'Tween Weft and Warp (PG)
Title: 'Tween Weft and Warp
Author: Fig Newton (sg_fignewton)
Rating: PG
Pairing: none
Word Count: ~6,650
Summary: Difficult choices can lead to painful results. Would different pasts offer a better future? In the wake of FIAD, angst and AUs abound as Daniel and Teal'c struggle to find out.
Warnings: none
Spoilers: References to events in COTG, Thor's Hammer, Cor-Ai, Secrets, and Forever in a Day.
Disclaimer: None of them are mine. They all belong to their respective copyright holders.
Author's Note: Written for the sg1friendathon, for the prompt: Daniel and Teal'c. Forgiveness that can never be accepted.
As always, my thanks to that queen of betas, randomfreshink.
'Tween Weft and Warp
They stepped through the chappa'ai and walked straight into an ambush. There was no hesitation or pause for assessment; the natives began to fire instantly from secure positions, using the same projectile weapons they had seen on that other, oddly technological planet.
After the near debacle of the previous day, Teal'c had ordered his men to have their staff weapons primed and ready. This extra caution saved their lives, as they were able to return fire almost instantly. Apophis stood behind them, his gold armor glittering, defended by their very bodies against the hail of metal that assaulted them.
One native after another fell as his fellow Jaffa advanced on their concealment, but Teal'c could see none of the terror that had been so evident on the other planet. There was grim, resolute determination, as they fired again and again and -
No hostages, a voice whispered in his mind.
It sounded oddly like Bra'tac.
No hostages who need protection. No innocent slave to protect from stray weapons fire.
He stood at the cusp of insurrection, his own staff weapon blasts faltering at the enormity of the moment.
If Apophis dies here...
Another native toppled backward in the dust. Fewer weapons chattered against them now.
Teal'c made his decision.
It was astonishingly simple to perform the ultimate act of rebellion; Apophis stood at arrogant ease, supremely confident of his First Prime's loyalty. Teal'c only wished that the golden helmet was open, so he could see the surprise and comprehension of betrayal. But the helmet was closed, and the sudden dimming of those glowing red eyes was the only sign as the staff blast, at nearly point-blank range, almost severed the head from the trunk.
The lifeless body collapsed. The others, still advancing and firing at the few remaining natives, hadn't even noticed.
"Dead false god," Teal'c whispered, then pivoted to shout at his men. "Jaffa! Kree!"
They paused, half-turning, and Teal'c pointed wordlessly at the body that lay sprawled by the stairs.
Two Jaffa simply stood and stared. The others gave howls of rage, turning back to fire upon the natives whom they assumed had killed Apophis.
Teal'c could not quite bring himself to kill his own men, but he gave no word of warning as the last armed natives seized the opportunity of their initial distraction to cut the remaining Jaffa down. He bowed his head in a silent moment of grief that he had led them to their deaths.
The natives shifted their aim to target him, and Teal'c opened his helmet before dropping his own staff weapon to the ground and lifting his hands in a show of surrender. He met the gaze of one young boy, watching as he narrowed his eyes with hatred and curled his finger more tightly on what must be the trigger of his weapon. If he died here... well, it would be just retribution for leading his own men to their ignominious deaths. And, at least, he would die free.
Then a woman's voice rapped across the sudden silence, sharp and commanding.
"Chahari!"
The natives hesitated. The young boy tore his gaze from Teal'c's face and shifted to glance over his shoulder.
"Chahari," the woman repeated, and now she stepped forward, angling her movements so that the young boy and the other two armed natives could still fire on Teal'c without obstruction. She stopped twenty paces from Teal'c and glared at him, without fear in her face or her voice. "You killed the one like Ra."
"I did," Teal'c acknowledged.
The woman ignored the ripple of murmurs and whispers behind her. "Explain your actions."
Teal'c absorbed the cadence of her words. It was not quite the formal language that he spoke in his dealings with Apophis (dead false god), nor the vernacular tongue of the Jaffa on Chulak, but it was close enough to allow for communication.
"This is Abydos," he replied. It was, he felt, nearly an explanation in itself, but her eyes flashed with a fire that owed its power to no symbiote, and he elaborated further. "This one, like Ra, claimed planets and slaves for his own. Ra was killed here. Apophis now lies dead. Like Ra." He stared back at her levelly, hiding the soaring triumph behind an impassive expression. "Two false gods now lie dead on the sands of Abydos."
The sound of running footsteps broke the tableau, and Teal'c forced himself to refrain from dropping into a defensive crouch as new soldiers burst into the chamber. Two were garbed as the other natives, but three were clad in clothing similar to those on the planet they had raided the previous day.
Alliance, whispered Bra'tac's voice in his mind. A frisson of hope stirred, and Teal'c wondered, for the first time, if there might be even greater achievements beyond the victory of Apophis' death.
Minutes later, Teal'c sat stripped of his armor, hands and feet bound. He offered no resistance, answering question after question with unruffled calm. The woman stood back now, pressed against the side of a native with lighter hair than the others, but she listened intently as the interrogation continued. The man in charge - one of those who had arrived after the brief skirmish - spoke not in Goa'uld, but in the common language that Teal'c had learned in his travels as First Prime.
These were not meek slaves, to be cowed by power; not the ones clad in robes, nor the ones wearing uniforms of a material as strange as their weapons. Teal'c's heart soared. These could, indeed, be powerful allies. Two false gods were dead. How many more could be killed, and both Jaffa and slaves released to a life of freedom?
"What happens when you don't come back to this Chulak of yours?" the leader pressed.
Teal'c considered the possibilities. "It is most likely that a larger contingent of Jaffa will be sent here to discover what has happened," he admitted. He glanced beyond the leader at the woman and the man who seemed to be her mate; they seemed to be in command of the robed natives, just as the leader commanded the soldiers in uniform. "In half a day, perhaps a bit more. Your people might be at risk."
"Jack -" the man started, looking sharply at the leader.
"Take it easy, Daniel," the leader said calmly, without taking his gaze off Teal'c. "We'll make sure Abydos is safe."
"If we rebury the Gate, there won't be any risk," the man called Daniel suggested grimly.
The native boy - Skaara, Daniel had called him - cried out a protest. The woman looked up at Daniel, surprise evident on her face, and murmured a question. Daniel hugged her a little more tightly, and answered her in the same language. Teal'c caught only a few words in the local dialect - "...know better now, Sha're, the risk isn't worth..." - before the leader named Jack distracted him.
"Is he right?" Jack demanded. "If the Abydons bury the Stargate, will they be safe?"
Stargate? "You mean the chappa'ai." Teal'c inclined his head in agreement. "Yes. If the chappa'ai is buried, the Jaffa on Chulak will not be able to establish a connection. They will believe that Apophis could not have come here to Abydos." He hesitated, then forced himself to voice the logical conclusion. "In that case, Apophis' loyal Jaffa will seek for him at the last planet we visited." He looked levelly at Jack and the now-familiar weapon he carried. "I believe that planet is yours."
"Sir," said a blond woman, clothed in the same strange uniform as Jack, "we have to warn Earth. And Ferretti needs medical attention..."
Jack stood silently for a moment, then turned to the man named Daniel. "We were supposed to take you back with us."
Daniel tightened his grip around his mate. "I'm not going anywhere," he said flatly. "I'll send you back to Earth, and we'll rebury -"
The woman - Sha're? - interrupted him boldly with a rapid spate of protest, hissed under her breath. Daniel turned to face her fully, and for the first time, Teal'c saw honest fear on one of his captor's faces.
"We will go with you!" Sha're called to Jack, ignoring Daniel's further arguments. "Danyel and I will speak for Abydos to the people of the Earth."
Jack shook his head. "You won't be able to come back here if Skaara and the boys bury the Gate. And, well..." He grimaced. "I don't know what kind of welcome you'll get there. Not after this."
"Sha're," Daniel murmured, and now he cupped her face in his hands, whispering too quietly for even Jaffa ears to listen. Sha're's look of determination faded into sad understanding, and at last she nodded in agreement.
"We'll stay here," Daniel said again. He moved away from his mate's side towards the alry'sai and began to press the symbols that would call forth the gateway to another world.
His mate stepped forward to speak to Jack. "Leave us what you can," she suggested. Her speech in the common language was heavily accented, but it was still understandable. Her gaze flickered to the wounded who lay along the walls. "We will need it."
Jack nodded in agreement and instructed the blond woman, "Captain, the packs stay behind. There's medicines and ammunition these people can use."
"Yes, sir," she answered crisply. She went to kneel by the side of the man she had called Ferretti, speaking in soothing, encouraging tones.
Behind Teal'c, the chappa'ai opened. "Good luck, Jack," Daniel said quietly as he moved away.
"Bury it good, Daniel," Jack told him in return.
"We will."
Jack drew a large knife from its holster on his thigh and cut the ropes that bound Teal'c's feet together. "You're coming with us," he said shortly. "There's a lot more we need to find out."
Teal'c gave a short nod of acquiescence, and obediently followed Jack up the steps to the chappa'ai. He paused at the sprawled body of Apophis, and seized a final opportunity to spit on the corpse.
Then he dissolved to his component atoms, and he journeyed to the planet of the Tau'ri. He knew he would be treated with wary suspicion, and perhaps even imprisoned; but he would do what he could to warn the people of Earth of the menace that stalked the rest of the galaxy.
Over the next several months, the people at the strangely named SGC tried many times to connect to Abydos, but always failed. Teal'c was secretly pleased that the brave woman and her mate, Daniel, had buried the chappa'ai and would be able to live out their lives free of the Goa'uld.
It was only years later that Teal'c learned of the summit that the House of Apophis convened with the other Goa'uld to report on Apophis' death, and that the System Lords came to a rare, unanimous agreement: a planet of slaves that had caused the deaths of two of their greatest could not be allowed to survive. The chappa'ai on Abydos never opened again because it was buried under tons of molten rock when the entire planet was razed by an armada of eight Goa'uld motherships, avenging the deaths of Apophis and Ra.
*
Movement.
Sound.
Light?
Voices.
"...ackson, can you..? ...aniel? He's not... RI now, we need..."
Hissing in his ears.
He is wrapped in Sha're's linen shrouds, buried beneath shifting sands...
No, not that, that was...
It was...
She was...
Teal'c, you did -
No!
*
Daniel, Sam, and Kendra halted in mid-step at the sight in front of them. A monstrous creature hung pinned in the orange light that cascaded from the doorway to the Labyrinth, held in place by Teal'c's strength and determination. Daniel could see the agony twisting the Jaffa's features, and he realized that Thor's Hammer had no way to differentiate between a fully mature Goa'uld and the larval symbiote that served as Teal'c's immune system.
Then Teal'c stumbled backwards, and Daniel could see that Jack had risked his own life to yank Teal'c away from that deadly doorway.
The seconds stretched out as the impossibly tall creature, now alone in its literal purgatory, writhed in the Hammer. It collapsed back into the Labyrinth, and the Hammer winked out.
After a moment, Teal'c moved to check on the monster's status. Daniel and the others stepped warily through the quiescent Hammer, their eyes fixed on the slumped creature, riddled with bullets, that lay on the ground.
Teal'c glanced up at Jack, his hand still resting on the monster's neck. "Without the healing power of the Goa'uld, this body will no longer regenerate," he stated evenly. "There is too much damage."
"Now I see why they call you friend," Kendra murmured. Daniel swallowed hard.
"This is Kendra," Sam explained to Jack. "She brought us here."
"She had first-hand knowledge," Daniel said, almost breathless with the enormity of what they'd witnessed. "She was a Goa'uld." He gestured behind him, at the archway. "The Hammer works."
Jack just stared back at him wordlessly.
Daniel couldn't believe that he still had to explain. "Do you know what this means?" he demanded.
It took a long moment before Jack finally answered. "It's the only way out of here, Daniel," he said quietly.
"What this can do for Sha're and Skaara!" Daniel pressed, almost infuriated that Jack still didn't get the point. This was the answer they'd been seeking, a chance to not only rescue his wife and good brother, but to restore them to themselves. It was their greatest discovery since they'd first stepped through the Stargate!
"Teal'c's here now," Jack pointed out, his face expressionless.
"And here I will remain," Teal'c said immediately, his voice as calm as ever. "I was with those that took the ones you love."
"No," Jack contradicted him.
No, Daniel thought furiously. You weren't with them. You took them yourself. You chose them.
"You're part of this family now," Jack continued. "We're not leaving you behind."
Daniel's mouth snapped shut on the words he ached to hurl at Jack for this double-edged insult - to himself, and to the loving family he'd lost because of Teal'c's actions.
Teal'c turned his head slowly to lock gazes with Daniel. He, at least, recognized what Jack chose to ignore.
Jack turned and picked up Teal'c's staff weapon, then walked forward. "This thing won't work in here," he said. "Try it from out there." He offered it to Daniel.
Daniel took the staff weapon automatically, his mouth open in an effort to voice the words screaming in his head. He glanced at Teal'c. Emotions played across that usually stoic face, and Teal'c lowered his gaze to the floor.
He knew.
He knew what he deserved.
Daniel opened his hand deliberately. The staff weapon clattered to the ground.
"No," he said.
Jack took another step forward. "Daniel..."
"No, Jack," Daniel repeated. He stared, hot and angry, at the man he called friend. "We don't have the right to do this. The Hammer protects this planet from the Goa'uld. What were you planning to do? Set up an answering machine? 'I'm sorry, but the Hammer is not in service. Please go back through the Stargate and invade our planet later'?"
"Daniel, we're a team! Teal'c -"
"Teal'c is safe and unharmed." Daniel crossed his arms. "Teal'c has food and water, and we can supply him with whatever else he might need. We want to find the Asgard, don't we? How friendly do you think they'd be if we destroyed the protection they've created for Cimmeria?"
"Daniel," Sam tried, "we have to -"
"And you, Sam! You really want to destroy this technology without the chance to study it first? What if we can duplicate it and create one like it for Earth?" Daniel gave the staff weapon a contemptuous kick.
Jack was getting angry. About time.
"Daniel," he started, his voice chilly, "you can take that staff weapon and fire it, or -"
"Or what?" Daniel's brows lifted, his voice equally cool. "I'm off SG-1? I wonder what Hammond would say about this tactical decision of yours - destroying a device that can mean the difference between victory and defeat." He paused, then added deliberately, "If we'd known about Cimmeria and Thor's Hammer from the beginning, we could've saved Kawalsky."
Jack actually rocked back on his heels at that. Then he recovered and strode forward, grabbing Daniel by the collar of his uniform.
"Fire it," he gritted between his teeth.
Daniel wrenched away. "Fire it yourself," he hissed, and turned and stalked out of the cave.
He tried not to listen for the inevitable blast and the agonized crackle of short-circuited technology that he knew was coming.
*
Teal'c's eyes fly open as he snaps abruptly out of his attempt at kel'no'reem. It takes a moment for him to recognize his surroundings. Antiseptic smell, sterile equipment... This is the SGC's morgue, where he sits, unasked, in watch over the body of Daniel Jackson's wife.
He does not know if the Tau'ri or the Abydons believe that a person's body must be guarded until the burial rites are completed, to keep watch over the dead one's spirit. Until he is told otherwise, he chooses to honor Sha're as he would wish for himself and his own family.
Now he takes slow, deliberate breaths, considering that oddly vivid - memory? No, that is not accurate. Daniel Jackson fired the staff weapon, releasing him from his imprisonment.
He willingly destroyed his wife and brother's salvation, for the sake of the man who was responsible for their torment.
Even now, Teal'c can not understand why.
*
Teal'c stalked through the corridor to the prisoners' chamber. He kept his face impassive through habit, but he felt sickened at what he had witnessed. He had never seen the choosing ceremony before. The casual humiliation, examination, and disposal of human beings, just to satisfy the capricious whims of Apophis and Amaunet...
Entering the room, he surveyed the women set aside for the choosing ceremony. They would each be treated as the first: inspected, then either taken or discarded. Those who remained after Amaunet selected her host would be killed outright.
He panned slowly over the faces that turned to meet him, wondering which one would be most likely to please Amaunet. True, they would all die; but if he picked the right victim, the remainder, at least, would die quickly, and in less pain. He wished he could do more, but he knew that a rebellion without support would serve no purpose but his own death. Another would simply step into his place - a new First Prime, who would most likely not be interested in sparing even a few of Apophis' victims.
Many of the women were anxious. A few even seemed interested. Which one...?
He stopped.
A single woman had not turned to look at him. She sat, ramrod straight, her back to the door.
It was the dark-haired woman from Abydos, who had furiously denied her fear in the dungeon and showed more concern for the boy who had been taken with her than she did for herself.
He started to point towards her, then stopped. Such spirit did not deserve to be shamed by the false gods. Better to pick another.
"You," he said instead, directing the flanking slaves to take one of the women lounging on the floor.
She shrank back from them, but did not struggle as they hustled her out of the chamber. Teal'c turned and followed, hoping that the selection process would end with this one and that Amaunet would be satisfied.
But the hours wore on, and the women were rejected, one by one. Some were disdained by Apophis; others were rejected by Amaunet, who hissed her displeasure before retreating. Teal'c writhed inwardly at the sheer waste of life for no other reason than the greedy, fickle desires of two arrogant creatures. He longed to seize Amaunet and wring the symbiote in two before anyone could stop him, to wrest a staff weapon from one of the guards and fire it upon Apophis until he was nothing more than a smoking, charred heap of flesh. But Bra'tac's voice in his mind counseled patience, and caution: a solitary attempt would accomplish nothing.
In the end, after nearly a day's delay, he instructed the slaves to take the Abydon woman. She fought back with furious strength, but Apophis only laughed, and took pleasure at debasing that spirit. And then Teal'c watched as Amaunet slithered across the woman's back, and plunged into her neck to claim her for its own.
The delay meant that when three strangers were guided into the palace by mistaken priests, they were not confronted by Apophis and his new queen. Instead, their stumbling efforts at communication led to suspicion, and they were stripped of all their equipment and imprisoned with the other common slaves in the dungeon. There, they met a boy they knew, but were unable to discover a means of escape.
When Apophis and Amaunet entered the main dungeons to allow the other Goa'uld of their House to select new hosts, one of the strangers leapt to his feet, crying out to Amaunet.
"Sha're! Sha're, it's me...!"
Apophis, angry at the man's audacity, ordered Teal'c to kill him on the spot.
Teal'c had no choice. He aimed his staff weapon and fired.
And when the other Goa'uld had chosen hosts, and Apophis and Amaunet had gone, and the older stranger appealed to Teal'c without fear...
Teal'c had no reason to believe him. But he was disgusted with what he had been forced to do, and he could no longer stomach watching and waiting.
He turned and fired on the other Jaffa.
In the end, the surviving prisoners fled, and Teal'c joined the stranger and the woman who was with him. When they reached the chappa'ai, and the woman attempted to establish a connection to their world, they found that they could not. Too much time had elapsed, and the leaders on their planet had sealed their chappa'ai permanently.
As Teal'c turned to make his final stand, he heard the shouts of the Jaffa troops that pursued them, and the whine of the gliders overhead. He knew that his fledgling revolution would die here, on the plains of Chulak, with him and the soldiers from Earth. And Sha're and Skaara of Abydos would remain hosts to Amaunet and Klorel, with no one to search for them and seek their release from their torment.
*
The voices seem less vague, now. But his limbs and tongue are stiff with grief, and the effort to respond seems overwhelming.
His heavy lids are lifted, and blinding light stabs into his eyes, but he can't raise a hand to shield himself.
"Pupils responding," a female voice murmurs.
Sha're?
He tries to speak, to call out her name.
"Daniel?" A faint stinging sensation on his cheek, muffled by a blanket of numbed misery. Too hard to flinch away.
He sinks back into the depths, drowning in a sea of could-have-beens and if-onlys.
You did the right -
No, no, no...
*
The bell clanged heavily in the air as the natives streamed back into the large chamber, eyeing Teal'c warily. They made their way to their seats, while Daniel, together with Sam, broke away from the crowd and approached Jack and Teal'c.
Jack looked up at them over Teal'c's bowed head, his face set. "What's the plan of attack?" he asked.
"Well, the way I look at it, Teal'c has already pled guilty," Daniel sighed. "So, to draw a parallel to an American trial, we have to look at this as sort of like the sentencing phase."
The words came out slowly, hesitantly. Teal'c's silence spoke volumes of his acceptance of his guilt in Hanno's father's death, and Daniel found himself leaning heavily against the wooden frame of the witness stand, weighted down by ironic parallels.
"We need to prove to these people that..." Daniel forced himself to continue, ignoring the acid taste of bitterness on his tongue. "He doesn't deserve to die."
Sam's mouth twisted. "How can we do that?"
Daniel gave a half-shrug. "We need to convince them that he's a different man now than he was then." As if that would change what happened to Hanno's father... and to Sha're.
"Good luck," Jack muttered. "It's not as if we have any -" He broke off and stared at Daniel. "Yes, we do, don't we?"
Daniel frowned at him. "What?"
Jack pointed a finger. "You can argue this for us, Daniel."
Daniel blinked at him for a moment, then suddenly understood. He jerked back as if struck. "You wouldn't dare," he breathed.
"Daniel," Jack said, his voice sharp. "Think. It might get us out of here. I know it won't be easy, but we can... fix things up later."
Daniel closed his eyes, seeking calm. When he opened then again, Jack actually flinched, and Daniel knew that he must be able to see the sheer fury in his stare.
"Don't try it," he warned, his voice little more than a hiss. "You won't like the answers you get if you do."
"Sir?" Sam darted a quick look at Daniel, then back at Jack. "What are you suggesting here?"
Jack ignored her. "Daniel."
"No, Jack."
"Daniel!"
Teal'c raised his head then, and the frown that dragged at the corners of his mouth deepened. "What do you propose, O'Neill?"
Jack ignored him, too. "Daniel," he said again, and now his voice was edged with something other than sharpness. "Daniel, we have to deal with now. You've gotten yourself past it. Now, you can just... help Hanno get past it, okay?"
Daniel licked his lips. "Maybe I haven't gotten past it as much as you think I have," he whispered. His gaze flicked to Teal'c, then back to Jack again. "I am standing right here, and I am ready to champion Teal'c, and I want him to be able to walk away. Let that be enough, Jack."
"It can't be enough." Jack circled the witness stand to lay a hand on Daniel's arm. It conveyed both reassurance and warning at once. "We need every weapon we've got here, Daniel."
"Some weapons cut both ways." Daniel tugged away. "Drop it, Jack. You'll be sorry if you don't."
And then I'll be sorrier, and Teal'c will be sorriest of all. And even if we get out of here, SG-1 will be shattered.
Hanno interrupted, then, as he declared the recess over. And Daniel stepped forward to do what he could to appeal for leniency for the man who took his wife from him, trying to ignore Sha're's grieving shadow casting crazy patterns on the walls.
In the end, all of Daniel's eloquence failed. It was Teal'c's personal heroism that persuaded Hanno to relent. The shell of SG-1 trudged back to the Circle of Woe in brittle, bitter silence.
Daniel's request for a transfer to a different team was on General Hammond's desk before the day was out.
*
Teal'c blinks away the vision of Daniel Jackson's revelation of his anger and rejection. This, too, is untrue; O'Neill spoke of Sha're during the Cor-Ai, and Daniel Jackson told the unvarnished facts: that Teal'c took her from him, and gave her to Amaunet. And yet he insisted that the "new Teal'c" was a changed man, one who deserved clemency.
And now Teal'c's jaw clenches, for he remembers the words that Daniel Jackson spoke in the reality of memory.
"I wanted to hate him at first."
Teal'c bows his head in shamed acknowledgment of that well-deserved disgust. Daniel Jackson's uncanny forgiveness does not alleviate the painful truth of what Teal'c knows is his unmitigated guilt.
So how, how can Daniel Jackson utter words of absolution when his wife lies dying by his side...?
*
Teal'c urged them to hurry, afraid of wasting every second of their precious time. They bid a hasty farewell to Kasuf and left Nagada, walking to the pyramid as quickly as Sha're could in her advanced state of pregnancy.
Daniel Jackson slapped the symbols on the DHD with almost frantic haste. As the event horizon settled, and Teal'c sent the signal with his GDO, he reached out and clasped his wife's hand.
"I'll be with you," he promised her again. "It's going to be okay."
Teal'c stood back to ensure their safety, and thus almost missed the sudden flash in Sha're's eyes as Amaunet was awakened from dormancy by the shock of the entry into the Stargate. He leapt after them, mouth open to shout a warning, but it was too late. As he emerged from the Stargate on Earth, a fully roused Amaunet reached out with deceptively slender fingers and seized his neck, snapping it with inhuman strength.
Even as Teal'c collapsed on the ramp, he saw Daniel Jackson die together with his Sha're, screaming his denial and trying to shield his wife's body from the hail of bullets from the SFs that guarded the Gateroom.
*
Daniel knows where he is, now. Muted beeps keep time with the thudding of his heart, and the sharp scent of antiseptic makes his nose itch. But he is afraid to open his eyes and discover which infirmary's reality he currently inhabits.
Is this the universe where he and Sha're never leave Abydos, or the one where they both die on Chulak - the ones where Teal'c tries, and fails? Is this the reality where the Tok'ra remove Amaunet, and he and Sha're get their happily-ever-after?
Or is this the one where she dies at peace, her message lovingly sent and achingly received?
His mind shies back from what he can't help but know is true, and desperately seeks sanctuary in searching for some other, alternate possibility...
*
By mutual agreement, Daniel Jackson took the infant to Kasuf while Teal'c remained behind to secure Amaunet. They hoped to keep her hidden from Heru'ur's guards until they could bring her to the safety of Earth.
Teal'c was binding her hands with the first set of plastic ties when she awakened from the zat blast. She broke the ties with ease and hurled herself at the shol'va. In the ensuing struggle, Amaunet beat Teal'c nearly to unconsciousness before Sha're was zatted twice.
Heru'ur's Jaffa had followed the sounds of tumult, and to Teal'c's shame, they easily subdued him. As they lashed the bonds tight, he heard them gloat over the deaths of the old man and the Tau'ri, whom they had killed when they took the infant.
Daniel Jackson. Kasuf of Nagada. Teal'c could do nothing to mourn the dead but bow his head in grief and speak their names in the silence of his head.
With Heru'ur's guards on the alert, Teal'c was forced to bear witness when O'Neill and Captain Carter came through the Stargate a few hours later and walked unknowing into a firestorm of staff weapon blasts.
*
...and Teal'c leaves the morgue after the attendant promises she will stay until his return, and strides toward the infirmary to see if Daniel Jackson is beginning to recover. Yet he cannot stop from wondering if there is something else he might have done, some twist in fate that might have spared himself and his friend this tragedy.
*
Kasuf did not have the chance to tell Daniel Jackson that Amaunet was involved. Sha're died when SG-3 overran her pavilion and gunned her down, never knowing that the beautiful female Goa'uld was Daniel Jackson's missing wife.
You -
Daniel forced himself to wait for back-up, but by the time he and the rest of SG-1 advanced on the pavilion, Amaunet had tried to escape and was shot in the melee that followed.
- did -
In his desperation to save the lives of both Daniel Jackson and Sha're, Teal'c risked using his zat on Amaunet. The zat blast danced along the beam of the ribbon device to strike Daniel Jackson, who immediately collapsed, his brain shorted out by the lethal double assault. Even as Teal'c raced to his friend's side in a futile attempt at resuscitation, Amaunet recovered from the lesser intensity of the shared blast. She ignored both Teal'c and her host's mate and fled the pavilion, where she was confronted and killed by the rest of SG-1.
- the right -
Daniel still believed that he could somehow get through to Sha're, but when Amaunet raised her hand and the ribbon device glittered malevolently in her palm, he steeled himself to fire his gun at the deadly weapon. Amaunet repulsed the bullet with a wave of energy from the ribbon device, and her subsequent fury at the failed attack was so intense that Sha're could not break through to send Daniel her final message before Teal'c shot Amaunet to save Daniel's life.
- thing -
Teal'c knew he must fire the staff weapon, but he tried for a crippling blow, not a deadly one. When Sha're collapsed with a smoking wound in her left shoulder, Amaunet abandoned its injured host. The symbiote died when Teal'c shot it again as it tried to wriggle its way to freedom, but the poisons it left in Sha're's system proved fatal.
You did the right thing, Teal'c.
*
Daniel opened his eyes.
He was lying in the infirmary, the curtain around his bed half-drawn for privacy. Subdued lighting and muffled sounds told him that it was late at night. He could feel something nibbling at the edge of memory, but he pushed it further back, afraid to face what he knew was lurking. Blinking heavily, he allowed his gaze to wander to the IV inserted in his left arm, the monitors set just a little too far away from his bedside to read without his glasses, the empty chair by his bedside...
The silent figure standing at the foot of the bed, his hands clasped behind his back.
Teal'c.
It all came rushing back: the desperate urgency to reach her; the piercing agony that drove him to his knees; the cool mockery behind those glowing eyes; the visions that shattered and spun in a thousand directions, until he couldn't tell what was real or imagined. The monitor stuttered for a moment as his heart thudded wildly, then returned to normal as he took slow, calming breaths.
Whichever memories and histories were the right ones, he could not deny the reality of this moment, lying in a darkened infirmary with Teal'c standing by his bedside. But which event, of all the conflicting ones that he remembered, had brought him here?
He swallowed. Licked dry lips. Closed his eyes for a desperate last deferment before determining which reality would confront him for the rest of his life.
"Teal'c," he croaked. His voice was scratchy, almost rusty, and he swallowed once more, a little confused. Surely all his screams had only been inside his own head?
"I should inform the medical staff that you have awakened," Teal'c observed. "You have been unconscious for nearly fifteen hours."
Despite his words, Teal'c did not move. He waited.
"Teal'c," Daniel tried again. "Sha're...?"
Teal'c bowed his head. "I am sorry, Daniel Jackson," he said. "Sha're is dead."
Dead.
"Oh," he whispered.
Teal'c moved forward. He picked up an object from the bed-side table and gravely offered it to Daniel.
It was his glasses.
Daniel looked at them blankly for a moment, then took them with a nod and gingerly slid them onto his nose. He winced at a sudden flare of pain, and carefully explored his face with tentative fingers.
"You have an extensive burn on your forehead from the ribbon device," Teal'c said in answer to his unspoken question. "Doctor Frasier expects it to fade without scarring in the next few days."
Daniel let his hand drop onto the mattress. He tipped his head back on the pillow and, with vision that was not yet completely clear, studied Teal'c with the same abstract air he would use to examine an artifact.
There were plenty of people at the SGC, soldiers and civilians alike, who thought that Teal'c's face never showed any expression. After three years of companionship, however, Daniel knew the planes and angles of Teal'c's face better than he knew his own. Teal'c was a master of subtlety, and the slightest twitch of an eyebrow or quirk of his lips could convey an entire gamut of emotion.
Now, Daniel noted the slight tic at the temple, the stony expression that was just a little too set to be genuine, the stiff shoulders that bespoke tension rather than attention. He could recognize the signs for what they were.
"Teal'c," he said hoarsely, swallowing not only the dryness in his mouth but a lifetime's worth of grief and regret. "Teal'c, you did the right thing."
The stony expression darkened into something real.
"I do not regret saving your life, Daniel Jackson," Teal'c said quietly. "I would do it again, if need be. But I do regret the death of Sha're."
"I don't think..." Daniel pulled off his glasses again and gingerly rubbed the bridge of his nose. "Teal'c, thank you for saving my life. And -" He took a deep breath, then blew it out again.
Teal'c waited patiently, but Daniel couldn't quite put his thoughts into words. He wasn't ready to tell anyone yet about the ribbon-induced visions, and the urgent message that Sha're had given him. He himself was still dazed and confused, unsure of what Sha're had showed him and what he'd dreamed on his own. It would be better to wait until his own mind was clear before he tried to persuade Jack and the others that Sha're had actually communicated with him.
"I think," he said carefully, "that Sha're was happy that I survived. I wish we could've saved her, Teal'c, but I don't think there was any way to make that happen. I've -" He stopped again.
"I've been trying to think of a way we could've saved Sha're," he continued, trying to ignore the slight hitch in his own voice. "And I don't think there was."
She was lost from the moment Apophis stepped through the Gate on Abydos. All the scenarios, all the different paths - they all led to failure and her death. We couldn't save her, Teal'c. But at least she's finally at peace.
"I forgive you," he said at last. He tasted the words with caution, and was oddly comforted that they felt right. He repeated them. "I forgive you, Teal'c."
Teal'c stepped back a pace, so that his face was blurred in the dim light.
"Daniel Jackson." He bowed his head. "I thank you for your forgiveness. But I cannot accept it."
Daniel's eyebrows rose. He opened his mouth to ask why, then closed it again, allowing his silence to speak for him. The minutes stretched out between them, singing soundless tension as the seconds ticked by.
Teal'c finally broke the tableau. "I know that I would not be able to forgive you, were you in my place," he admitted. "And I am unsure that my actions can ever be truly forgiven."
Daniel blinked.
I offer him my forgiveness because Sha're wanted it, but it's not the only reason. It can't be. It's also because I know it's the only way I can get past this.
But what works for me doesn't necessarily work for Teal'c.
"I need to offer forgiveness, Teal'c," he said aloud. His lips curved, despite themselves, into a rueful smile. "If you need not to accept it - well, that's okay, too."
Teal'c tilted his head to one side, considering. Then he, too, allowed himself a small smile.
"That will do, Daniel Jackson," he agreed.
He stepped forward again, and Daniel reached out to clasp his outstretched arm.
For now, for both of them, it was enough.
end.
Author: Fig Newton (sg_fignewton)
Rating: PG
Pairing: none
Word Count: ~6,650
Summary: Difficult choices can lead to painful results. Would different pasts offer a better future? In the wake of FIAD, angst and AUs abound as Daniel and Teal'c struggle to find out.
Warnings: none
Spoilers: References to events in COTG, Thor's Hammer, Cor-Ai, Secrets, and Forever in a Day.
Disclaimer: None of them are mine. They all belong to their respective copyright holders.
Author's Note: Written for the sg1friendathon, for the prompt: Daniel and Teal'c. Forgiveness that can never be accepted.
As always, my thanks to that queen of betas, randomfreshink.
'Tween Weft and Warp
They stepped through the chappa'ai and walked straight into an ambush. There was no hesitation or pause for assessment; the natives began to fire instantly from secure positions, using the same projectile weapons they had seen on that other, oddly technological planet.
After the near debacle of the previous day, Teal'c had ordered his men to have their staff weapons primed and ready. This extra caution saved their lives, as they were able to return fire almost instantly. Apophis stood behind them, his gold armor glittering, defended by their very bodies against the hail of metal that assaulted them.
One native after another fell as his fellow Jaffa advanced on their concealment, but Teal'c could see none of the terror that had been so evident on the other planet. There was grim, resolute determination, as they fired again and again and -
No hostages, a voice whispered in his mind.
It sounded oddly like Bra'tac.
No hostages who need protection. No innocent slave to protect from stray weapons fire.
He stood at the cusp of insurrection, his own staff weapon blasts faltering at the enormity of the moment.
If Apophis dies here...
Another native toppled backward in the dust. Fewer weapons chattered against them now.
Teal'c made his decision.
It was astonishingly simple to perform the ultimate act of rebellion; Apophis stood at arrogant ease, supremely confident of his First Prime's loyalty. Teal'c only wished that the golden helmet was open, so he could see the surprise and comprehension of betrayal. But the helmet was closed, and the sudden dimming of those glowing red eyes was the only sign as the staff blast, at nearly point-blank range, almost severed the head from the trunk.
The lifeless body collapsed. The others, still advancing and firing at the few remaining natives, hadn't even noticed.
"Dead false god," Teal'c whispered, then pivoted to shout at his men. "Jaffa! Kree!"
They paused, half-turning, and Teal'c pointed wordlessly at the body that lay sprawled by the stairs.
Two Jaffa simply stood and stared. The others gave howls of rage, turning back to fire upon the natives whom they assumed had killed Apophis.
Teal'c could not quite bring himself to kill his own men, but he gave no word of warning as the last armed natives seized the opportunity of their initial distraction to cut the remaining Jaffa down. He bowed his head in a silent moment of grief that he had led them to their deaths.
The natives shifted their aim to target him, and Teal'c opened his helmet before dropping his own staff weapon to the ground and lifting his hands in a show of surrender. He met the gaze of one young boy, watching as he narrowed his eyes with hatred and curled his finger more tightly on what must be the trigger of his weapon. If he died here... well, it would be just retribution for leading his own men to their ignominious deaths. And, at least, he would die free.
Then a woman's voice rapped across the sudden silence, sharp and commanding.
"Chahari!"
The natives hesitated. The young boy tore his gaze from Teal'c's face and shifted to glance over his shoulder.
"Chahari," the woman repeated, and now she stepped forward, angling her movements so that the young boy and the other two armed natives could still fire on Teal'c without obstruction. She stopped twenty paces from Teal'c and glared at him, without fear in her face or her voice. "You killed the one like Ra."
"I did," Teal'c acknowledged.
The woman ignored the ripple of murmurs and whispers behind her. "Explain your actions."
Teal'c absorbed the cadence of her words. It was not quite the formal language that he spoke in his dealings with Apophis (dead false god), nor the vernacular tongue of the Jaffa on Chulak, but it was close enough to allow for communication.
"This is Abydos," he replied. It was, he felt, nearly an explanation in itself, but her eyes flashed with a fire that owed its power to no symbiote, and he elaborated further. "This one, like Ra, claimed planets and slaves for his own. Ra was killed here. Apophis now lies dead. Like Ra." He stared back at her levelly, hiding the soaring triumph behind an impassive expression. "Two false gods now lie dead on the sands of Abydos."
The sound of running footsteps broke the tableau, and Teal'c forced himself to refrain from dropping into a defensive crouch as new soldiers burst into the chamber. Two were garbed as the other natives, but three were clad in clothing similar to those on the planet they had raided the previous day.
Alliance, whispered Bra'tac's voice in his mind. A frisson of hope stirred, and Teal'c wondered, for the first time, if there might be even greater achievements beyond the victory of Apophis' death.
Minutes later, Teal'c sat stripped of his armor, hands and feet bound. He offered no resistance, answering question after question with unruffled calm. The woman stood back now, pressed against the side of a native with lighter hair than the others, but she listened intently as the interrogation continued. The man in charge - one of those who had arrived after the brief skirmish - spoke not in Goa'uld, but in the common language that Teal'c had learned in his travels as First Prime.
These were not meek slaves, to be cowed by power; not the ones clad in robes, nor the ones wearing uniforms of a material as strange as their weapons. Teal'c's heart soared. These could, indeed, be powerful allies. Two false gods were dead. How many more could be killed, and both Jaffa and slaves released to a life of freedom?
"What happens when you don't come back to this Chulak of yours?" the leader pressed.
Teal'c considered the possibilities. "It is most likely that a larger contingent of Jaffa will be sent here to discover what has happened," he admitted. He glanced beyond the leader at the woman and the man who seemed to be her mate; they seemed to be in command of the robed natives, just as the leader commanded the soldiers in uniform. "In half a day, perhaps a bit more. Your people might be at risk."
"Jack -" the man started, looking sharply at the leader.
"Take it easy, Daniel," the leader said calmly, without taking his gaze off Teal'c. "We'll make sure Abydos is safe."
"If we rebury the Gate, there won't be any risk," the man called Daniel suggested grimly.
The native boy - Skaara, Daniel had called him - cried out a protest. The woman looked up at Daniel, surprise evident on her face, and murmured a question. Daniel hugged her a little more tightly, and answered her in the same language. Teal'c caught only a few words in the local dialect - "...know better now, Sha're, the risk isn't worth..." - before the leader named Jack distracted him.
"Is he right?" Jack demanded. "If the Abydons bury the Stargate, will they be safe?"
Stargate? "You mean the chappa'ai." Teal'c inclined his head in agreement. "Yes. If the chappa'ai is buried, the Jaffa on Chulak will not be able to establish a connection. They will believe that Apophis could not have come here to Abydos." He hesitated, then forced himself to voice the logical conclusion. "In that case, Apophis' loyal Jaffa will seek for him at the last planet we visited." He looked levelly at Jack and the now-familiar weapon he carried. "I believe that planet is yours."
"Sir," said a blond woman, clothed in the same strange uniform as Jack, "we have to warn Earth. And Ferretti needs medical attention..."
Jack stood silently for a moment, then turned to the man named Daniel. "We were supposed to take you back with us."
Daniel tightened his grip around his mate. "I'm not going anywhere," he said flatly. "I'll send you back to Earth, and we'll rebury -"
The woman - Sha're? - interrupted him boldly with a rapid spate of protest, hissed under her breath. Daniel turned to face her fully, and for the first time, Teal'c saw honest fear on one of his captor's faces.
"We will go with you!" Sha're called to Jack, ignoring Daniel's further arguments. "Danyel and I will speak for Abydos to the people of the Earth."
Jack shook his head. "You won't be able to come back here if Skaara and the boys bury the Gate. And, well..." He grimaced. "I don't know what kind of welcome you'll get there. Not after this."
"Sha're," Daniel murmured, and now he cupped her face in his hands, whispering too quietly for even Jaffa ears to listen. Sha're's look of determination faded into sad understanding, and at last she nodded in agreement.
"We'll stay here," Daniel said again. He moved away from his mate's side towards the alry'sai and began to press the symbols that would call forth the gateway to another world.
His mate stepped forward to speak to Jack. "Leave us what you can," she suggested. Her speech in the common language was heavily accented, but it was still understandable. Her gaze flickered to the wounded who lay along the walls. "We will need it."
Jack nodded in agreement and instructed the blond woman, "Captain, the packs stay behind. There's medicines and ammunition these people can use."
"Yes, sir," she answered crisply. She went to kneel by the side of the man she had called Ferretti, speaking in soothing, encouraging tones.
Behind Teal'c, the chappa'ai opened. "Good luck, Jack," Daniel said quietly as he moved away.
"Bury it good, Daniel," Jack told him in return.
"We will."
Jack drew a large knife from its holster on his thigh and cut the ropes that bound Teal'c's feet together. "You're coming with us," he said shortly. "There's a lot more we need to find out."
Teal'c gave a short nod of acquiescence, and obediently followed Jack up the steps to the chappa'ai. He paused at the sprawled body of Apophis, and seized a final opportunity to spit on the corpse.
Then he dissolved to his component atoms, and he journeyed to the planet of the Tau'ri. He knew he would be treated with wary suspicion, and perhaps even imprisoned; but he would do what he could to warn the people of Earth of the menace that stalked the rest of the galaxy.
Over the next several months, the people at the strangely named SGC tried many times to connect to Abydos, but always failed. Teal'c was secretly pleased that the brave woman and her mate, Daniel, had buried the chappa'ai and would be able to live out their lives free of the Goa'uld.
It was only years later that Teal'c learned of the summit that the House of Apophis convened with the other Goa'uld to report on Apophis' death, and that the System Lords came to a rare, unanimous agreement: a planet of slaves that had caused the deaths of two of their greatest could not be allowed to survive. The chappa'ai on Abydos never opened again because it was buried under tons of molten rock when the entire planet was razed by an armada of eight Goa'uld motherships, avenging the deaths of Apophis and Ra.
*
Movement.
Sound.
Light?
Voices.
"...ackson, can you..? ...aniel? He's not... RI now, we need..."
Hissing in his ears.
He is wrapped in Sha're's linen shrouds, buried beneath shifting sands...
No, not that, that was...
It was...
She was...
Teal'c, you did -
No!
*
Daniel, Sam, and Kendra halted in mid-step at the sight in front of them. A monstrous creature hung pinned in the orange light that cascaded from the doorway to the Labyrinth, held in place by Teal'c's strength and determination. Daniel could see the agony twisting the Jaffa's features, and he realized that Thor's Hammer had no way to differentiate between a fully mature Goa'uld and the larval symbiote that served as Teal'c's immune system.
Then Teal'c stumbled backwards, and Daniel could see that Jack had risked his own life to yank Teal'c away from that deadly doorway.
The seconds stretched out as the impossibly tall creature, now alone in its literal purgatory, writhed in the Hammer. It collapsed back into the Labyrinth, and the Hammer winked out.
After a moment, Teal'c moved to check on the monster's status. Daniel and the others stepped warily through the quiescent Hammer, their eyes fixed on the slumped creature, riddled with bullets, that lay on the ground.
Teal'c glanced up at Jack, his hand still resting on the monster's neck. "Without the healing power of the Goa'uld, this body will no longer regenerate," he stated evenly. "There is too much damage."
"Now I see why they call you friend," Kendra murmured. Daniel swallowed hard.
"This is Kendra," Sam explained to Jack. "She brought us here."
"She had first-hand knowledge," Daniel said, almost breathless with the enormity of what they'd witnessed. "She was a Goa'uld." He gestured behind him, at the archway. "The Hammer works."
Jack just stared back at him wordlessly.
Daniel couldn't believe that he still had to explain. "Do you know what this means?" he demanded.
It took a long moment before Jack finally answered. "It's the only way out of here, Daniel," he said quietly.
"What this can do for Sha're and Skaara!" Daniel pressed, almost infuriated that Jack still didn't get the point. This was the answer they'd been seeking, a chance to not only rescue his wife and good brother, but to restore them to themselves. It was their greatest discovery since they'd first stepped through the Stargate!
"Teal'c's here now," Jack pointed out, his face expressionless.
"And here I will remain," Teal'c said immediately, his voice as calm as ever. "I was with those that took the ones you love."
"No," Jack contradicted him.
No, Daniel thought furiously. You weren't with them. You took them yourself. You chose them.
"You're part of this family now," Jack continued. "We're not leaving you behind."
Daniel's mouth snapped shut on the words he ached to hurl at Jack for this double-edged insult - to himself, and to the loving family he'd lost because of Teal'c's actions.
Teal'c turned his head slowly to lock gazes with Daniel. He, at least, recognized what Jack chose to ignore.
Jack turned and picked up Teal'c's staff weapon, then walked forward. "This thing won't work in here," he said. "Try it from out there." He offered it to Daniel.
Daniel took the staff weapon automatically, his mouth open in an effort to voice the words screaming in his head. He glanced at Teal'c. Emotions played across that usually stoic face, and Teal'c lowered his gaze to the floor.
He knew.
He knew what he deserved.
Daniel opened his hand deliberately. The staff weapon clattered to the ground.
"No," he said.
Jack took another step forward. "Daniel..."
"No, Jack," Daniel repeated. He stared, hot and angry, at the man he called friend. "We don't have the right to do this. The Hammer protects this planet from the Goa'uld. What were you planning to do? Set up an answering machine? 'I'm sorry, but the Hammer is not in service. Please go back through the Stargate and invade our planet later'?"
"Daniel, we're a team! Teal'c -"
"Teal'c is safe and unharmed." Daniel crossed his arms. "Teal'c has food and water, and we can supply him with whatever else he might need. We want to find the Asgard, don't we? How friendly do you think they'd be if we destroyed the protection they've created for Cimmeria?"
"Daniel," Sam tried, "we have to -"
"And you, Sam! You really want to destroy this technology without the chance to study it first? What if we can duplicate it and create one like it for Earth?" Daniel gave the staff weapon a contemptuous kick.
Jack was getting angry. About time.
"Daniel," he started, his voice chilly, "you can take that staff weapon and fire it, or -"
"Or what?" Daniel's brows lifted, his voice equally cool. "I'm off SG-1? I wonder what Hammond would say about this tactical decision of yours - destroying a device that can mean the difference between victory and defeat." He paused, then added deliberately, "If we'd known about Cimmeria and Thor's Hammer from the beginning, we could've saved Kawalsky."
Jack actually rocked back on his heels at that. Then he recovered and strode forward, grabbing Daniel by the collar of his uniform.
"Fire it," he gritted between his teeth.
Daniel wrenched away. "Fire it yourself," he hissed, and turned and stalked out of the cave.
He tried not to listen for the inevitable blast and the agonized crackle of short-circuited technology that he knew was coming.
*
Teal'c's eyes fly open as he snaps abruptly out of his attempt at kel'no'reem. It takes a moment for him to recognize his surroundings. Antiseptic smell, sterile equipment... This is the SGC's morgue, where he sits, unasked, in watch over the body of Daniel Jackson's wife.
He does not know if the Tau'ri or the Abydons believe that a person's body must be guarded until the burial rites are completed, to keep watch over the dead one's spirit. Until he is told otherwise, he chooses to honor Sha're as he would wish for himself and his own family.
Now he takes slow, deliberate breaths, considering that oddly vivid - memory? No, that is not accurate. Daniel Jackson fired the staff weapon, releasing him from his imprisonment.
He willingly destroyed his wife and brother's salvation, for the sake of the man who was responsible for their torment.
Even now, Teal'c can not understand why.
*
Teal'c stalked through the corridor to the prisoners' chamber. He kept his face impassive through habit, but he felt sickened at what he had witnessed. He had never seen the choosing ceremony before. The casual humiliation, examination, and disposal of human beings, just to satisfy the capricious whims of Apophis and Amaunet...
Entering the room, he surveyed the women set aside for the choosing ceremony. They would each be treated as the first: inspected, then either taken or discarded. Those who remained after Amaunet selected her host would be killed outright.
He panned slowly over the faces that turned to meet him, wondering which one would be most likely to please Amaunet. True, they would all die; but if he picked the right victim, the remainder, at least, would die quickly, and in less pain. He wished he could do more, but he knew that a rebellion without support would serve no purpose but his own death. Another would simply step into his place - a new First Prime, who would most likely not be interested in sparing even a few of Apophis' victims.
Many of the women were anxious. A few even seemed interested. Which one...?
He stopped.
A single woman had not turned to look at him. She sat, ramrod straight, her back to the door.
It was the dark-haired woman from Abydos, who had furiously denied her fear in the dungeon and showed more concern for the boy who had been taken with her than she did for herself.
He started to point towards her, then stopped. Such spirit did not deserve to be shamed by the false gods. Better to pick another.
"You," he said instead, directing the flanking slaves to take one of the women lounging on the floor.
She shrank back from them, but did not struggle as they hustled her out of the chamber. Teal'c turned and followed, hoping that the selection process would end with this one and that Amaunet would be satisfied.
But the hours wore on, and the women were rejected, one by one. Some were disdained by Apophis; others were rejected by Amaunet, who hissed her displeasure before retreating. Teal'c writhed inwardly at the sheer waste of life for no other reason than the greedy, fickle desires of two arrogant creatures. He longed to seize Amaunet and wring the symbiote in two before anyone could stop him, to wrest a staff weapon from one of the guards and fire it upon Apophis until he was nothing more than a smoking, charred heap of flesh. But Bra'tac's voice in his mind counseled patience, and caution: a solitary attempt would accomplish nothing.
In the end, after nearly a day's delay, he instructed the slaves to take the Abydon woman. She fought back with furious strength, but Apophis only laughed, and took pleasure at debasing that spirit. And then Teal'c watched as Amaunet slithered across the woman's back, and plunged into her neck to claim her for its own.
The delay meant that when three strangers were guided into the palace by mistaken priests, they were not confronted by Apophis and his new queen. Instead, their stumbling efforts at communication led to suspicion, and they were stripped of all their equipment and imprisoned with the other common slaves in the dungeon. There, they met a boy they knew, but were unable to discover a means of escape.
When Apophis and Amaunet entered the main dungeons to allow the other Goa'uld of their House to select new hosts, one of the strangers leapt to his feet, crying out to Amaunet.
"Sha're! Sha're, it's me...!"
Apophis, angry at the man's audacity, ordered Teal'c to kill him on the spot.
Teal'c had no choice. He aimed his staff weapon and fired.
And when the other Goa'uld had chosen hosts, and Apophis and Amaunet had gone, and the older stranger appealed to Teal'c without fear...
Teal'c had no reason to believe him. But he was disgusted with what he had been forced to do, and he could no longer stomach watching and waiting.
He turned and fired on the other Jaffa.
In the end, the surviving prisoners fled, and Teal'c joined the stranger and the woman who was with him. When they reached the chappa'ai, and the woman attempted to establish a connection to their world, they found that they could not. Too much time had elapsed, and the leaders on their planet had sealed their chappa'ai permanently.
As Teal'c turned to make his final stand, he heard the shouts of the Jaffa troops that pursued them, and the whine of the gliders overhead. He knew that his fledgling revolution would die here, on the plains of Chulak, with him and the soldiers from Earth. And Sha're and Skaara of Abydos would remain hosts to Amaunet and Klorel, with no one to search for them and seek their release from their torment.
*
The voices seem less vague, now. But his limbs and tongue are stiff with grief, and the effort to respond seems overwhelming.
His heavy lids are lifted, and blinding light stabs into his eyes, but he can't raise a hand to shield himself.
"Pupils responding," a female voice murmurs.
Sha're?
He tries to speak, to call out her name.
"Daniel?" A faint stinging sensation on his cheek, muffled by a blanket of numbed misery. Too hard to flinch away.
He sinks back into the depths, drowning in a sea of could-have-beens and if-onlys.
You did the right -
No, no, no...
*
The bell clanged heavily in the air as the natives streamed back into the large chamber, eyeing Teal'c warily. They made their way to their seats, while Daniel, together with Sam, broke away from the crowd and approached Jack and Teal'c.
Jack looked up at them over Teal'c's bowed head, his face set. "What's the plan of attack?" he asked.
"Well, the way I look at it, Teal'c has already pled guilty," Daniel sighed. "So, to draw a parallel to an American trial, we have to look at this as sort of like the sentencing phase."
The words came out slowly, hesitantly. Teal'c's silence spoke volumes of his acceptance of his guilt in Hanno's father's death, and Daniel found himself leaning heavily against the wooden frame of the witness stand, weighted down by ironic parallels.
"We need to prove to these people that..." Daniel forced himself to continue, ignoring the acid taste of bitterness on his tongue. "He doesn't deserve to die."
Sam's mouth twisted. "How can we do that?"
Daniel gave a half-shrug. "We need to convince them that he's a different man now than he was then." As if that would change what happened to Hanno's father... and to Sha're.
"Good luck," Jack muttered. "It's not as if we have any -" He broke off and stared at Daniel. "Yes, we do, don't we?"
Daniel frowned at him. "What?"
Jack pointed a finger. "You can argue this for us, Daniel."
Daniel blinked at him for a moment, then suddenly understood. He jerked back as if struck. "You wouldn't dare," he breathed.
"Daniel," Jack said, his voice sharp. "Think. It might get us out of here. I know it won't be easy, but we can... fix things up later."
Daniel closed his eyes, seeking calm. When he opened then again, Jack actually flinched, and Daniel knew that he must be able to see the sheer fury in his stare.
"Don't try it," he warned, his voice little more than a hiss. "You won't like the answers you get if you do."
"Sir?" Sam darted a quick look at Daniel, then back at Jack. "What are you suggesting here?"
Jack ignored her. "Daniel."
"No, Jack."
"Daniel!"
Teal'c raised his head then, and the frown that dragged at the corners of his mouth deepened. "What do you propose, O'Neill?"
Jack ignored him, too. "Daniel," he said again, and now his voice was edged with something other than sharpness. "Daniel, we have to deal with now. You've gotten yourself past it. Now, you can just... help Hanno get past it, okay?"
Daniel licked his lips. "Maybe I haven't gotten past it as much as you think I have," he whispered. His gaze flicked to Teal'c, then back to Jack again. "I am standing right here, and I am ready to champion Teal'c, and I want him to be able to walk away. Let that be enough, Jack."
"It can't be enough." Jack circled the witness stand to lay a hand on Daniel's arm. It conveyed both reassurance and warning at once. "We need every weapon we've got here, Daniel."
"Some weapons cut both ways." Daniel tugged away. "Drop it, Jack. You'll be sorry if you don't."
And then I'll be sorrier, and Teal'c will be sorriest of all. And even if we get out of here, SG-1 will be shattered.
Hanno interrupted, then, as he declared the recess over. And Daniel stepped forward to do what he could to appeal for leniency for the man who took his wife from him, trying to ignore Sha're's grieving shadow casting crazy patterns on the walls.
In the end, all of Daniel's eloquence failed. It was Teal'c's personal heroism that persuaded Hanno to relent. The shell of SG-1 trudged back to the Circle of Woe in brittle, bitter silence.
Daniel's request for a transfer to a different team was on General Hammond's desk before the day was out.
*
Teal'c blinks away the vision of Daniel Jackson's revelation of his anger and rejection. This, too, is untrue; O'Neill spoke of Sha're during the Cor-Ai, and Daniel Jackson told the unvarnished facts: that Teal'c took her from him, and gave her to Amaunet. And yet he insisted that the "new Teal'c" was a changed man, one who deserved clemency.
And now Teal'c's jaw clenches, for he remembers the words that Daniel Jackson spoke in the reality of memory.
"I wanted to hate him at first."
Teal'c bows his head in shamed acknowledgment of that well-deserved disgust. Daniel Jackson's uncanny forgiveness does not alleviate the painful truth of what Teal'c knows is his unmitigated guilt.
So how, how can Daniel Jackson utter words of absolution when his wife lies dying by his side...?
*
Teal'c urged them to hurry, afraid of wasting every second of their precious time. They bid a hasty farewell to Kasuf and left Nagada, walking to the pyramid as quickly as Sha're could in her advanced state of pregnancy.
Daniel Jackson slapped the symbols on the DHD with almost frantic haste. As the event horizon settled, and Teal'c sent the signal with his GDO, he reached out and clasped his wife's hand.
"I'll be with you," he promised her again. "It's going to be okay."
Teal'c stood back to ensure their safety, and thus almost missed the sudden flash in Sha're's eyes as Amaunet was awakened from dormancy by the shock of the entry into the Stargate. He leapt after them, mouth open to shout a warning, but it was too late. As he emerged from the Stargate on Earth, a fully roused Amaunet reached out with deceptively slender fingers and seized his neck, snapping it with inhuman strength.
Even as Teal'c collapsed on the ramp, he saw Daniel Jackson die together with his Sha're, screaming his denial and trying to shield his wife's body from the hail of bullets from the SFs that guarded the Gateroom.
*
Daniel knows where he is, now. Muted beeps keep time with the thudding of his heart, and the sharp scent of antiseptic makes his nose itch. But he is afraid to open his eyes and discover which infirmary's reality he currently inhabits.
Is this the universe where he and Sha're never leave Abydos, or the one where they both die on Chulak - the ones where Teal'c tries, and fails? Is this the reality where the Tok'ra remove Amaunet, and he and Sha're get their happily-ever-after?
Or is this the one where she dies at peace, her message lovingly sent and achingly received?
His mind shies back from what he can't help but know is true, and desperately seeks sanctuary in searching for some other, alternate possibility...
*
By mutual agreement, Daniel Jackson took the infant to Kasuf while Teal'c remained behind to secure Amaunet. They hoped to keep her hidden from Heru'ur's guards until they could bring her to the safety of Earth.
Teal'c was binding her hands with the first set of plastic ties when she awakened from the zat blast. She broke the ties with ease and hurled herself at the shol'va. In the ensuing struggle, Amaunet beat Teal'c nearly to unconsciousness before Sha're was zatted twice.
Heru'ur's Jaffa had followed the sounds of tumult, and to Teal'c's shame, they easily subdued him. As they lashed the bonds tight, he heard them gloat over the deaths of the old man and the Tau'ri, whom they had killed when they took the infant.
Daniel Jackson. Kasuf of Nagada. Teal'c could do nothing to mourn the dead but bow his head in grief and speak their names in the silence of his head.
With Heru'ur's guards on the alert, Teal'c was forced to bear witness when O'Neill and Captain Carter came through the Stargate a few hours later and walked unknowing into a firestorm of staff weapon blasts.
*
...and Teal'c leaves the morgue after the attendant promises she will stay until his return, and strides toward the infirmary to see if Daniel Jackson is beginning to recover. Yet he cannot stop from wondering if there is something else he might have done, some twist in fate that might have spared himself and his friend this tragedy.
*
Kasuf did not have the chance to tell Daniel Jackson that Amaunet was involved. Sha're died when SG-3 overran her pavilion and gunned her down, never knowing that the beautiful female Goa'uld was Daniel Jackson's missing wife.
You -
Daniel forced himself to wait for back-up, but by the time he and the rest of SG-1 advanced on the pavilion, Amaunet had tried to escape and was shot in the melee that followed.
- did -
In his desperation to save the lives of both Daniel Jackson and Sha're, Teal'c risked using his zat on Amaunet. The zat blast danced along the beam of the ribbon device to strike Daniel Jackson, who immediately collapsed, his brain shorted out by the lethal double assault. Even as Teal'c raced to his friend's side in a futile attempt at resuscitation, Amaunet recovered from the lesser intensity of the shared blast. She ignored both Teal'c and her host's mate and fled the pavilion, where she was confronted and killed by the rest of SG-1.
- the right -
Daniel still believed that he could somehow get through to Sha're, but when Amaunet raised her hand and the ribbon device glittered malevolently in her palm, he steeled himself to fire his gun at the deadly weapon. Amaunet repulsed the bullet with a wave of energy from the ribbon device, and her subsequent fury at the failed attack was so intense that Sha're could not break through to send Daniel her final message before Teal'c shot Amaunet to save Daniel's life.
- thing -
Teal'c knew he must fire the staff weapon, but he tried for a crippling blow, not a deadly one. When Sha're collapsed with a smoking wound in her left shoulder, Amaunet abandoned its injured host. The symbiote died when Teal'c shot it again as it tried to wriggle its way to freedom, but the poisons it left in Sha're's system proved fatal.
You did the right thing, Teal'c.
*
Daniel opened his eyes.
He was lying in the infirmary, the curtain around his bed half-drawn for privacy. Subdued lighting and muffled sounds told him that it was late at night. He could feel something nibbling at the edge of memory, but he pushed it further back, afraid to face what he knew was lurking. Blinking heavily, he allowed his gaze to wander to the IV inserted in his left arm, the monitors set just a little too far away from his bedside to read without his glasses, the empty chair by his bedside...
The silent figure standing at the foot of the bed, his hands clasped behind his back.
Teal'c.
It all came rushing back: the desperate urgency to reach her; the piercing agony that drove him to his knees; the cool mockery behind those glowing eyes; the visions that shattered and spun in a thousand directions, until he couldn't tell what was real or imagined. The monitor stuttered for a moment as his heart thudded wildly, then returned to normal as he took slow, calming breaths.
Whichever memories and histories were the right ones, he could not deny the reality of this moment, lying in a darkened infirmary with Teal'c standing by his bedside. But which event, of all the conflicting ones that he remembered, had brought him here?
He swallowed. Licked dry lips. Closed his eyes for a desperate last deferment before determining which reality would confront him for the rest of his life.
"Teal'c," he croaked. His voice was scratchy, almost rusty, and he swallowed once more, a little confused. Surely all his screams had only been inside his own head?
"I should inform the medical staff that you have awakened," Teal'c observed. "You have been unconscious for nearly fifteen hours."
Despite his words, Teal'c did not move. He waited.
"Teal'c," Daniel tried again. "Sha're...?"
Teal'c bowed his head. "I am sorry, Daniel Jackson," he said. "Sha're is dead."
Dead.
"Oh," he whispered.
Teal'c moved forward. He picked up an object from the bed-side table and gravely offered it to Daniel.
It was his glasses.
Daniel looked at them blankly for a moment, then took them with a nod and gingerly slid them onto his nose. He winced at a sudden flare of pain, and carefully explored his face with tentative fingers.
"You have an extensive burn on your forehead from the ribbon device," Teal'c said in answer to his unspoken question. "Doctor Frasier expects it to fade without scarring in the next few days."
Daniel let his hand drop onto the mattress. He tipped his head back on the pillow and, with vision that was not yet completely clear, studied Teal'c with the same abstract air he would use to examine an artifact.
There were plenty of people at the SGC, soldiers and civilians alike, who thought that Teal'c's face never showed any expression. After three years of companionship, however, Daniel knew the planes and angles of Teal'c's face better than he knew his own. Teal'c was a master of subtlety, and the slightest twitch of an eyebrow or quirk of his lips could convey an entire gamut of emotion.
Now, Daniel noted the slight tic at the temple, the stony expression that was just a little too set to be genuine, the stiff shoulders that bespoke tension rather than attention. He could recognize the signs for what they were.
"Teal'c," he said hoarsely, swallowing not only the dryness in his mouth but a lifetime's worth of grief and regret. "Teal'c, you did the right thing."
The stony expression darkened into something real.
"I do not regret saving your life, Daniel Jackson," Teal'c said quietly. "I would do it again, if need be. But I do regret the death of Sha're."
"I don't think..." Daniel pulled off his glasses again and gingerly rubbed the bridge of his nose. "Teal'c, thank you for saving my life. And -" He took a deep breath, then blew it out again.
Teal'c waited patiently, but Daniel couldn't quite put his thoughts into words. He wasn't ready to tell anyone yet about the ribbon-induced visions, and the urgent message that Sha're had given him. He himself was still dazed and confused, unsure of what Sha're had showed him and what he'd dreamed on his own. It would be better to wait until his own mind was clear before he tried to persuade Jack and the others that Sha're had actually communicated with him.
"I think," he said carefully, "that Sha're was happy that I survived. I wish we could've saved her, Teal'c, but I don't think there was any way to make that happen. I've -" He stopped again.
"I've been trying to think of a way we could've saved Sha're," he continued, trying to ignore the slight hitch in his own voice. "And I don't think there was."
She was lost from the moment Apophis stepped through the Gate on Abydos. All the scenarios, all the different paths - they all led to failure and her death. We couldn't save her, Teal'c. But at least she's finally at peace.
"I forgive you," he said at last. He tasted the words with caution, and was oddly comforted that they felt right. He repeated them. "I forgive you, Teal'c."
Teal'c stepped back a pace, so that his face was blurred in the dim light.
"Daniel Jackson." He bowed his head. "I thank you for your forgiveness. But I cannot accept it."
Daniel's eyebrows rose. He opened his mouth to ask why, then closed it again, allowing his silence to speak for him. The minutes stretched out between them, singing soundless tension as the seconds ticked by.
Teal'c finally broke the tableau. "I know that I would not be able to forgive you, were you in my place," he admitted. "And I am unsure that my actions can ever be truly forgiven."
Daniel blinked.
I offer him my forgiveness because Sha're wanted it, but it's not the only reason. It can't be. It's also because I know it's the only way I can get past this.
But what works for me doesn't necessarily work for Teal'c.
"I need to offer forgiveness, Teal'c," he said aloud. His lips curved, despite themselves, into a rueful smile. "If you need not to accept it - well, that's okay, too."
Teal'c tilted his head to one side, considering. Then he, too, allowed himself a small smile.
"That will do, Daniel Jackson," he agreed.
He stepped forward again, and Daniel reached out to clasp his outstretched arm.
For now, for both of them, it was enough.
end.