Stargate SG1 - Roswell (50 page)

Teal'c, also smiling broadly, somehow managed a bow. “You have done well, Colonel Mitchell.”

“Couldn't have done it without you.” He nodded gratefully at all of them. “Seriously.”

Still with her laptop balanced on her knees, Sam looked up at Cam apologetically. “On Ra's ship—”

“I told you not to beam me out, Sam, remember?”

“Yeah, but...” A brief smile crossed her face. “I'm glad you're safe.”

“Ra's First Prime had the damned thing on him when he ringed aboard Ra's ship,” Cam said, handing the hand DHD to Sam. “Lost the radio when I was trying to get if off him. Once I took care of that, I figured ringing down out would save us all a lot of time and grief.” The smile on his face was at complete odds with the pain in his eyes. “You could probably use the New York Stargate to go back in time, but the DHD hasn't been set up there, yet, so there'll be no interference with the signal if you want to use the Antarctic 'gate instead.”

Slipping the device over her hand, Sam nodded. The jewel on the cuff immediately began to glow. “I think it would be wiser to make time jumps between the same physical 'gates.”

“And remember—”

Sam moved the laptop and stood. Taking in a deep breath, she
embraced him and said, “Three Finger Brown.”

“And this timeline will cease exist,” Teal'c said.

Cam turned to him and with a voice tired beyond measure, replied, “Teal'c, there aren't words to describe how much I'm looking
forward to that.”

“Just say, for instance, something else goes wrong and we don't make it back, or this timeline keeps going.” Jack turned and met Sam's glare. “I'm just pointing out what you said earlier.”

“Thought about that,” Cam replied, “and what you said to me
in
the Park, Teal'c. I don't think it'll take a hell of a lot of convincing to get them to bury the Stargate. The capstones are at
the museum.”

“Someone could open it again, Cam,” Daniel warned, glancing at Bennett.

“Someone did, as I recall.” A grin briefly crossed Cam's face as he met Daniel's eyes. “And figured out how to use it. It's like I said, I've set things up on several planets for people and Jaffa—to take care of themselves. Everyone on Earth knows about the 'gate, and they've experienced a taste of what's out there.”

He glanced at Bennett, and Sam briefly explained how he'd come
to team up with them, then shook his hand and said, “Thanks
for everything.”

Bennett met each of their eyes in turn, then settled on Sam's. “Thank
you,
Colonel.”

“Well, son,” Cam said to him, “if you and I are still here when these guys reset the clock, you're about to begin a new career as the negotiator for an interplanetary peace treaty. Who knows? Maybe we'll prevent the Cold War before it even starts. But right now, I've got several hundred very confused Jaffa hanging around the 'gate, wondering what the hell happened to Ra and Qetesh, so we better get down there.” He turned to An. “Scottie, beam us out.”

An stood. “My name is An, and I am going with you.”

“What do you mean?” Jack objected. “The entire reason we went through this was to recover you—and don't even
start
on Asgard law, because—”

“He's right, sir,” Sam interrupted, reaching for the transport controls.

“Oh, for cryin' out loud!”

“I belong in this time—and this timeline,” An replied simply.

Nodding, Sam added, “We'll recover you in our 1947. We have to, because it's the only thing that explains the tunnel on the wrong side of the Antarctic 'gate.”

“What
wrong tunnel?” Jack demanded.

“There's a jumper sized hole on the far side of the Antarctic Stargate, sir, not the side where the vortex hits. I've often speculated—”

“Stop!” Jack ordered, wincing. Daniel suspected a migraine was hovering. “Carter. If you say so, I believe you.”

She smiled thinly. “Trust me, sir. This will work.”

“That's what you said when you sent me on this merry goose chase,” he reminded her.

“That was the future me, sir.”

“Whatever. Let's just get the hell outta here.”

“An?” Sam smiled at him. “Will you be okay, here...if?”

“I will be fine, Colonel Carter. Your speculation that this timeline will continue on a separate path is the most likely scenario. Once an Asgard ship comes to investigate, they will detect my locator beacon. I also believe that the High Council will be very interested to learn about this.” He glanced around at the jumper. “Fifth Race, indeed.”

Jack turned to Cam and grinned before addressing Commander Bennett. “Meanwhile, you can take him to your leader.”

CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

Vala's words broke through the steel wool clag that inhabited Cam's skull. “Y'know, you have to wonder, don't you?”

Opening one eye, he saw her sitting with her back to a soot-covered brick wall, young Howard huddled beside her, apparently hanging off every word. “Regards to what?”

“Well, let's face it,” Vala was saying. “Assuming the Ancients
did recreate all life in this galaxy, what were they thinking
when they created the Goa'uld? I've come across some nasty specimens in my time, but a creature that mixes its DNA with a human to create a slave race, and then sets itself up as a god?”

“Didn't you say they were false gods?” Howard asked.

“As distinct from true gods? I mean have you encountered any of those around the universe?” She smiled and turned to him. “No of course
you
haven't but aside from the odd fundamentalist who doesn't seem to need proof in any form, I haven't met anyone yet who really fits that description. And let's
face it, the Ancients aren't stacking up too well in that regard, despite this whole Ascension thing they've got going.”

“What...the hell happened?” Cam asked, pushing himself up. The last thing he remembered was walking into a tack room and—crap. “Did someone shoot me?”

He brought his hand up and felt around his groin. It was tacky with dried blood, and there was a hole in the cloth directly above...

Vala smiled at him brightly. “Oh good, you're awake. We better get going before it gets too light, or we'll be spending the day hiding among these garbage cans. And yes, you did get shot, but don't worry, all the bits are back in place and it's all healed up. As to whether they're in working order—”

A white light in front of his eyes blurred everything for a moment and then he was...

...staring at the back of a seat inside the jumper—which rapidly turned into a pair of dust-covered glasses with a frowning Daniel Jackson behind them, demanding to know if he was all right.

“Peachy.” Which was more than he could say for the slightly—well, badly—singed looking guy lying on the deck beside him. “Who's that?”

Jackson didn't reply but instead swiveled around and said to Vala, “Can you heal him?”

“Hello, Vala,” she said. “It's ever so nice to see you survived crashing through the floor of a burning building, not to mention your heroic rescue of Colonel Mitchell, and that you healed that rather nasty hole in his—”

“Yes, yes, thank you Vala, you did a superb job but can you please heal this man otherwise...well, we really,
really,
don't have time to go into the reasons right now, but take my word for it, the future of the human race depends on it.”

Jackson's words tumbled out so fast it took Cam a few moments to process them.

Vala—having not been so recently shot and apparently mortally wounded—picked up on the situation immediately. “Oh, well why didn't you say as much?”

Grasping hold of the jumper's passenger seat, Cam pulled himself to his feet. The light from Vala's hand device filled the cargo bay. He peered out through the windscreen. The jumper was about two thousand miles above the Eastern seaboard. Then he glanced at Sam, and noticed that she was wearing most of a set of Jaffa armor. A quick check of O'Neill, Teal'c and Jackson confirmed that they were similarly dressed.

Squinting at Daniel, Cam said, “Look, Jackson, I know you weren't happy with the whole bonnet thing, but did I miss something, here?”

“What do you mean?” Daniel stared at him in confusion.

“The Jaffa outfits?”

“What?” O'Neill remarked from the pilot seat. “You don't like
our new uniforms?”

Daniel offered up a cryptic smile and turned to look out the
windscreen, then an image on the HUD. It seemed nobody was
willing to offer an explanation. “Looks like the fire's under control,” he said to Jack, who nodded with relief.

“There was a fire?”

The light faded, and Vala paused and sat back on her heels. He
could see her disguise was ripped and burned in places, her hair looked like it had tangled with the Godzilla of hair dryers and
the sweat on her face was making railway tracks through a
solid
layer of soot.

“Is something wrong?” Daniel asked with concern.

“I'm going to need a few moments,” Vala said. “Do you need him nice and shiny new? Or just, you know, not dead?”

“He was dead?” Sam briefly dragged her attention away from
her
laptop.

“I'm good.” Vala lifted her hand and the light played over the guy again. “But I'm not
that
good. Still, he would have been dead soon enough.”

“He
has to be completely fit and healthy,” Daniel said, directing his remark to Vala.

“This is going to take a while, then,” said Vala. “He's in a bad way.”

The grizzly burn that had taken off half the guy's face began to heal over.

Cam watched her for a moment and then turned to Daniel. “Will someone
please
tell me what's going on around here? I'm out of it for a few hours, and—”

“More like decades,” Daniel muttered.

“Then we can get back to Antarctica,” said the General.

Antarctica. Cam peered out the windscreen again. They were definitely still over the United States, although he could see clear down to Cuba from this aspect.

“Sam?”

She looked up, and her gaze briefly settled on his forehead before she offered him a tired smile. That's when he noticed she looked like she'd been through a couple of fires herself. “Hey, Cam. It's good to see you. Really.” She turned back to I the computer.

“How's Three Finger doing?” O'Neill asked.

“Three Finger?” The name, weird as it was, rang a bell. Cam turned his attention to Vala's patient.