fuck up, Cameron.”
Cam grinned. “You’re just bent because you haven’t admitted that you’re sweet on Vala yet.”
“Seriously, shut up.”
“Come on,” Cam cajoled. “You can’t tell me that you don’t get worked up by the idea of a confident, capable woman.”
“Vala doesn’t need that right now,” Daniel replied, not realizing that he was revealing too much until the words were out of his mouth.
“From what I can see, Vala likes you,” Cam said. “We’ve learned the hard way that life is short. You might want to take advantage of it.”
Daniel shook his head. “Not until she makes a move. I have a good idea what happened to her while we were in that Goa’uld dungeon. I don’t know that she’s going to be interested in having another man pawing at her anytime soon.”
“If you do it right, she won’t think of it as pawing,” Cam pointed out.
Daniel snorted. “That’s what you think. Vala hasn’t given me any indication that she’s interested.”
Cam laughed. “Then you haven’t been paying attention.”
Daniel shook his head. “We’ve got enough to think about right now.”
“If you say so.”
“I do.” Daniel kept his eyes focused on the ship. He knew they could take care of themselves, but he didn’t like splitting up. Daniel watched as Sam and Vala made contact with the gunrunners. They exchanged cordial nods and then disappeared inside the ship.
“They’ve got a stun grenade,” Cam said, although he sounded as though he was reassuring himself more than Daniel. He checked his watch. “We’ll give them another minute.”
Daniel shifted but didn’t argue. The main reason Sam and Vala had gone alone was because they were more likely to get the jump on their quarry.
“Okay, let’s move,” Cam ordered softly.
Daniel followed Cam as he sauntered across the open ground in front of the two ships. The one they wanted was to the left, but they took a circuitous route, approaching obliquely, trying not to give away their objective.
Sam and Vala had gone in with only a small bag between the two of them, ostensibly to hold the payment for the weapons. They’d chosen to attack now, before the weapons were off-loaded, knowing that Atlantis could probably use the extra ordinance. Daniel and Cam carried their supplies, doing their best to look like passers-by just checking out the sights.
One of the smugglers stepped out of the doorway, his hand on the gun tucked into his belt; from what Daniel could see, it was a pulse weapon of some sort, which seemed to be common in this area of the galaxy. The rule of thumb seemed to be that if it wasn’t a spear, or an arrow, it was a pulse weapon.
Cam approached slowly, looking every inch the country bumpkin that he often pretended to be. “Hey, Danny. Look at this ship! Pretty cool, huh?”
The guard turned a jaundiced eye on Cam. “What’s your business here?”
“No business,” Cam replied, raising his hands in supplication. “We just don’t get a chance to see ships like this where we’re from, and my friend here is a real aficionado. What model is this?”
“It’s similar to a tel’tak,” the guard replied, unbending slightly under the full force of Cam’s good old boy charm. “It was a special order.”
“Really?” Cam asked, sounding as enthusiastic as a child at Disneyland. “This is great! I don’t suppose there’s any chance we can get a tour.”
“No, sorry,” the man replied, but his hand dropped away from his gun. Daniel took the opportunity to zat him. Cam fired twice more, and the body disintegrated.
Daniel didn’t protest, although he hated the loss of life. Nearly ten years with the SGC, and he still hadn’t quite gotten used to the idea of acceptable casualties. They entered the ship and dropped their packs by the entrance, hopefully out of sight.
“What the hell took you so long?” Vala demanded, sticking her head around the corner. “The ship is clear.”
“It’s not like we knew,” Daniel replied defensively. “Everyone’s unconscious?”
“There was some resistance,” Vala admitted. “Daniel, you might want to check on Sam. She took fire. Cam, you can fly this, right?”
“Sure,” Cam replied with a smile. “I can fly anything.”
“Good. I’ll give you a hand. Daniel? Sam’s in the cargo area.”
“Got it,” Daniel replied. He felt the ship come to life under his feet as he made his way to the cargo area. It was similar enough to the tel’tak for Daniel to find his way without any trouble. “Sam?”
Sam waved at him. “I’m okay.”
“Vala said you needed medical attention,” Daniel replied, feeling the vibration under his feet as the ship took off. “How bad is it?”
Sam sighed. “It’s my leg. I’ve had worse.”
“That’s not saying much,” Daniel replied, making his way over to her.
She shrugged. “True enough, but it’s really not that bad.”
“Let me be the judge of that.”
Everyone in the SGC had to have at least some first aid training, and everyone on SG-1 had a little more instruction than most. They’d all been stuck in the field without medical help far too often to leave anything to chance.
Daniel winced when he saw the blood on Sam’s pants and the makeshift bandage over the top. “Okay, I think the best thing to do would be to get your pants off.”
“How long have you been waiting to say that?” Sam joked.
Daniel grinned at her. “All my life.”
She laughed. “Charmer. Pull off the bandage, and I’ll work on the pants.”
Daniel didn’t want to hurt her, and he untied the bandage carefully. The fabric of Sam’s BDUs hadn’t had a chance to stick to the skin yet, and Daniel removed her boots and helped her remove her pants carefully.
“Sorry,” he muttered.
Sam let out a muffled laugh. “Nothing you haven’t seen before.”
“It just seemed like the thing to say,” Daniel replied. “It doesn’t look too bad. Not enough bleeding to involve an artery, and the wound seems to have been cauterized by the blast.”
Sam managed a smile. “Good to know, since it hurts like a motherfucker.”
“I’ll get a clean bandage on it, and then you can pull your pants back on,” Daniel promised.
“Are my legs that bad?” Sam joked.
“Well, you haven’t shaved in awhile…”
She laughed, and Daniel thought that it was a testament to their friendship that they both could find that funny. “I forgot to pack my razor,” Sam joked.
“So did I,” Daniel replied. “Good thing that Cam’s a Boy Scout and packed an extra.”
“That’s why you’ve been looking rather scruffy.”
“Maybe I like a beard.”
“It looks good on you,” Sam replied, running a hand down his face. “You could always pull it off.”
“I miss Jack,” he said suddenly, apropos of absolutely nothing. He focused his attention on the dressing on Sam’s leg, checking out the damage and making sure there was nothing he’d missed.
“God, so do I,” Sam replied fervently. “Daniel…” She trailed off, her voice hitching on the last syllable.
“I know,” he said softly. “I know better than anyone.”
“Except maybe Teal’c,” Sam replied. “But yeah, you would. Do you think he’s still alive?”
“I don’t know,” Daniel admitted. “I can’t think of any reason why they’d kill him, though. They’d have every reason to keep him alive.”
Daniel didn’t say why they’d leave him alive, because Sam knew all the reasons already. They would torture Jack for information, but they would keep him alive. If Jack could stay out of the Trust’s hands for long enough, if he could stay alive long enough, Teal’c might be able to rescue him.
It was a long shot, but it was better than nothing.
Sam just shrugged and braced herself against the hull while Daniel cleaned her wound and bandaged it.
“Thanks,” she said as he finished. “That looks good.”
“Janet gave me personal lessons,” Daniel admitted. “After I asked.”
He could hear Sam swallow thickly. “I miss her, too.” Daniel looked up to see Sam blinking back tears. “Do you ever think that it’s too much, Daniel? That we’ve lost too much?”
“What other choice do we have?” Daniel asked. “We have to keep going.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
“Then yes,” Daniel replied, his voice hoarse. “Yeah, I feel like we’ve lost too much every single day.”
“Good to know it’s not just me.”
“It’s not just you.” He finished bandaging Sam’s wound, and then helped her get dressed again. “I don’t know that we’ve got much for the pain, but I might be able to come up with something.”
“I think I might just sleep, if that’s okay,” Sam replied, her voice faint. “I’m feeling pretty tired.”
“Sleep if you can,” Daniel said. “I’ll wake you up when we need you.”
He helped her get settled, even though he knew that Sam normally hated to show any sign of weakness. The fact that she accepted his help told him that she was hurting far worse than she was willing to let on.
Daniel covered her with his jacket as well as one of their emergency blankets and headed for the front of the ship.
“How’s it going?”
“We’re about ready to activate the hyperdrive,” Cam replied. “No other hostiles in sight.”
“Did you or Sam get a chance to check the cargo?” Daniel asked Vala.
Vala grinned. “We’ve got enough ordinance to supply a very small army for a long time, or a large army for a very short time.” She sobered quickly. “How is she?”
“It’s not life-threatening,” Daniel replied. “I’d prefer to get it looked at by a real doctor, but…” He trailed off.
“We do what we can,” Cam said, focusing on the controls. “You might want to have a seat, Jackson. I have no idea what this baby can do.”
Daniel nodded and headed back to the cargo area, sitting down next to Sam’s sleeping form and bracing himself against the hull. He felt the ship begin to vibrate underneath him, and he tipped his head back.
Maybe he should get some sleep, too. They didn’t have much else to do to pass the time.
~~~~~
“You know, I much prefer gate travel,” Vala said, laying on her back in the cargo hold. “Seriously, how much longer are we going to be on this blasted ship?”
Sam sighed. “We’re approaching the edge of the Pegasus galaxy. Another two days to hit Pegasus, and probably another five or six to Atlantis.”
“We don’t have enough food to make it that long,” Vala pointed out. “Not with half the ship’s stores destroyed by that fungus.”
“Cam and I talked about it. We’re going to stop off on the first world that has a gate and that looks safe. We’ll dial Atlantis and get recommendations on the best places to stop for food.” Sam rubbed her eyes. “I can’t believe that we’re actually going to Atlantis.”
“It’s too late to turn around now,” Vala replied.
“I’m aware.” Sam pushed herself up off the floor slowly, and Vala watched carefully. Sam had run a fever for a day or two, but she seemed to be okay now. She favored her left leg, but the damage probably wasn’t permanent.
Probably. Vala had seen even minor wounds turn deadly, and Sam’s injury had not been what she would call “minor.”
Vala closed her eyes, replaying the scene in her head. They had managed to get two of the smugglers in the hold easily enough, but the third had remained in the cockpit, with the fourth standing guard outside. She and Sam had walked a little ways off, ostensibly to talk over the deal, but it had given them the chance to duck behind a few crates and toss the grenade.
The smugglers had gotten off a warning before they were rendered unconscious, giving the smuggler in the cockpit time to start shooting. Sam had gone down before Vala could get a shot off, and it was luck alone that allowed her to kill the pilot without getting shot, too.
“Vala?”
She opened her eyes to find Daniel’s nose just inches from her own. “Hey.”
“Cam wants to know if you’re okay to take your shift.”
“I’m good.” Vala forced a smile. “Keep me company?”
“Of course,” Daniel replied. “I don’t have anything better to do.”
Vala rolled her eyes. “Oh, thank you so much.”
Daniel clasped her shoulder. “My pleasure.” She was unaccountably warmed by the contact, particularly when Daniel left his hand there a little longer than absolutely necessary. “I’ll check on Sam and join you.”
Vala made her way to the cockpit and put a hand on Cam’s shoulder. “You ready for me?”
“We’re on autopilot for now,” Cam replied, sliding out of the pilot’s seat. “You good for a few hours?”
“I’ll be fine,” Vala promised. “Daniel’s going to keep me company.”
Cam rubbed his eyes. “I’ll grab some sleep and then bring you guys something to eat. Call if you need anything.”
Vala sat down, checking the readouts automatically. They had been running the hyperdrive at half capacity, not wanting to risk a burnout in the middle of unoccupied space. So far, they had been successful, but Vala wasn’t going to count on actually making it to Pegasus.
They’d had remarkably good luck since escaping from the Goa’uld, but she knew it couldn’t last forever.
Daniel joined her a few minutes later. As the only non-pilot among them, he’d spent his time keeping each of them company in turn, while taking on the lion’s share of cooking and other chores. Vala had no idea when he slept, although she got the feeling that it was infrequent.
“How are you feeling?” she asked him.
He shrugged. “My arm aches less, and my ribs are almost back to normal. I’ll probably be ready for anything by the time we reach Atlantis.”
“It’s a dream come true for you, isn’t it?” she asked softly. “I know I interrupted your last trip.”
Daniel slouched a little deeper in his seat. “Yes, well, I thought going to Atlantis would mean a chance for discovery, something new after being with SG-1 for so long. I was sure I could make a difference with the expedition.”
“You’ll still be able to do that,” Vala pointed out.
Daniel shook his head. “It’s harder not knowing where Jack is, you know? I don’t have a lot of family. I really didn’t have any family at all until I joined the SGC. And now-we don’t know what happened to Jack, or General Hammond, or Cassie. I just-I’m not sure if I can move on not knowing.”
“It’s not about moving on,” Vala said quietly. “It’s about doing the job that’s in front of you for the good of those around you. You remember those you’ve left behind. You hold them in your memory. But you don’t let those memories hold you back.”
“You sound as though you’re speaking from experience.”
Vala shot him a dirty look. “I wasn’t hatched from an egg, Daniel. I had a mother and father. I had friends, and people I cared about.”
“And then?”
“And then I was taken as host to a Goa’uld, and whatever life I’d dreamed of having was swept away,” Vala replied. “There was a boy in my village I thought I would marry. He was kind and handsome and quite the catch. And then Qetesh chose me for a host, and there was no more boy, no more village, no more parents.”
“I’m sorry,” Daniel said softly.
Vala shook her head. “We all have our sad stories. That’s what I’ve learned in my years traveling. There’s no one who doesn’t have some tragedy in their past.”
“My parents were killed in front of me,” Daniel admitted in a low voice. “They were getting a museum exhibit ready, and it collapsed on them.”
“I’m sorry,” Vala said softly.
Daniel took a deep, audible breath. “There was a lot that they passed along to me before they died. I try to honor that.”
“And you do a remarkable job,” Vala replied.
Daniel smiled. “What about your parents?”
“My father was a smuggler and a thief,” Vala replied. “He would appear when it suited him, and he was gone the rest of the time. My mother died when I was a child, and I was raised mostly by my stepmother, who died while I was a host.” She glanced over at him. “You and Sam and Cameron are my family, Daniel.”
Daniel was quiet for a long moment, and then he said, “Thank you.”
“You shouldn’t thank me for telling the truth,” Vala said. “We’re on the same team. We owe each other that much.”
“We do,” Daniel replied softly.
Vala hesitated, wanting to ask her question but not knowing whether she should ask.
“Go for it,” Daniel said. “I promise to be honest.”
“Do you think less of me?” Vala asked.
Daniel shot her an incredulous look. “For what? For what happened with the guards?”
Vala shrugged.
“Vala, I told you, that wasn’t your fault.”
“Saying it and believing it are two separate issues.”
“Do you really think that little of me?” Daniel asked.
Vala kept her eyes on the readouts in front of her. “It’s not you I think so little of-it’s the universe at large. I’ve been around a long time, Daniel.”
“So have I,” Daniel replied. “And I know you well enough to understand when something is your fault, and when it’s not.”
“If I thought that trading my body for our freedom would have worked, I would have done it,” Vala admitted.
“I know,” Daniel replied quietly. “I know you would have, Vala. That doesn’t change anything.”
Vala shot him a grateful look. “Thank you.”
“We’re on the same team. We owe each other the truth,” Daniel said.
“More than the truth,” Vala replied.
Daniel smiled. “More than the truth.”
Vala glanced over at him, and then, following an impulse, leaned close to him and pressed her lips to his.
Daniel froze momentarily, but then his hand came up to frame her face, and his thumb caressed her cheek.
Vala didn’t know how long it had been since someone had touched her like this-she and Sam hugged and cuddled and touched, but that was different. That was completely platonic. No man had touched Vala with romantic intent for…
She couldn’t remember how long it had been. There had to be something wrong with that.
Daniel pulled back first, and the taste of his lips lingered on Vala’s. “You’re one of the strongest people I know,” he said quietly.
“You’re insane,” Vala replied.
Daniel smiled. “Maybe, but it’s a good insanity, right?”
“Yes, I think it might be.”
“Good.” Daniel laughed. “Are we really trying this?”
“Are we?”
“I think we are.” Daniel laughed. “If you want.”
Vala leaned in for another kiss.
“Okay,” Daniel said when she pulled back slightly. “Okay, we’re doing this.”
“We are,” Vala agreed.
Daniel pushed a hand through Vala’s hair. “I just never thought… I never thought you would look seriously at me.”
“I’ve looked seriously at you for a long time,” Vala confessed.
Daniel leaned in for another kiss in lieu of a response.
~~~~~
Cam glanced over at Sam, who sat in the co-pilot’s seat with her bad leg propped on the console. She stared out at the black, and from her expression, she was a million light years away.
“Penny for your thoughts,” he said.
“They’re not even worth that much,” Sam replied.
Cam shrugged. “Humor me.”
Sam sighed. “It’s just more of the same old, same old-all the people we left behind, everything I miss about Earth.”
“Coffee?”
“God, yes,” Sam agreed fervently. “Pizza.”
“Hamburgers.”
“Thai food.”
“Chinese.”
“Pasta.”
“My mom’s roast chicken.”
“Pot roast.”
“Beer.”
“I miss beer,” Sam agreed. “A lot.”
“We probably won’t get any on Atlantis,” Cam observed.
Sam slumped a little lower in her seat. “I know. They’re probably going to be running out of coffee soon, if they haven’t already.”
“A lot of other things, too,” Cam observed. “That’s going to be the hardest part of being cut off from Earth. They’re going to be short on everything-supplies, ammunition, and personnel.”
“How many others do you think will make it to Pegasus?” Sam asked.
Cam thought of Carrie, and half a dozen others he thought had probably made it out of the base. “I don’t know. If we make it, it’s going to be a miracle.”
“I know.” Sam rubbed her eyes. “What the hell was Jack thinking?”
“He didn’t have a choice.” Cam couldn’t believe that he was the one leaping to O’Neill’s defense. That honor would normally be reserved for Jackson or Sam or Teal’c. But Teal’c wasn’t there, Jackson was wrapped up in Vala at the moment, and Sam was too torn up about everything to think straight.
Cam suspected that she was pissed at the general for not escaping while he had the opportunity, and for not coming to rescue them when he knew something was wrong.
To tell the truth, Cam was a little pissed off about that himself. If O’Neill had sent someone, if he’d come himself, maybe Vala wouldn’t have been hurt so badly.
They’d been left to rot because there hadn’t been anyone to send after them, because there was no one to send through the gate, no one to give them the order to go. But O’Neill could have sent one of the departing teams to the planet where they’d been held. Rescue had been possible, but it hadn’t been attempted.
Cam knew the difference.
The silence hung between them, and Sam finally shook her head. “He did have a choice, and he made it. I knew that duty always wins with Jack.”
“Isn’t that true of most of us?” Cam asked.
Sam shot him a look. “I don’t know. You tell me. If you could go back, if we could have dialed Earth, would you have gone back for your family?”
“In a heartbeat,” Cam said readily.
“Yeah.”
“You wish you could go back for Cassie?”
“Every day.” Sam sighed. “She was on my list, you know. She might-there’s at least a possibility that she’ll be sent off-world.”
“There’s a better chance that she won’t need rescuing,” Cam pointed out, well aware of Cassie’s background. He’d read the mission reports, and he’d met Cassie once before. “She’s just a college student.”
“Teal’c said he’d check on her if he could,” Sam said hopefully. “So, maybe…”
“Maybe,” Cam agreed, wishing he’d thought to have Teal’c check on his parents and his brother’s family. But that was just the thing-Teal’c had enough to worry about trying to rescue O’Neill. If they had each had a list of people to be rescued, Teal’c would have no hope of fulfilling their requests.
Cam couldn’t help but think that it was an impossible situation.
An alarm sounded, interrupting their thoughts, and Cam quickly began to press buttons, trying to get a clear report.
“What have we got?” Sam asked, pulling her foot down and stretching it out in front of her.
Cam’s hands danced over the console. “We’ve got a problem. There’s a leak in the coolant system.”
Sam hit the button for the intercom. “Vala, I need your help in the cockpit.”
Vala turned up in a few seconds. “What’s going on?”
“There’s a problem in the engine room,” Sam replied. “I need your help.”
“You’ve got it,” Vala promised readily. “Let’s move.”
Cam didn’t pay much attention as Vala helped Sam to a standing position, and then supported her out of the cockpit. Jackson joined Cam soon thereafter, his forehead creased in concern.
“How bad is it?” Jackson asked.
Cam shrugged. “You’ll have to ask Sam after she’s had a chance to look at the engine. It might be serious.”
Jackson grimaced. “Let’s hope not.”
Cam just focused on the readouts. “I’m bringing us out of hyperspace.”
“Yeah, I figured that out,” Jackson replied.
Cam gave him a dirty look, and then slowed the ship to normal speed and activated the ship’s intercom. “Sam? Any details?”
“We’ve got a leak,” Sam replied after a long silence. “I can put a patch job on it, but I don’t know that it’s going to get us very far.”
“Do what you can,” Cam replied. “We’ll deal with the consequences when we have a better idea of what we’re looking at.”
“You got it.”
Jackson sent Cam a worried look. “We don’t have much food left. If we’re really careful, and we go to starvation rations, we might make it. Might.”
“Then we cut back on everything we can,” Cam responded. “Water, food, whatever. We do whatever it takes.”
“Agreed, but I’m not sure that ‘whatever it takes’ is going to be enough,” Jackson said quietly.
Cam nodded. “I know. We’ll give it our best shot.”
Jackson stared at the console in front of him for a long moment. “You should probably give me as much instruction as you can. We should all know how to pilot the ship, and I’m the only one who doesn’t have some rudimentary understanding.”
“Yeah, that’s true.” Cam focused on his hands, feeling the helplessness wash over him in a horrible wave. They could be stuck out here, drifting in the black, with no hope of rescue, until they all died of hunger or dehydration.
They could, Cam thought, but they’d made it this far. He had to believe that they’d make it to Atlantis, too.
“Okay, quick tutorial,” Cam said. “Switch places with me.”
Cam hit the intercom once Jackson was settled. “Sam, let us know when we’re okay to fire the engines up again.”
“You got it,” Sam promised.
“Put your hands on the yoke, here,” Cam instructed, demonstrating. “It’s really pretty simple.”
Cam hoped it would be simple, anyway. He hoped Jackson wouldn’t need the information. And he hoped to hell they could find a way to make it to Atlantis.
~~~~~
Jack glanced over at Sam, stretched out in the lawn chair on the dock, wearing nothing but a pair of shorts and a tank top. Her legs looked impossibly long from this angle, her skin still pale from long hours spent inside or in BDUs. Her cheeks were flushed with the heat from the July sun, and she pressed a cold bottle of beer to the side of her neck.
“You can’t tell me this wasn’t a good idea,” Jack said, unable to resist crowing a bit.
He could feel her rolling her eyes behind her sunglasses. “There aren’t any fish.”
“That’s the whole point,” Jack replied. “Come on, tell me you’re not having fun.”
A smile quirked her lips. “I’m not having fun.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“That’s your problem, isn’t it?” Sam replied, but she grinned openly now. “It’s just too bad that Daniel and Teal’c couldn’t come.”
It was Jack’s turn to roll his eyes. “Uh huh.”
“I’ve missed my team,” Sam said softly.
“And there are a lot of activities we would have to forego if they were here,” Jack said lightly, feeling the need to deflect.
They were all close, and Jack knew that Daniel and Teal’c knew about their relationship, but he wasn’t willing to have sex with them in the next room.
Hell, it had taken two days of solitude for Jack to stop feeling guilty for looking at her with intent. They had been dancing around this relationship for so long, trying to move on, but without success. They’d spent so long not talking about how they felt about each other, it had become impossible to discuss it now.
And they were still hiding, although they weren’t trying very hard. Now that they were no longer under the same command, there were no rules preventing them from being together, but they’d agreed that it was too soon. Jack had just recently moved to D.C.; Sam was still getting her feet under her as a commanding officer. Their relationship would raise too many questions, and Jack didn’t want Sam’s career to take a hit.
Jack knew that he was pretty much bulletproof at this point, but Sam wasn’t. He was just waiting for retirement.
Real retirement.
Sam wiggled her toes. “I don’t know. They would probably give us our privacy.”
“I’d rather not have to try,” Jack replied.
“I’m worried about Cassie,” Sam suddenly confessed. “She said she was going to spend the weekend with friends, but I don’t think her first year in college went well.”
“She has to find her own way, Carter,” Jack said, still not used to using her first name.
He’d started using her first name within the privacy of his own mind, but he was having a little trouble with the rest of it.
“I’m aware of that,” Sam said. “I did. Everybody does. It’s just-I feel like I’m failing Janet.”
“We’ve all done our best to be there for that kid,” Jack replied. “We’re all trying, you hardest of all. There’s nothing else you can do.” He waited for her to reply, and when she didn’t, he asked, “Cassie’s making friends, isn’t she?”
“Yeah.” Sam sighed. “It’s okay. It’s good that she has people she can spend the holidays with, even if it’s not me.”
Jack suspected that Sam had harbored a hope that Cassie would spend time with her over the 4th of July weekend. Cassie might be relatively close, going to school in Boulder, ostensibly pre-med, but Cassie didn’t get down to Colorado Springs very often.
“She’s going to be okay, Sam,” Jack promised. “She’s strong.”
“I know.” Sam put her beer down and leaned across the intervening space, meeting Jack’s lips with her own. “Jack…”
Hearing his name on her lips did something to him, Jack admitted. He was half-hard already, and he let out a little groan as Sam left her lawn chair and straddled his lap.
Jack lost himself in her. He’d lived in the moment as Jonah, with Thera’s head a warm and heavy weight on his shoulder. He’d wrapped his arms around her in the aftermath of a hard mission, content just to feel her, to hear her breathing, to let her faith substitute for his own.
She made him feel impossibly old and impossibly young, all at the same time, and Jack was so grateful for this-for hot sun and still, fish-less water, and the warmth of human contact.
And Jack woke, with the sense-memory of Samantha Carter still on his lips. There was the taste of beer, of sweat, of sunscreen, even though he’d had nothing but tasteless gruel for-
How long? Jack wondered. He’d woken up in this cell with no idea of where he was, or how long he’d been unconscious. The only hint of light came when he’d been fed at semi-regular intervals. The food was always the same-a sort of porridge that tasted like nothing. Jack had tried counting minutes, tried keeping track of the days, but to no avail.
Jack knew what the Trust was trying to do, of course. He’d taken advanced interrogation techniques; he’d spent four months in an Iraqi prison, and they didn’t have anything on Ba’al.
He suspected that they would leave him here, in near-sensory deprivation, to soften him up. There was no light, and no sound but his own breathing and the occasional squeak of metal when his meal was shoved through the slot in the door. He had no idea what they’d done to secure the opening, but he’d tried to pry it open with no success.
They might leave him here for weeks, even months, and by the time they allowed him contact with another human being, Jack would be pathetically grateful. He’d be so happy to see anyone, that he would tell them anything at all.
At least, that was the theory. It was no wonder that Jack’s vivid dreams took him to happier times.
Thinking of the most recent dream, Jack wished he’d thought to get Cassie out, but he didn’t know that she would have been any safer. He could have sent her with one of the Stargate teams, but that wasn’t a guarantee of safety. She would probably be better off where she was-with friends, at class, living her life. With luck, she wouldn’t know about their disappearances for a long time.
With luck, the Trust wouldn’t figure out what hurting Cassie would do to his fortitude.
Jack shivered. It wasn’t cold enough to kill him, but it was cold enough to keep him uncomfortable and shivering. He forced himself to get up and start doing jumping jacks, crunches, push-ups, stretches, anything to get his blood moving.
He knew he had to settle in for the long haul. He’d left his team with no hope of rescue, and now he found himself in the same boat.
The irony was killing him.
After a series of calisthenics, Jack curled up in the corner of the room. Eventually, someday, Jack might have to think about ending it all. He knew how to do it even in a bare cell.
But right now, Jack held onto the hope that he’d be able to escape. When he knew he couldn’t hang onto the information he held, that’s when Jack would take matters into his own hands.
Until then, Jack would allow his duty to survive to overwhelm everything else.
Chapter 7
“The thing about being on SG-1 is that you never say you’re fucked. That’s what first made me want to be a part of that team, you know? I wanted to be a part of that. I fought to walk again; I wanted a team who would have the same kind of determination to beat the odds. I never thought we’d face an enemy we couldn’t beat, but maybe that’s just my eternal optimism talking.”
~Interview with Cameron Mitchell
Sam woke all at once, her heart thundering in her chest, her breath coming in quick, silent gasps. She was no stranger to nightmares, but this one had been bad. She’d watched her team being tortured over and over again, powerless to stop it, and then she’d been forced to watch a laughing Ba’al slit Jack’s throat.
They couldn’t go back to Earth, Sam reminded herself. The gate was closed, and they’d been given their orders.
Jack would have ignored orders, though. If any of them had been left behind, Jack would have moved heaven and earth to get them back.
But Teal’c had promised to look, to get whatever information he could. Maybe Teal’c would manage the impossible.
Sam wasn’t just worried about Jack. Cassie was still on Earth, although Sam thought she’d be insulated from any real danger. Sam and Janet had both discussed what Cassie should do if something like this happened. If there was an invasion or foothold situation, Cassie knew to keep her head down, to go to class and pretend that everything was normal.
Technically, Cassie’s connection with the SGC had ended with Janet’s death. The Trust would have no reason to go after her. At least, that’s what Sam kept telling herself. Cassie was just a kid, just a college student still trying to find her way.
Vala suddenly rolled over and propped herself up on an elbow. “You okay?” she whispered.
“Fine.”
“Because I can hear you thinking from here.”
“Did you ever meet Cassie?” Sam asked, not wanting to talk about the dream that woke her up.
Vala shook her head. “No. She’s your friend’s daughter, right?”
“She’s at college,” Sam replied. “I haven’t been able to give her much thought. That sounds terrible, but-”
Vala put a hand on her arm. “When you’re off-world, you think of those you’ve left behind as safe.”
“I’ve been so worried about Jack,” Sam replied. “Cassie’s at college. There’s no reason for the Trust to go after her.”
“No reason at all,” Vala agreed.
“Teal’c will get her out if necessary, if he can.” Daniel’s voice floated across the space between the two beds. “And Cassie’s a smart kid. She’ll know to keep a low profile.”
“Yeah,” Sam said, knowing that Cam had as much reason to worry about his family as she did about Cassie. “I want to go back to Earth.”
“I know,” Cam said, speaking for the first time. “So do I.”
Sam closed her eyes. “We can’t.”
“No, we can’t,” Daniel agreed. “We have to do this. We have to follow orders this time, Sam.”
“I know,” she agreed. “God, I know.”
“Do you think you’re going to be able to go back to sleep?” Cam asked.
“No,” Sam replied, shuddering at the thought of her nightmare. “No.”
“Okay, then,” Cam replied, sitting up in bed. “Let’s get cleaned up and start gathering our supplies. Might as well use the time to our advantage.”
Cam and Daniel went to get cleaned up, leaving Sam and Vala alone in their room. “What do you think we can expect?” Sam asked once the guys were gone.
“Oh, I imagine they’ll shoot at us,” Vala admitted cheerfully, collapsing back on the bed. “But we can take them.”
“I think you spent too much time with the Marines while at the SGC,” Sam accused.
Vala grinned. “Oh, but can you blame me? They’re so delicious.”
Sam rolled her eyes, but she couldn’t help the laugh that escaped. “You’re incorrigible.”
“If there’s one thing I’ve learned, Sam, it’s that death can come for us at any time. Why not make the best of the time we have?”
Sam wondered how she’d gone for so many years without a female teammate. She still missed Janet terribly, and she loved the men on her team, but she was grateful to have Vala here with her now.
“Good point,” Sam agreed.
“Sorry,” Vala said. “I know you’d rather have your general.”
“I really would.” Sam sighed. “I hate this feeling that we’re leaving people behind, you know?”
“It’s one of the things I like most about you,” Vala replied.
“Are you okay?” Sam asked.
“Getting there,” Vala replied.
“You going to make a move on Daniel any time soon?”
“Getting there,” Vala replied, a smile in her voice.
Sam grinned. “He’s going to wait for you, you know.”
“And when I do make a move, as you so elegantly put it, he’ll throw it back in my face,” Vala replied.
“I don’t know. He’s been acting a little territorial lately.”
“Being protective doesn’t mean being interested.”
“I haven’t seen him this interested in years,” Sam replied. “You pose a challenge.”
“Bully for me,” Vala murmured. She sighed. “Maybe I’ll broach the subject on the way to Atlantis.”
“Just give me a warning,” Sam replied. “I’ll make sure that Cam and I are otherwise occupied.”
Vala grinned at her. “You’re a real friend.”
Sam returned the grin. “You know it.” They sprawled on the bed in companionable silence until Daniel and Cam reentered the room.
“It’s all yours,” Cam announced. “We’ll start gathering supplies as soon as you get back.”
Sam shared a look with Vala, and then began gathering whatever clean clothes she could put her hands on. She missed washing machines and hot showers, and she wanted nothing more than a set of clean BDUs-or even better, her favorite skirt and jean jacket.
“What do you miss?” Sam asked, once they had entered the washroom. “Clothes, I mean.”
Vala’s expression went a little dreamy. “There was this dress I had while I was a host. I loved it. I wish I had it now.”
Sam grinned. “You think there’s anywhere we could go between here and Atlantis to get some shopping done?”
“Unfortunately, no,” Vala replied. “I wish.”
Sam thought longingly of a day of shopping. She should have introduced Vala to Cassie while they were still on Earth; they could have had an old-fashioned girls’ day.
They would never get the chance now.
“We should get going,” Sam said. “We have a lot to do.”
Cam and Daniel had already packed up. All Sam and Vala had to do was to stuff their dirty clothing into the packs.
“We’ll need dried meat, dried fruit, and bread,” Vala said. “We might be on short rations, but between the ship’s stores and what we can purchase here, we should be good for a week and a half, maybe two.”
“Can we make it to Atlantis in that time?” Cam asked Sam.
Sam nodded. “If all goes well, yes, although I can’t make any promises. The ship appeared to be in good repair from what we saw of it, but that doesn’t mean something won’t go wrong.”
“There aren’t any guarantees in this gig,” Cam agreed. “We’ll do the best we can. You ladies know the plan?”
“We go in, we get as many of them together as we possibly can, and we drop the stun grenade,” Vala said briskly. “Yes, Cameron. We’ve gone over it enough.”
“Well, Vala, pardon me if I don’t want to get us all killed!” Cam shot back.
Daniel held up his hands. “Okay, that’s enough. We’re all under a lot of pressure. Let’s not fight about it.”
“How many men?” Cam asked.
Sam sighed and shook her head, knowing that Cam wasn’t going to stop pushing until he knew for certain that they all knew the plan inside and out. She didn’t blame him; if Sam had been the one left behind, she would be just as pushy.
“There were four that we saw,” Sam said for the fourth time. “We can get two or three in the same room at the same time. You and Daniel will prevent anyone from escaping. We take the ship, and we leave. We’ll dump the bodies out the airlock, or we’ll strand them on a planet.”
“I vote for stranding, if possible,” Daniel inserted, although he didn’t sound too hopeful.
“If possible, that’s what we’ll do,” Sam agreed. “But we may not have a choice.”
Daniel sighed. “I’m aware of that.”
“So, stun, zat, and otherwise incapacitate or kill,” Cam summed up.
Sam met his eyes. “We’ve got it covered, Cam. We’ll be fine.”
“I know you will,” he replied, and it was a promise.
Sam appreciated his faith; she knew she’d take it with her into the next battle.
~~~~~
Daniel grimaced. “I hate this.”
“You and me both,” Cam agreed fervently. “Damn those women for being competent anyway.”
Daniel shot him a dirty look. “Shut the fuck up, Cameron.”
Cam grinned. “You’re just bent because you haven’t admitted that you’re sweet on Vala yet.”
“Seriously, shut up.”
“Come on,” Cam cajoled. “You can’t tell me that you don’t get worked up by the idea of a confident, capable woman.”
“Vala doesn’t need that right now,” Daniel replied, not realizing that he was revealing too much until the words were out of his mouth.
“From what I can see, Vala likes you,” Cam said. “We’ve learned the hard way that life is short. You might want to take advantage of it.”
Daniel shook his head. “Not until she makes a move. I have a good idea what happened to her while we were in that Goa’uld dungeon. I don’t know that she’s going to be interested in having another man pawing at her anytime soon.”
“If you do it right, she won’t think of it as pawing,” Cam pointed out.
Daniel snorted. “That’s what you think. Vala hasn’t given me any indication that she’s interested.”
Cam laughed. “Then you haven’t been paying attention.”
Daniel shook his head. “We’ve got enough to think about right now.”
“If you say so.”
“I do.” Daniel kept his eyes focused on the ship. He knew they could take care of themselves, but he didn’t like splitting up. Daniel watched as Sam and Vala made contact with the gunrunners. They exchanged cordial nods and then disappeared inside the ship.
“They’ve got a stun grenade,” Cam said, although he sounded as though he was reassuring himself more than Daniel. He checked his watch. “We’ll give them another minute.”
Daniel shifted but didn’t argue. The main reason Sam and Vala had gone alone was because they were more likely to get the jump on their quarry.
“Okay, let’s move,” Cam ordered softly.
Daniel followed Cam as he sauntered across the open ground in front of the two ships. The one they wanted was to the left, but they took a circuitous route, approaching obliquely, trying not to give away their objective.
Sam and Vala had gone in with only a small bag between the two of them, ostensibly to hold the payment for the weapons. They’d chosen to attack now, before the weapons were off-loaded, knowing that Atlantis could probably use the extra ordinance. Daniel and Cam carried their supplies, doing their best to look like passers-by just checking out the sights.
One of the smugglers stepped out of the doorway, his hand on the gun tucked into his belt; from what Daniel could see, it was a pulse weapon of some sort, which seemed to be common in this area of the galaxy. The rule of thumb seemed to be that if it wasn’t a spear, or an arrow, it was a pulse weapon.
Cam approached slowly, looking every inch the country bumpkin that he often pretended to be. “Hey, Danny. Look at this ship! Pretty cool, huh?”
The guard turned a jaundiced eye on Cam. “What’s your business here?”
“No business,” Cam replied, raising his hands in supplication. “We just don’t get a chance to see ships like this where we’re from, and my friend here is a real aficionado. What model is this?”
“It’s similar to a tel’tak,” the guard replied, unbending slightly under the full force of Cam’s good old boy charm. “It was a special order.”
“Really?” Cam asked, sounding as enthusiastic as a child at Disneyland. “This is great! I don’t suppose there’s any chance we can get a tour.”
“No, sorry,” the man replied, but his hand dropped away from his gun. Daniel took the opportunity to zat him. Cam fired twice more, and the body disintegrated.
Daniel didn’t protest, although he hated the loss of life. Nearly ten years with the SGC, and he still hadn’t quite gotten used to the idea of acceptable casualties. They entered the ship and dropped their packs by the entrance, hopefully out of sight.
“What the hell took you so long?” Vala demanded, sticking her head around the corner. “The ship is clear.”
“It’s not like we knew,” Daniel replied defensively. “Everyone’s unconscious?”
“There was some resistance,” Vala admitted. “Daniel, you might want to check on Sam. She took fire. Cam, you can fly this, right?”
“Sure,” Cam replied with a smile. “I can fly anything.”
“Good. I’ll give you a hand. Daniel? Sam’s in the cargo area.”
“Got it,” Daniel replied. He felt the ship come to life under his feet as he made his way to the cargo area. It was similar enough to the tel’tak for Daniel to find his way without any trouble. “Sam?”
Sam waved at him. “I’m okay.”
“Vala said you needed medical attention,” Daniel replied, feeling the vibration under his feet as the ship took off. “How bad is it?”
Sam sighed. “It’s my leg. I’ve had worse.”
“That’s not saying much,” Daniel replied, making his way over to her.
She shrugged. “True enough, but it’s really not that bad.”
“Let me be the judge of that.”
Everyone in the SGC had to have at least some first aid training, and everyone on SG-1 had a little more instruction than most. They’d all been stuck in the field without medical help far too often to leave anything to chance.
Daniel winced when he saw the blood on Sam’s pants and the makeshift bandage over the top. “Okay, I think the best thing to do would be to get your pants off.”
“How long have you been waiting to say that?” Sam joked.
Daniel grinned at her. “All my life.”
She laughed. “Charmer. Pull off the bandage, and I’ll work on the pants.”
Daniel didn’t want to hurt her, and he untied the bandage carefully. The fabric of Sam’s BDUs hadn’t had a chance to stick to the skin yet, and Daniel removed her boots and helped her remove her pants carefully.
“Sorry,” he muttered.
Sam let out a muffled laugh. “Nothing you haven’t seen before.”
“It just seemed like the thing to say,” Daniel replied. “It doesn’t look too bad. Not enough bleeding to involve an artery, and the wound seems to have been cauterized by the blast.”
Sam managed a smile. “Good to know, since it hurts like a motherfucker.”
“I’ll get a clean bandage on it, and then you can pull your pants back on,” Daniel promised.
“Are my legs that bad?” Sam joked.
“Well, you haven’t shaved in awhile…”
She laughed, and Daniel thought that it was a testament to their friendship that they both could find that funny. “I forgot to pack my razor,” Sam joked.
“So did I,” Daniel replied. “Good thing that Cam’s a Boy Scout and packed an extra.”
“That’s why you’ve been looking rather scruffy.”
“Maybe I like a beard.”
“It looks good on you,” Sam replied, running a hand down his face. “You could always pull it off.”
“I miss Jack,” he said suddenly, apropos of absolutely nothing. He focused his attention on the dressing on Sam’s leg, checking out the damage and making sure there was nothing he’d missed.
“God, so do I,” Sam replied fervently. “Daniel…” She trailed off, her voice hitching on the last syllable.
“I know,” he said softly. “I know better than anyone.”
“Except maybe Teal’c,” Sam replied. “But yeah, you would. Do you think he’s still alive?”
“I don’t know,” Daniel admitted. “I can’t think of any reason why they’d kill him, though. They’d have every reason to keep him alive.”
Daniel didn’t say why they’d leave him alive, because Sam knew all the reasons already. They would torture Jack for information, but they would keep him alive. If Jack could stay out of the Trust’s hands for long enough, if he could stay alive long enough, Teal’c might be able to rescue him.
It was a long shot, but it was better than nothing.
Sam just shrugged and braced herself against the hull while Daniel cleaned her wound and bandaged it.
“Thanks,” she said as he finished. “That looks good.”
“Janet gave me personal lessons,” Daniel admitted. “After I asked.”
He could hear Sam swallow thickly. “I miss her, too.” Daniel looked up to see Sam blinking back tears. “Do you ever think that it’s too much, Daniel? That we’ve lost too much?”
“What other choice do we have?” Daniel asked. “We have to keep going.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
“Then yes,” Daniel replied, his voice hoarse. “Yeah, I feel like we’ve lost too much every single day.”
“Good to know it’s not just me.”
“It’s not just you.” He finished bandaging Sam’s wound, and then helped her get dressed again. “I don’t know that we’ve got much for the pain, but I might be able to come up with something.”
“I think I might just sleep, if that’s okay,” Sam replied, her voice faint. “I’m feeling pretty tired.”
“Sleep if you can,” Daniel said. “I’ll wake you up when we need you.”
He helped her get settled, even though he knew that Sam normally hated to show any sign of weakness. The fact that she accepted his help told him that she was hurting far worse than she was willing to let on.
Daniel covered her with his jacket as well as one of their emergency blankets and headed for the front of the ship.
“How’s it going?”
“We’re about ready to activate the hyperdrive,” Cam replied. “No other hostiles in sight.”
“Did you or Sam get a chance to check the cargo?” Daniel asked Vala.
Vala grinned. “We’ve got enough ordinance to supply a very small army for a long time, or a large army for a very short time.” She sobered quickly. “How is she?”
“It’s not life-threatening,” Daniel replied. “I’d prefer to get it looked at by a real doctor, but…” He trailed off.
“We do what we can,” Cam said, focusing on the controls. “You might want to have a seat, Jackson. I have no idea what this baby can do.”
Daniel nodded and headed back to the cargo area, sitting down next to Sam’s sleeping form and bracing himself against the hull. He felt the ship begin to vibrate underneath him, and he tipped his head back.
Maybe he should get some sleep, too. They didn’t have much else to do to pass the time.
~~~~~
“You know, I much prefer gate travel,” Vala said, laying on her back in the cargo hold. “Seriously, how much longer are we going to be on this blasted ship?”
Sam sighed. “We’re approaching the edge of the Pegasus galaxy. Another two days to hit Pegasus, and probably another five or six to Atlantis.”
“We don’t have enough food to make it that long,” Vala pointed out. “Not with half the ship’s stores destroyed by that fungus.”
“Cam and I talked about it. We’re going to stop off on the first world that has a gate and that looks safe. We’ll dial Atlantis and get recommendations on the best places to stop for food.” Sam rubbed her eyes. “I can’t believe that we’re actually going to Atlantis.”
“It’s too late to turn around now,” Vala replied.
“I’m aware.” Sam pushed herself up off the floor slowly, and Vala watched carefully. Sam had run a fever for a day or two, but she seemed to be okay now. She favored her left leg, but the damage probably wasn’t permanent.
Probably. Vala had seen even minor wounds turn deadly, and Sam’s injury had not been what she would call “minor.”
Vala closed her eyes, replaying the scene in her head. They had managed to get two of the smugglers in the hold easily enough, but the third had remained in the cockpit, with the fourth standing guard outside. She and Sam had walked a little ways off, ostensibly to talk over the deal, but it had given them the chance to duck behind a few crates and toss the grenade.
The smugglers had gotten off a warning before they were rendered unconscious, giving the smuggler in the cockpit time to start shooting. Sam had gone down before Vala could get a shot off, and it was luck alone that allowed her to kill the pilot without getting shot, too.
“Vala?”
She opened her eyes to find Daniel’s nose just inches from her own. “Hey.”
“Cam wants to know if you’re okay to take your shift.”
“I’m good.” Vala forced a smile. “Keep me company?”
“Of course,” Daniel replied. “I don’t have anything better to do.”
Vala rolled her eyes. “Oh, thank you so much.”
Daniel clasped her shoulder. “My pleasure.” She was unaccountably warmed by the contact, particularly when Daniel left his hand there a little longer than absolutely necessary. “I’ll check on Sam and join you.”
Vala made her way to the cockpit and put a hand on Cam’s shoulder. “You ready for me?”
“We’re on autopilot for now,” Cam replied, sliding out of the pilot’s seat. “You good for a few hours?”
“I’ll be fine,” Vala promised. “Daniel’s going to keep me company.”
Cam rubbed his eyes. “I’ll grab some sleep and then bring you guys something to eat. Call if you need anything.”
Vala sat down, checking the readouts automatically. They had been running the hyperdrive at half capacity, not wanting to risk a burnout in the middle of unoccupied space. So far, they had been successful, but Vala wasn’t going to count on actually making it to Pegasus.
They’d had remarkably good luck since escaping from the Goa’uld, but she knew it couldn’t last forever.
Daniel joined her a few minutes later. As the only non-pilot among them, he’d spent his time keeping each of them company in turn, while taking on the lion’s share of cooking and other chores. Vala had no idea when he slept, although she got the feeling that it was infrequent.
“How are you feeling?” she asked him.
He shrugged. “My arm aches less, and my ribs are almost back to normal. I’ll probably be ready for anything by the time we reach Atlantis.”
“It’s a dream come true for you, isn’t it?” she asked softly. “I know I interrupted your last trip.”
Daniel slouched a little deeper in his seat. “Yes, well, I thought going to Atlantis would mean a chance for discovery, something new after being with SG-1 for so long. I was sure I could make a difference with the expedition.”
“You’ll still be able to do that,” Vala pointed out.
Daniel shook his head. “It’s harder not knowing where Jack is, you know? I don’t have a lot of family. I really didn’t have any family at all until I joined the SGC. And now-we don’t know what happened to Jack, or General Hammond, or Cassie. I just-I’m not sure if I can move on not knowing.”
“It’s not about moving on,” Vala said quietly. “It’s about doing the job that’s in front of you for the good of those around you. You remember those you’ve left behind. You hold them in your memory. But you don’t let those memories hold you back.”
“You sound as though you’re speaking from experience.”
Vala shot him a dirty look. “I wasn’t hatched from an egg, Daniel. I had a mother and father. I had friends, and people I cared about.”
“And then?”
“And then I was taken as host to a Goa’uld, and whatever life I’d dreamed of having was swept away,” Vala replied. “There was a boy in my village I thought I would marry. He was kind and handsome and quite the catch. And then Qetesh chose me for a host, and there was no more boy, no more village, no more parents.”
“I’m sorry,” Daniel said softly.
Vala shook her head. “We all have our sad stories. That’s what I’ve learned in my years traveling. There’s no one who doesn’t have some tragedy in their past.”
“My parents were killed in front of me,” Daniel admitted in a low voice. “They were getting a museum exhibit ready, and it collapsed on them.”
“I’m sorry,” Vala said softly.
Daniel took a deep, audible breath. “There was a lot that they passed along to me before they died. I try to honor that.”
“And you do a remarkable job,” Vala replied.
Daniel smiled. “What about your parents?”
“My father was a smuggler and a thief,” Vala replied. “He would appear when it suited him, and he was gone the rest of the time. My mother died when I was a child, and I was raised mostly by my stepmother, who died while I was a host.” She glanced over at him. “You and Sam and Cameron are my family, Daniel.”
Daniel was quiet for a long moment, and then he said, “Thank you.”
“You shouldn’t thank me for telling the truth,” Vala said. “We’re on the same team. We owe each other that much.”
“We do,” Daniel replied softly.
Vala hesitated, wanting to ask her question but not knowing whether she should ask.
“Go for it,” Daniel said. “I promise to be honest.”
“Do you think less of me?” Vala asked.
Daniel shot her an incredulous look. “For what? For what happened with the guards?”
Vala shrugged.
“Vala, I told you, that wasn’t your fault.”
“Saying it and believing it are two separate issues.”
“Do you really think that little of me?” Daniel asked.
Vala kept her eyes on the readouts in front of her. “It’s not you I think so little of-it’s the universe at large. I’ve been around a long time, Daniel.”
“So have I,” Daniel replied. “And I know you well enough to understand when something is your fault, and when it’s not.”
“If I thought that trading my body for our freedom would have worked, I would have done it,” Vala admitted.
“I know,” Daniel replied quietly. “I know you would have, Vala. That doesn’t change anything.”
Vala shot him a grateful look. “Thank you.”
“We’re on the same team. We owe each other the truth,” Daniel said.
“More than the truth,” Vala replied.
Daniel smiled. “More than the truth.”
Vala glanced over at him, and then, following an impulse, leaned close to him and pressed her lips to his.
Daniel froze momentarily, but then his hand came up to frame her face, and his thumb caressed her cheek.
Vala didn’t know how long it had been since someone had touched her like this-she and Sam hugged and cuddled and touched, but that was different. That was completely platonic. No man had touched Vala with romantic intent for…
She couldn’t remember how long it had been. There had to be something wrong with that.
Daniel pulled back first, and the taste of his lips lingered on Vala’s. “You’re one of the strongest people I know,” he said quietly.
“You’re insane,” Vala replied.
Daniel smiled. “Maybe, but it’s a good insanity, right?”
“Yes, I think it might be.”
“Good.” Daniel laughed. “Are we really trying this?”
“Are we?”
“I think we are.” Daniel laughed. “If you want.”
Vala leaned in for another kiss.
“Okay,” Daniel said when she pulled back slightly. “Okay, we’re doing this.”
“We are,” Vala agreed.
Daniel pushed a hand through Vala’s hair. “I just never thought… I never thought you would look seriously at me.”
“I’ve looked seriously at you for a long time,” Vala confessed.
Daniel leaned in for another kiss in lieu of a response.
~~~~~
Cam glanced over at Sam, who sat in the co-pilot’s seat with her bad leg propped on the console. She stared out at the black, and from her expression, she was a million light years away.
“Penny for your thoughts,” he said.
“They’re not even worth that much,” Sam replied.
Cam shrugged. “Humor me.”
Sam sighed. “It’s just more of the same old, same old-all the people we left behind, everything I miss about Earth.”
“Coffee?”
“God, yes,” Sam agreed fervently. “Pizza.”
“Hamburgers.”
“Thai food.”
“Chinese.”
“Pasta.”
“My mom’s roast chicken.”
“Pot roast.”
“Beer.”
“I miss beer,” Sam agreed. “A lot.”
“We probably won’t get any on Atlantis,” Cam observed.
Sam slumped a little lower in her seat. “I know. They’re probably going to be running out of coffee soon, if they haven’t already.”
“A lot of other things, too,” Cam observed. “That’s going to be the hardest part of being cut off from Earth. They’re going to be short on everything-supplies, ammunition, and personnel.”
“How many others do you think will make it to Pegasus?” Sam asked.
Cam thought of Carrie, and half a dozen others he thought had probably made it out of the base. “I don’t know. If we make it, it’s going to be a miracle.”
“I know.” Sam rubbed her eyes. “What the hell was Jack thinking?”
“He didn’t have a choice.” Cam couldn’t believe that he was the one leaping to O’Neill’s defense. That honor would normally be reserved for Jackson or Sam or Teal’c. But Teal’c wasn’t there, Jackson was wrapped up in Vala at the moment, and Sam was too torn up about everything to think straight.
Cam suspected that she was pissed at the general for not escaping while he had the opportunity, and for not coming to rescue them when he knew something was wrong.
To tell the truth, Cam was a little pissed off about that himself. If O’Neill had sent someone, if he’d come himself, maybe Vala wouldn’t have been hurt so badly.
They’d been left to rot because there hadn’t been anyone to send after them, because there was no one to send through the gate, no one to give them the order to go. But O’Neill could have sent one of the departing teams to the planet where they’d been held. Rescue had been possible, but it hadn’t been attempted.
Cam knew the difference.
The silence hung between them, and Sam finally shook her head. “He did have a choice, and he made it. I knew that duty always wins with Jack.”
“Isn’t that true of most of us?” Cam asked.
Sam shot him a look. “I don’t know. You tell me. If you could go back, if we could have dialed Earth, would you have gone back for your family?”
“In a heartbeat,” Cam said readily.
“Yeah.”
“You wish you could go back for Cassie?”
“Every day.” Sam sighed. “She was on my list, you know. She might-there’s at least a possibility that she’ll be sent off-world.”
“There’s a better chance that she won’t need rescuing,” Cam pointed out, well aware of Cassie’s background. He’d read the mission reports, and he’d met Cassie once before. “She’s just a college student.”
“Teal’c said he’d check on her if he could,” Sam said hopefully. “So, maybe…”
“Maybe,” Cam agreed, wishing he’d thought to have Teal’c check on his parents and his brother’s family. But that was just the thing-Teal’c had enough to worry about trying to rescue O’Neill. If they had each had a list of people to be rescued, Teal’c would have no hope of fulfilling their requests.
Cam couldn’t help but think that it was an impossible situation.
An alarm sounded, interrupting their thoughts, and Cam quickly began to press buttons, trying to get a clear report.
“What have we got?” Sam asked, pulling her foot down and stretching it out in front of her.
Cam’s hands danced over the console. “We’ve got a problem. There’s a leak in the coolant system.”
Sam hit the button for the intercom. “Vala, I need your help in the cockpit.”
Vala turned up in a few seconds. “What’s going on?”
“There’s a problem in the engine room,” Sam replied. “I need your help.”
“You’ve got it,” Vala promised readily. “Let’s move.”
Cam didn’t pay much attention as Vala helped Sam to a standing position, and then supported her out of the cockpit. Jackson joined Cam soon thereafter, his forehead creased in concern.
“How bad is it?” Jackson asked.
Cam shrugged. “You’ll have to ask Sam after she’s had a chance to look at the engine. It might be serious.”
Jackson grimaced. “Let’s hope not.”
Cam just focused on the readouts. “I’m bringing us out of hyperspace.”
“Yeah, I figured that out,” Jackson replied.
Cam gave him a dirty look, and then slowed the ship to normal speed and activated the ship’s intercom. “Sam? Any details?”
“We’ve got a leak,” Sam replied after a long silence. “I can put a patch job on it, but I don’t know that it’s going to get us very far.”
“Do what you can,” Cam replied. “We’ll deal with the consequences when we have a better idea of what we’re looking at.”
“You got it.”
Jackson sent Cam a worried look. “We don’t have much food left. If we’re really careful, and we go to starvation rations, we might make it. Might.”
“Then we cut back on everything we can,” Cam responded. “Water, food, whatever. We do whatever it takes.”
“Agreed, but I’m not sure that ‘whatever it takes’ is going to be enough,” Jackson said quietly.
Cam nodded. “I know. We’ll give it our best shot.”
Jackson stared at the console in front of him for a long moment. “You should probably give me as much instruction as you can. We should all know how to pilot the ship, and I’m the only one who doesn’t have some rudimentary understanding.”
“Yeah, that’s true.” Cam focused on his hands, feeling the helplessness wash over him in a horrible wave. They could be stuck out here, drifting in the black, with no hope of rescue, until they all died of hunger or dehydration.
They could, Cam thought, but they’d made it this far. He had to believe that they’d make it to Atlantis, too.
“Okay, quick tutorial,” Cam said. “Switch places with me.”
Cam hit the intercom once Jackson was settled. “Sam, let us know when we’re okay to fire the engines up again.”
“You got it,” Sam promised.
“Put your hands on the yoke, here,” Cam instructed, demonstrating. “It’s really pretty simple.”
Cam hoped it would be simple, anyway. He hoped Jackson wouldn’t need the information. And he hoped to hell they could find a way to make it to Atlantis.
~~~~~
Jack glanced over at Sam, stretched out in the lawn chair on the dock, wearing nothing but a pair of shorts and a tank top. Her legs looked impossibly long from this angle, her skin still pale from long hours spent inside or in BDUs. Her cheeks were flushed with the heat from the July sun, and she pressed a cold bottle of beer to the side of her neck.
“You can’t tell me this wasn’t a good idea,” Jack said, unable to resist crowing a bit.
He could feel her rolling her eyes behind her sunglasses. “There aren’t any fish.”
“That’s the whole point,” Jack replied. “Come on, tell me you’re not having fun.”
A smile quirked her lips. “I’m not having fun.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“That’s your problem, isn’t it?” Sam replied, but she grinned openly now. “It’s just too bad that Daniel and Teal’c couldn’t come.”
It was Jack’s turn to roll his eyes. “Uh huh.”
“I’ve missed my team,” Sam said softly.
“And there are a lot of activities we would have to forego if they were here,” Jack said lightly, feeling the need to deflect.
They were all close, and Jack knew that Daniel and Teal’c knew about their relationship, but he wasn’t willing to have sex with them in the next room.
Hell, it had taken two days of solitude for Jack to stop feeling guilty for looking at her with intent. They had been dancing around this relationship for so long, trying to move on, but without success. They’d spent so long not talking about how they felt about each other, it had become impossible to discuss it now.
And they were still hiding, although they weren’t trying very hard. Now that they were no longer under the same command, there were no rules preventing them from being together, but they’d agreed that it was too soon. Jack had just recently moved to D.C.; Sam was still getting her feet under her as a commanding officer. Their relationship would raise too many questions, and Jack didn’t want Sam’s career to take a hit.
Jack knew that he was pretty much bulletproof at this point, but Sam wasn’t. He was just waiting for retirement.
Real retirement.
Sam wiggled her toes. “I don’t know. They would probably give us our privacy.”
“I’d rather not have to try,” Jack replied.
“I’m worried about Cassie,” Sam suddenly confessed. “She said she was going to spend the weekend with friends, but I don’t think her first year in college went well.”
“She has to find her own way, Carter,” Jack said, still not used to using her first name.
He’d started using her first name within the privacy of his own mind, but he was having a little trouble with the rest of it.
“I’m aware of that,” Sam said. “I did. Everybody does. It’s just-I feel like I’m failing Janet.”
“We’ve all done our best to be there for that kid,” Jack replied. “We’re all trying, you hardest of all. There’s nothing else you can do.” He waited for her to reply, and when she didn’t, he asked, “Cassie’s making friends, isn’t she?”
“Yeah.” Sam sighed. “It’s okay. It’s good that she has people she can spend the holidays with, even if it’s not me.”
Jack suspected that Sam had harbored a hope that Cassie would spend time with her over the 4th of July weekend. Cassie might be relatively close, going to school in Boulder, ostensibly pre-med, but Cassie didn’t get down to Colorado Springs very often.
“She’s going to be okay, Sam,” Jack promised. “She’s strong.”
“I know.” Sam put her beer down and leaned across the intervening space, meeting Jack’s lips with her own. “Jack…”
Hearing his name on her lips did something to him, Jack admitted. He was half-hard already, and he let out a little groan as Sam left her lawn chair and straddled his lap.
Jack lost himself in her. He’d lived in the moment as Jonah, with Thera’s head a warm and heavy weight on his shoulder. He’d wrapped his arms around her in the aftermath of a hard mission, content just to feel her, to hear her breathing, to let her faith substitute for his own.
She made him feel impossibly old and impossibly young, all at the same time, and Jack was so grateful for this-for hot sun and still, fish-less water, and the warmth of human contact.
And Jack woke, with the sense-memory of Samantha Carter still on his lips. There was the taste of beer, of sweat, of sunscreen, even though he’d had nothing but tasteless gruel for-
How long? Jack wondered. He’d woken up in this cell with no idea of where he was, or how long he’d been unconscious. The only hint of light came when he’d been fed at semi-regular intervals. The food was always the same-a sort of porridge that tasted like nothing. Jack had tried counting minutes, tried keeping track of the days, but to no avail.
Jack knew what the Trust was trying to do, of course. He’d taken advanced interrogation techniques; he’d spent four months in an Iraqi prison, and they didn’t have anything on Ba’al.
He suspected that they would leave him here, in near-sensory deprivation, to soften him up. There was no light, and no sound but his own breathing and the occasional squeak of metal when his meal was shoved through the slot in the door. He had no idea what they’d done to secure the opening, but he’d tried to pry it open with no success.
They might leave him here for weeks, even months, and by the time they allowed him contact with another human being, Jack would be pathetically grateful. He’d be so happy to see anyone, that he would tell them anything at all.
At least, that was the theory. It was no wonder that Jack’s vivid dreams took him to happier times.
Thinking of the most recent dream, Jack wished he’d thought to get Cassie out, but he didn’t know that she would have been any safer. He could have sent her with one of the Stargate teams, but that wasn’t a guarantee of safety. She would probably be better off where she was-with friends, at class, living her life. With luck, she wouldn’t know about their disappearances for a long time.
With luck, the Trust wouldn’t figure out what hurting Cassie would do to his fortitude.
Jack shivered. It wasn’t cold enough to kill him, but it was cold enough to keep him uncomfortable and shivering. He forced himself to get up and start doing jumping jacks, crunches, push-ups, stretches, anything to get his blood moving.
He knew he had to settle in for the long haul. He’d left his team with no hope of rescue, and now he found himself in the same boat.
The irony was killing him.
After a series of calisthenics, Jack curled up in the corner of the room. Eventually, someday, Jack might have to think about ending it all. He knew how to do it even in a bare cell.
But right now, Jack held onto the hope that he’d be able to escape. When he knew he couldn’t hang onto the information he held, that’s when Jack would take matters into his own hands.
Until then, Jack would allow his duty to survive to overwhelm everything else.
Chapter 7