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Chapter Text

“Where ya headed?” Jack tilts his head as Captain Carter hits the button for level fourteen. He drops his finger from nineteen and tries to come up with a reason besides going to her lab.

Sam swallows almost casually. “The ops flight, sir. I need to read in the day shift.” The one Apophis attacked, less than a year after she left. Sam stares her guilt into the sliding doors. ‘I’m sorry I can’t tell you what it is, Sergeant. You’re cleared to know that it’s in no way dangerous.’

“Good call.” Jack nods. He’s got two-and-a-half levels to turn ‘can I come?’ into something that doesn’t sound like a four-year-old or a micromanaging jackass.

The doors slide open.

“See ya later?” he asks, not at all pathetically.

Sam turns back and tries not to think too much. “Of course, sir.” They work here.

Jack scrubs a hand through his rapidly graying hair. He needs to leave her alone. For multiple reasons. But mostly because he’s supposed to be a freaking full colonel again, not some captain handling a few dozen junior airmen. He does need to see them though, everyone here. This is a shutdown team in central Colorado that didn’t even know what they were guarding. They weren’t supposed to watch their own teammates get slaughtered and captured by high-tech evil aliens.

But I doubt they want to see you either. Jack frowns and hits the level for his interim office. There’s been very little continuity over the last year, but he’s willing to bet ‘guy who barged in before the program went south’ is probably a reputation that survived the personnel cuts. He’s gonna have to do something about it soon, though, at least if the President tells him to stay. But Hammond hasn’t sent word back from DC yet, and Jack doesn’t envy the man his trip. ‘Thank you very much for seeing me, Mr. President. …Right, sir, I agree that my initial revival of Stargate didn’t meet your authorization. We did immediately provoke the false god again, sir. Yes, they are still in the infirmary. I understand it’s creating a lot of refugees. I’m sure all of this is quite expensive, Mr. President.’ Jack grimaces at the large dust-covered doohickeys outside the elevator door. Damn expensive.

‘Yes, it would’ve been cheaper if we’d realized all this last year. Correct, Mr. President, the defected alien general did confirm that his evil alien god-king has considered sending a starship armada to enslave and destroy Earth. …I know you don’t believe any of that, sir. Yes, I understand that’s not what I presented to you in approving the nine exploration teams. I do promise we’re not trying to make a habit of upsetting the balance of power of the universe, Mr. President.’ Jack checks the nearest room number and turns around.

‘Actually, sir, I was hoping we could speak briefly about the nine Stargate teams your authorized. You see, Colonel O’Neill—yes, sir, that Colonel O’Neill. …No, sir, I let him out of the stockade.’ Jack snorts and opens the door of ‘Doctor Eve Lau’s’ mothballed office. ‘Well you see, I slated Colonel O’Neill as an SG team lead. Yes, he would be working far below his pay grade and costing the US taxpayers thousands extra every month. Because I’m a softie flyboy that likes second chances. Yes, Mr. President, that ousted and retired, recently-suicidal black ops colonel who screwed up the first mission. And I’ve gotten another request from the ridiculously valuable expatriated civilian linguist who also flouted the first mission and is in this specifically to chase his missing alien wife. He has absolutely zero military training. Yes, Mr. President, I am aware that our military has widely-versed combat linguists that don’t come with utterly catastrophic conflicts of interest.’

Jack coughs slightly at the dust on his computer case. ‘Right, Mr. President, and I’m also planning to give Colonel O’Neill the virtually indispensable Stargate captain who had her career torpedoed by this last year. Yes, I did rea that Project Giza only trained her as a clandestine reconnaissance team lead. I know he wasn’t discreet about his initial opinion, Mr. President, but O’Neill seems to have changed his mind. Yes, I suppose he does do that a lot, sir. No sir, I don't know why they didn't take her team the first time. Yes, I imagine it might’ve changed things.’ No kidding.

Jack opens his intelligence files and turns to the flickering gray screen. ‘That's correct, Mr. President, I'm referring to sticking them all in the same five-foot radius and repeatedly kicking them thousands of light years away through a unidirectional bull’s-eye. I agree, it is utterly idiotic and an apparently wanton use of resources. …Oh, and Mr. President, O’Neill would also like the wholly invaluable and dangerous, just-defected alien general to be his subordinate on the team. Yes, sir, the man on the surveillance tape from the Gate Room where he killed four American airmen and gave another to the torture device. No, sir, we haven’t found Airman Weterings yet. No, sir, we don’t know how to start rescuing her. I assure you the alien general who brutally slaughtered her four teammates doesn’t either. You are correct, Mr. President, we have absolutely no idea what we’re doing. Please give us a billion dollars.'

Chapter Text

Of course, Jack’s probably giving the president too much credit for his critique of the SGC. Eagan is prior military, but Washington is all about money. Money and votes, which are mostly money. Money, votes, and killing black ops colonels they don’t like. Jack huffs and pulls forward the rickety keyboard. Unit capabilities requested: one Force Reconnaissance platoon, two special operations intelligence flights, a Pararescue team, a Special Forces detachment, three Civil Affairs teams, six Special Tactics instructors, eight joint-qualified war planners (major or above), nine black ops linguists… and a partridge in a giant space gun.

He grunts.

Big surprise, Jack-boy. It’s gonna take a lot more than a presidential go-ahead and a not-asshole general to turn the defunct Giza into a frontline unit. He leans down and scrubs his eyes.

You can’t fix this. He can’t fix this. Hell, he broke this in the first place. Twenty years as a fucking Air Force officer, and he thinks it’s okay to not just usurp, but to deliberately piss off a civilian organization. A civilian organization that built a fucking supercomputer to control a thirty-ton alien gateway that stabilizes wormholes. Because who would need those guys not to hate the US military.

Oh, right. This idiot right here. The idiot who now needs to beg for their help in preventing the potential annihilation of Earth. That he caused.

Jack loosens his tie and almost certainly musses up his hair too much. No, this idiot is not doing so well for himself right now. Amazing how getting pulled off your dead son’s bed and demoted to leading four young lieutenants who also get killed, only to come home and find out your wife left you, is not the best way to get your entirely fucked life back in order.

Whoda-fucking-thunkit.

Force-multiplier  and other capabilities: four Scout Sniper pairs, a Special Operations Weather Team, a materiel management flight, whatever the infirmary wants, a shitload of UAVs… he scribbles the math on somebody’s memo. They’ve already lost the air war. Nothing fits through that damn ring. And twenty joint staffers who remember how to work without airpower. Of which there are none, God bless the US Air Force.

Jack braces the back of his neck and stares at the fading keyboard. He just needs a minute. Fixing crap like this is his job. Or was his job. “General, you don’t understand. There are innocent people on Abydos!” “Colonel, there are innocent people here! I have four bodies lying in the infirmary, and I am not about to let this thing create more.”

Jack’s head jerks up. God, he missed the funerals while they were on Chulak. A fist pushes on his bandaged knee.

“We’ve taken extreme precautions ever since I unburied it. Skaara’s militiamen guard the Gate thirty-six hours a day.” On Abydos. Not on Earth. On Earth junior airmen think it’s a lousy detail and aren’t cleared to know that they shouldn’t walk up the Gate ramp and pick up a freaking scanning sphere.

“The kids on Abydos. They’re why we kept this all a secret in the first place, right?” Charlie sinks down on the couch next to him. “Great kids.” But how much younger are they than the bodies in the infirmary? And they can grow older. Jack squints out the images. The woman Apophis kidnapped, she has a son. She has a son. And Jack has no fucking idea how to get her back.

So stop sniveling and fix it. His fist tightens. Jack knows better than to think like this, after twenty years. You used to. Then you killed your own universe.

His head shakes.

“Reburying it won’t work, General. The Goa’uld have ships, and they know we’re here now.” And how much of that is Jack’s own fault? Apophis is coming, soon. Teal’c agrees. The clock above his door ticks.

She smiles. “Amazing. This is what we were missing in Giza.” The captain’s beaming at him. “This is how they controlled it.” Because the one person that Project Giza trained for this job, the one officer that tried to salvage it afterwards, the one person Major General Hammond called back in personally, even she didn’t know what a DHD looked like until a year after Jack got back from Abydos. Even she didn’t get to see the cartouche. Even she didn’t see the alien mothership like the ones that will attack Earth. Jack turns over the folder in his hands.

“We can use this map, then. Like you said, Doctor, just correct for Doppler shift.” Jack presses his eyes closed. He really didn’t control a lot of this shit. But how much time did he waste by not doing that recon on Abydos? Not talking to Giza, not bringing the trained team, not showing her the DHD, the ship, the staff weapons, not finding the map? How many people are dead and missing? How many more will Apophis kill when he gets here?

The borrowed chair screeches as he stands up.

Chapter Text

Sam tugs at her newly-donned BDUs and steels herself yet again. She’d asked Lieutenant Kersh to bring in this shift, but she really has no idea what to say. This is the crew that was on duty when Apophis came. That watched their teammates slaughtered in front of them. A handful of junior airmen, and already they’re totally beyond her. The Gate lab was hard, but to lead them… She sucks in a breath and opens the door. 

“Room, tench-HUT!”

“Seats, at ease.” Sam waves them down and surveys the guard lounge. This is their place, but they don’t look comfortable. A dozen guys, most of them fewer than four years out of high school, trying not to look slumped on their couches. Trying not to look angry with her. She skips the introduction. “How is everyone holding up?” Sam checks each face for a beat, though she doesn’t recognize some.

“Poorly, ma’am!” A new senior airman barks in perfect form. It earns a few hidden chuckles. She can’t remember him, but she probably should. Zayas.

Sam nods and leans stiffly against a table. “Me, too. Is there anything I can do for you?” Of course, she knows the big answer.

“Find her.” This time it’s a staff sergeant, actually their shift sergeant now with McAtee dead. Sam thinks he’s twenty-four.

She nods again. “That’s what we’re trying to do.” And God help them.

“Really? Because lately I’ve been hearing a lot more about that geek doctor’s wife than my own missing airman.” The grieving man stares precisely not at his superior’s eyes.

So much for containing that shoe drop. Sam meets his not-glare. “I care about Airman Weterings, Sergeant.”

He looks back with less animus. “She has a husband too, you know. Great guy. Beautiful kid.”

“I’m sure David is a wonderful man. And Patrick.” She keeps her voice candid, she thinks, silently thanking the colonel for their names. “They need her back.”

The sergeant blows out a breath of temporary approval. Sam’s guessing it’s fake, but Cipriano would know how to handle his people by now. She’s certainly not going to object.

“You think that she’s dead, don’t you?” It cuts through the room faster than his original joke did. The same senior airman.

Sam releases a controlled breath. “I don’t know.” She finds his eyes, too. “But I’m going to do everything in my power to find out.”

“And how much is that?” He’s not a big ‘ma’am’ person, apparently. “Aren’t you the captain they kicked out of here?”

God, she walked right into that. Accurately, no less. But Sam’s rapidly losing control of this conversation, and she’s done more than enough of them over the years to know better. “That’s why I’m here. I need your help.” Neither statement is particularly on-point, but it’s what she thought of. At least it piques some interest. “How would you folks feel about returning to duty?” Except that she didn’t actually advocate for that yet, which makes this a supremely stupid idea.

The room stirs slightly. “You trust us to work?” someone asks.

Not really. What with the routinely smoking and playing poker in the Gate Room and the taking forever to respond to an alien infiltration on live video monitoring. “Yes.”

“In the missile silo?”

No, though in her opinion they’re far too short-staffed either way. Still, they must understand this now. And what goes wrong next? She has to start being preemptive. This time Sam pauses too long.

“I knew it.” Zayas scowls. “You blame us! They died in that room, and you blame us!”

“Airman!” Sam finally hits her command tenor. She puffs out a breath as the room falls silent. He’s right; it’s your fault. “You all already know that you’re under inquiry for violating protocol.” She forestalls any objection. “That’s not why I’m here. I’m here because you can help.” There are a few murmurs, but people mostly just exchange looks. She can’t read most of them.

Lieutenant Kersh finally coughs to his voice. “Ma’am, what I think the men are saying is…” He’s got the eye of everyone in the room now, and it seems to shock him. Sam nods. “We’d like to know what we’re dealing with.” He elects to play dumb with them, not that he really understands this despite commanding the full flight.

Which of course means ‘we’d like to know why you didn’t tell us that magic warriors with fire-staffs could materialize thirty stories underground in central Colorado’. And murder them, with no warning and no help. Sam white-knuckles the table. “Your flight wasn’t cleared to know about the situation in the missile silo last year.” She buries the ‘why’ there. “Now you are.”

More exchanged looks, but a few people lean forward. She’ll take it. “The device under the tarp is called a Stargate. This one was found at an Ancient Egyptian dig site near Giza in 1928. We made it work a year ago, but determined it only led to one place.” One place that had not only a DHD to analyze, but a map. Sam forces herself not to stop. “It was another planet some thousands of light years from here. That Gate was subsequently thought to be destroyed, and it was determined that the Earth Gate no longer functioned. It was slated for destruction and stored here while preparing for shipment to Yucca Mountain.”

To their credit, no one lashes out. Sam takes the moment to repeatedly kick herself in the head some more. It was determined that the Earth Gate no longer functioned.

“So…Carol is thousands of light years away?” He’s another young airman, probably not old enough to drink. Sam doesn’t envy him.

“Yes.” She pins on her rank and looks at him earnestly. “And that’s where I’ll have to go to get her.”

He swallows quickly. The guy next to him wraps an arm over his shoulders.

“Any return to duty would be optional.” Sam speaks up and scans the room again. It’s not much brighter. “I know your certifications are pulled. I’m not sure what I can do for you,” she slips in the correction. “But if you’d like anything at all, my door is always open.” Her eyes settle on the Senior Airman Zayas but address the room. “I’d like to help you.”

The room falls silent as Sam handles the last of their weighing looks. You need to say more for them. God, she needs to do more for them. She doesn’t know how to do any of this. How could someone know how to do this? She gives Kersh a quick ‘meet me’ look and turns to leave.

“Room—”

“Carry on.” Sam waves off the call to attention and tries a sad smile. It doesn’t get returned.

Chapter Text

Second Lieutenant Drew Kersh watches the door re-latch nervously. He’s grateful for the captain’s vote of confidence, but he’s not actually sure what it does. You really, really fucked this one up, bud. God, he’s supposed to be at pilot training in a month. ‘Casual status’ is boring they said. Just a lame local gig before your start date, they said. Get a pilot slot, you’ll be lucky to supervise anyone before you make captain, they said. He should’ve been a linguist. Or better yet, gone to a different university. Screw the Academy, everyone needs to get the hell out of Colorado before something worse comes through that thing.

Drew picks his way out of the guard room but lingers short of the office. He likes this captain, he thinks. She left before his time, but most people seem to like her alright. She came back at least, and that’s something. It’s about all he’s got. And Drew suspects he needs all he’s got, considering a five-person guard detail in his sixth month ended with four bodies, lit cigarettes, and real poker chips on the floor of a top-secret nuclear bunker. And his commanding general put a full colonel in a holding cell for just lying about…something. He gulps and pokes his head around the doorway.

Sam pulls out a chair in the closet-cum-junior officers’ cubicle. Junior officer cubicle, really, considering how understaffed they are and how often they transfer in and out. She gestures Lieutenant Kersh to sit down from where he’s holding up the doorframe to his own office. The wiry twenty-one-year-old sinks down next to her and tries to look at ease in the hard plastic chair.

Sam likes the kid, sort of. They’d only met on few short trips after she transferred back to the Pentagon, and he’s not brightest bulb, but he seems to care about his people. More so than she could’ve possibly hoped for when they dropped in a fresh butterbar awaiting pilot training.

Drew coughs and picks up a pencil to fiddle with. “You wanted to see me, ma’am?”

“How’s it going, Lieutenant?”

He tries to shrug. “You saw in them there, ma’am. And the other shifts are exhausted.”

She noticed, and she’s glad he knows. That’s the main reason Sam wants people back on duty. “I’ll do everything I can.”

Drew nods. “It was a good idea, getting them back on the horse like that.” He wishes he’d thought of it. And trusted them for it. His sergeants on the other shifts certainly don’t.

Sam hadn’t thought of that directly, but he’s right. “I’m certainly going to advocate for them.” And this time she won’t fail.

“I appreciate it, ma’am.” Because he is way the hell out of his depth. Hopefully he can stay working with the captain. Drew’s not big on explaining how people’s friends bled out in front of them because their own government literally didn’t bother to prevent it.

Sam watches the emotions grapple across his face. “And how are you?”

His head jerks up nervously. “Ma’am?”

Yeah. “How are you, Kersh?”

“Outstanding, ma’am,” he delivers by rote.

Sam winces visibly. She hates that saying. “Their deaths aren’t on you, you know.” Actually, they are to an extent, and she probably shouldn’t lie about it. But they’re on you more. “General Hammond is an excellent commander, and I’m sure he’ll handle your case properly.” Though again, she basically just likes to think that’s true. Sam served under Hammond for a few months when there was still a sizable chain of command out here. But other than learning that he’s not General West and he’d unsurprisingly served with and apparently liked her father, she didn’t pick up much. She regrets that now. Her father isn’t exactly a master of understanding new generations.

“Understood, ma’am.” The younger man starts to waver.

Sam waits.

“…I just.” Drew counts the scuffs on his desk. “Their funerals were really hard.” His voice cracks.

She presses her eyes closed. He must see her guilt through them. “I’m so sorry, Drew.” Sam forces herself to find his lost gaze. “I wish I could’ve been there. We all do.” And she’d been so damn excited about Gate travel before they told her about the casualties.

“I know, ma’am.” Drew shrugs at his pencil.

She swallows. God, there is no one here for these kids. The unit, her treasured Giza, is gone. A two-star general personally responded to that hostile fire report. Her wavering hand finds the younger man’s back. She’s not nearly as much older as she pretends.

“Please know that your son died valiantly serving his country, ma’am.” No, they died because he didn’t lead them. They died because you failed. Drew’s arms wrap around his head. Six months into his first job and he’s the supervisor of four closed caskets. Four dead sons. “I…” He stops as his voice cracks. Stop saying ‘I’, you bastard. His head jerks up to the person beside him.

Sam just barely flinches at the movement. Sad eyes, not even six years younger than hers. God, do something. She sits still. The gaze searches her, looking for…something. Something she can’t begin to identify, much less provide. I’m not a hero, brother. She can’t save him.

Drew coughs and scrubs a hand over his face. God, she looks so old. How does someone look that old? He’ll never be able to. Fight, Lieutenant. Just move. He shakes slightly as his training keeps knocking at him. “Um, did you…” He blinks as her gaze wavers. “Did you get anything about her? From the mission?”

Sam’s eyes close of their own volition. Get back it under control. Now, Captain. “I’m afraid I can’t tell you that.” Teal’c says that she’s dead. She’s dead, and Teal’c is here. And Apophis has a sarcophagus. Sam manages not to shudder.

Drew nods silently. “Can I help?”

She finds some small fraction of a smile. “You do help, Lieutenant.” It’s an automatic placation, and her brain stalls for a second before actually searching for what he should do. Delegate, dammit. Task, person, authority, feedback. Four steps. Four. Move. He’s looking at her. “Do you have your report?”

Drew nods and rifles through the sheets on his desk. He’s got a copy here, definitely. God, how can he still be this disorganized? “Um, yeah.” Wasting time, Cadet! His airman is probably dying. Drew swallows a lump. “Actually…”

Sam tilts her head as he hands her a cluttered legal pad. ‘Missile silo defense procedures – safe knockout gas? Electric shock ramp? What was that thing?’ She smiles at the jumbled notes.

“I have my memos,” somewhere “ma’am, but I was just thinking…” He trails off, embarrassed. “I know they built your Iris now, but maybe just if…”

Maybe if we ever actually get any money. Sam scans the page with interest before flipping it. ‘What if we just knocked the ring over?’ She smiles. “I always like thinking. This is good. Though unfortunately safe knockout gas isn’t real.” On Earth. God, that’s gonna need some getting used to. Sam takes out her pen and jots ‘decontamination – foreign microbials’ in the corner of his third page. She looks up. “Can I keep this?”

His eyes brighten. “Of course! Ma’am.”

Sam smiles. Again she hadn’t planned it as a morale move, just more problem solving. But she can roll with it. “Let’s talk—1030 tomorrow, my lab?” He nods. “And maybe bring—”

“Cipriano, yes, ma’am. And my other shift leaders?” His superior nods. Drew gulps and finally exhales. “Ma’am. I’m glad you…” he gestures to the notes. Like it. She likes it. She’s a freaking doctor of alien retrofit genius, and she likes it. Maybe he’ll survive this thing after all. He breathes in again, almost light-headed. “I really do appreciate it, ma’am. I know I’m not the sharpest spoon in the drawer, but being alone down here has really been—I mean, not that I didn’t do okay at the Academy and everything. I’d still make a good pilot,” he corrects with a headshake. The last thing Drew needs right now is for her to decide he’s stupid. “But I just really wasn’t ready for this here. I know that that’s wrong—”

“It’s understandable.” Sam overrides automatically. This earns her a correctly doubtful look. “At least the part where you didn’t anticipate crazy egomaniacal aliens zooming thousands of light years across the galaxy to materialize under your nose in a secure, decommissioning nuclear bunker.” She can’t quite say it deadpan, but he gets a little amused anyway.

“So you’re not mad?” He’s really trying not to sound like a kicked puppy. Four dead sons.

Yes. “No.” Sam really shouldn’t be. He’s certainly been dressed down enough out here. And don’t forget this is really your fault.

Drew squints honestly at the wall behind her. “You know, I gave them that assignment because they lost the basketball tournament.”

Sam winces for him.

He chuckles sadly. “They’re mostly late enlistees. Too old for their ranks.” And with too-young families. “I know didn’t know most of them as well as I’m supposed to. McAtee used to joke that they’d never even see an officer down there once the main heat got lowered.” Which was basically true, especially once Drew started prepping for pilot training.

Sam tries to school her face. “It’s all right, you know.” Except none of this is all right. And you’re the one that left them. “You know the mistakes you made, Kersh.” And he’s paying for every one of them. Sam finds something that sounds like confidence. “I know you’ll learn.” And he could, really, with the right sergeants and CO. He might even end up a quick study, especially if he loses his pilot slot. There aren’t many other jobs where you could avoid immediately being a supervisor even if you wanted to.

Drew brightens cautiously. “You think they’ll let me keep my commission?”

They might. Sam really doesn’t want him scapegoated in this. Or herself. Or the colonel? She sighs. “I think if we get this together, we can show Washington how it’s supposed to work.” She gives him an assured smile. And how is this supposed to work?

Drew manages to return the grin and studies his piled-high inbox.

Chapter Text

Sam sits down inside her mostly plastic-wrapped former lab and sorts through her latest memos. Diallo’s managed to implement the counter-hacking protocols they’d brainstormed. Their fix is barely a stopgap; all of Giza’s programmers were fired or transferred months ago. Mostly fired. But at least it should stop any random alien that wants to dial their Gate. And if you’d done it sooner…

Sam tamps out the thought and flips through her pile. You have to do more for them. She pulls out some standard forms to sign and doesn’t quite read them closely. But what can she even do? I don’t know, maybe apologize? ‘Hello Airmen, I’m sorry I killed your friends?’ ‘I apologize that I could’ve given them enough to save their own lives, but I couldn’t get clearance to?’ ‘I’m sorry I blew my budget trying to make the Gate work and couldn’t even afford to seal the thing when I was finally transferred?’ ‘I’m sorry for failing you all?’ She’s sorry for failing them all.

But she needs to freaking concentrate. If they’d fixed the dialing loophole earlier—God, how had she missed that?—if they’d fixed it earlier, maybe they could’ve tricked Apophis. And Airman Weterings would…be dead on the floor of the Gate Room. Along with her teammates. And Teal’c. And Apophis. And probably half of the reinforcements, including General Hammond. She grips her forehead.

Of course, tricking them also requires knowing how that scanning sphere even works. And anything else it can detect. Teal’c doesn’t understand any of it, and there weren’t any frequency probes in the Gate Room. Sam jots that on her latest budget draft above ‘mechanism to control Ramp orientation’. Notes: ‘suspect visible light modulation, probably by amplitude. Contact…’ she scrubs her hairline, ‘Gupta and Wong at CalTech.’

Now if only she could delegate that task to someone. Not that there’s much to learn much before it happens again. Which it shouldn’t now, with the Iris. No, now it’ll happen to some poor SG team off-world, and they still won’t know what to do about it. God, she needs to get back out there. She’s got to get in front of this thing.

They have to start understanding Apophis. Not that Sam doesn’t want him dead regardless, but they need to get some kind of clue before they keep doing this. Or it’ll be more bodies in the Gate Room. Dammit, there’s a reason she got tapped to lead a clandestine reconnaissance team for Giza. And it’s not just because she can’t get good infantry training. Really, what was O’Neill thinking out there with Ra? The last of his kind? According to whom? How? Why? Color her naïve, but one might think it’d take something pretty big to wipe out a whole race of technologically advanced super evil god-kings. Maybe check on that next time.

Sam grabs the nearest pencil and moves ‘outline specifications for electronic surveillance UAV’ upwards on her very long priority list. Which is a mess. And now you’re a year behind. A full year and five young airmen behind, just because her maybe-future boss wouldn’t know a complex galaxy if it literally murdered his people with mass-manufactured alien space guns. Which he subsequently elected not to even tell anyone about. A full colonel. In US Air Force Special Operations. A man whose entire career revolved around gathering and exploiting complex intelligence decided it was okay to nuke the Sun God. And lie about it.

Quit it. Sam sighs. She really does like the colonel in some respects. For some reason. He’s on the not-exactly-short list of people that’ve saved her life, and he’d led a good mission this time. Better than she could’ve, at least. But you can’t make or stay a colonel by running six-person teams. Heck, Sam wouldn’t make major by running a six-person team. Don’t remind me. Now she sees why General Hammond went to DC personally. They really are racking up the failures for a unit that’s about to enter into an interstellar war for Earth’s survival. And one of their potential senior commanders is the person that caused it. And their ranking science officer couldn’t fix it. And their commanding general just delivered four completely—four easily—avoidable eulogies.

It isn’t that Sam doesn’t know how difficult foresight like this is. She’d failed, too. Spectacularly, if not for bad reasons. But foresighted decision-making in outer space was the colonel’s job, and someone has to do it now, too. And somehow Sam doubts that the Joint Chiefs will appreciate O’Neill’s story of not working with anyone experienced in the project, not executing his due diligence for the mission, subsequently reaching and acting on the wrong conclusion, and then lying about it.

Of course, the Joint Chiefs don’t have your personal biases about it.

Her thumb reopens the colonel’s corrected mission report. It lands on the last DHD page automatically.

Sam manages to clap the folder closed again and picks up another memo. This is ridiculous; she’s got work to do. And he’s a full colonel. This is all none of her business by a good thirteen years and three pay grades.

She blinks at her next subject line. The initial personnel recall is underway; most of her Giza crew is already at Peterson. And there’s another briefing Sam definitely isn’t looking forward to. She turns to the fuzzy computer screen and rehearses into it. ‘Hello folks, welcome back.’ Smile. ‘I know some of you hate me for being the Air Force lab director when you lost your jobs, but I’m here to tell you that the Air Force is reinstating our project and desperately needs your help. Eight Americans are already dead, and we’ve accidentally put Earth in existential danger by destabilizing the galaxy.’ Sam’s not sure exactly what facial expression could fit there. ‘I have to tell you that this occurred on Colonel O’Neill’s mission, and you may be working for him again if you come back.’ Though, again, she doubts it. ‘I expect many of you remember the colonel from last year when he took this program out from under our noses without even speaking to any of us. You see, you good folks all did exactly what your government asked of you for fifteen years, and my beloved Air Force blew it up with a nuclear bomb and told you that you’d failed. I’m really very sorry; your new contracts are on the desk. Oh, and I don’t know how we’re going to pay you yet.’

She sighs. That may need some work.

Chapter Text

The next memo in Sam’s pile is by Sergeant Harriman along with Siler. ‘Suggestions for wormhole alert system and Gate Room control mechanisms.’ She manages a little smile and runs some feasibility numbers in the margins. It looks good, not that she’s surprised. She is grateful for their quick partnership, though. Maybe the sergeants can help her unite a bunch of jaded civilian scientists and overwhelmed junior airmen into running a Gate that can take on a galaxy of sadistic supervillains. She reminds herself to bring doughnuts and drop in on them Monday. Because nothing says ‘I’m really sorry you still can’t earn imminent danger pay’ like a good chocolate éclair. And what flavor says ‘Help, I’m barely twenty-eight and have no idea what to do?’

Sam won’t admit that she jumped as the phone rang. Reacted, really. She picks it up and silently thanks whoever did the reinstall. “Captain Carter.” She winces immediately. “Sorry, I just sat down. Sure. Let me read it now.” Sam looks at the memo pile and curses her inward distraction. Stop thinking about O’Neill. She’s got work to do, and Jamal says he’s stalled on the Abydos map. She signs off the phone and digs up his report.

Right, of course there are multiple ways to set up the coordinate system around the experimental Chulak adjustment. Sam runs a quick binomial coefficient analysis and estimates the time and resources to try each option. Crap. She pages back through their other priorities. You told the colonel this would be easy. Which it will be; but fast is always a different problem. And they’ve got a missing airman on another planet right now. They can’t bottleneck here. Sam’s already rearranging the top of the lab’s task distribution. Maybe Daniel can help?

And why do you still always do this? She grimaces. Sam’s never really had the patience for detailed experimentalism—too much of a speed demon; that’s why she’s a manager instead of a straight lab girl—but you think she’d be better at ball-parking these things by now. Because you’ve been fully out of school for all of three years?

“Sam?”

Sam blinks into the receiver. Did she call him already? “Yes, Doctor Jackson?”

“Great! Are you ready to start on the staff weapon again? I’m in Teal’c’s cell.”

Sam nods before realizing it’s a phone. “Right.” Did she schedule this? God, what time is it here? “Sure, yeah.” She sighs and scrubs a hand through her still not-quite-clean hair.

Daniel frowns at the receiver sympathetically. “Everything all right?”

No, not at all. Though Daniel’s a heck of a person to ask her that. She opens the priority list reluctantly. You are supposed to be managing things around here, Captain. “Actually, Daniel, could you do something else for me first?”

He tries not to grimace. Sam’s been good to him, but he really needs—Sha’re really needs—them to understand Apophis’s army. Right now. “Yeah?” he asks with a wince.

She hears the expression. “My team in lab nineteen-six-lima is struggling with the datums of the Abydos map.” Sam blinks and scribbles ‘not dextral orthonormal?’ in the margin of Jamal’s report.

Daniel chugs back the rest of his coffee and calms his shaking hand on the desk. “Nineteen-six-L?”

“Yes.” She closes her eyes. “And Daniel? Could you…” come on. “Could you please go see the Security Forces day shift for me? They’d really appreciate hearing that you’re trying to help.”

His brow furrows. “Help with what?” Of course he’s trying to help. He eyes the aloof guards on Teal’c’s flanks.

Sam winces. “Airman Carol Weterings, Daniel. The missing SF from Apophis’s attack?” She rubs her temple. “We haven’t been able to dial that address yet. Her husband’s name is David; their son is Patrick. He’s ten months old.”

Daniel gulps and almost crashes into his seat. “Yeah, I, sorry. I…” Forgot. He forgot. Teal’c produces what must be a concerned look. “David and Patrick. I’ll go there now.” Daniel hangs up and turns to the nearest security guard, who looks like he’s about twelve hours short of having slept this week. God, poor guys. He needs to make enough coffee for them.

Chapter Text

Sam opens her staff weapon notes and checks the major research areas. Jamming, shock loads, power stabilization, counter-measuring, repair… She adds ‘fabrication’ below repair but doubts that Teal’c knows much about it. She needs to hand off the investigation anyway; it’s already too extensive. Except that Teal’c is pretty selective about the people he’ll deal with. Sam’s surprised she’s in the club, actually. Probably just because Daniel mentioned that she was on Chulak as the manager of the team that finished building Earth’s DHD. Without ever seeing one. It’s odd; apparently that’s enough to make a mildly sexist superhuman five-star alien general tolerate her, but not enough to keep a retired Air Force colonel from publicly undercutting her individualized recall. By his own two-star commander, who’d just literally let him out of a holding cell. While briefing at least one major that O’Neill knows tried to kill Giza. Because it’s not like that’s wildly idiotic and irresponsible, Colonel.

Sam shakes off the sarcasm. No, they hadn’t started off on the best foot. And that’s ignoring the fact that Hammond still chose her alone from Giza to recall and send off-world, but O’Neill didn’t see fit to recognize her name when he seized her boss’s job. And hers, for that matter. Thanks, boss. She stares at the dim computer screen. Of course, O’Neill also didn’t see fit to mention the existence of a tactical firearm that shoots discrete plasma bursts. Because it’s not like that’s an important thing to know can even exist in this universe, sir.

‘Complete mission report’ her ass. Apparently O’Neill spent the last twenty years in an Air Force where shit like that doesn’t get people killed.

Sam squeezes her eyes on the curse and reaches blindly for her empty coffee mug. Darn headache. 5) Naquadah power source’s interaction with RDX explosives: untested, but continue follow-on analyses as per appendix G. 6) Alternative uses of power core: Recommend three research pairs, per appendix H. 7) Variable rates of fire: “Enter.” Sam calls before she registers the knock.

“Ma’am, Senior Airman Zayas reports—”

“At ease.” She shakes off her writing and drops a quick salute. The airman, who was nothing if not a defensive lineman in high school, keeps stiffly towering over her.

“Ma’am, Lieutenant Kersh permitted me to see you directly concerning—”

Sam finds a smile for the Midwesterner she doesn’t know. “Just relax, Airman. Please sit.” She stands herself and scrapes another chair across the cement floor.

Gil Zayas takes the front third of his offered seat and stares at a dusty…something on a shelf. This place looks like an old Frankenstein lab. He guesses it is, sort of.

Sam wishes she’d already gotten a coffeemaker for in here. “It’s all right.” She leans back rather pointedly, putting just the corner of the desk between them.

Gil droops slightly on his heavy build. “Ma’am, I’m sorry about my behavior earlier. What I meant, what I need to say is…” he trails off and squints out the door.

“It won’t reflect back on you,” She explains to the side of his brush cut. Not when he does this in private, a belated initiative that she’s rather grateful for.

The blank check surprises him a little. Gil finally looks at the captain he doesn’t known. He’s not even really sure where she fits into this whole ‘SGC’ rumor. He shifts uncomfortably and tries to block out the memory.

Sam makes herself meet his first real gaze since…ever, actually. She doesn’t know this young man, and she has no idea what she’s stepping into. You should’ve read his file already. Goddammit, she knows better than that, especially after opening her door. “Please speak freely.”

That’s not usually a problem for him, but Gil doesn’t. It takes him a minute to lose her eyes and find his speed-laced boots. “I’m scared.”

Sam nods and gives herself a beat to plan. “Me, too.” It’s a little too poised.

He looks up hesitantly. “You are?”

She finds an open mien. “This is a scary thing. A galaxy we don’t know how to handle. That we don’t know how it works, what it’s doing.” She gestures upward slightly. “We don’t even know who’s out there, much less what they want.” Sam looks up at the wide, deep, dark, hidden sky. “It is scary.” And exhilarating and devastating, and far more responsibility than she’d been imagining it as.

Goddernit, he hadn’t even thought of that part. “Yes, ma’am.” It doesn’t help. Gil swallows and forces his gaze to level. “That’s not all I’m scared of.”

Sam looks down from the ceiling to her airman. “What else, son?” He’s not nearly young enough to be her son, but she’s learned to borrow the phrase for its familiarity.

“You.”

She loses control of her eyebrows. What?

“Urrm, not ‘you’, you, ma’am.” Except basically yes. Gil finds himself seated back at attention. “I know what I signed up for, ma’am. I understand it, not that I wanted security forces—”

Sam takes the quick deflection. “What did you want to be?” She’s going to need a minute, and more information. Scared of me?

Gil stumbles and trails off. “Um, aerial gunner, ma’am. Or maybe combat weather.” Not that anyone who gets stuck twenty stories underground wanted SF. Too bad he sucks with numbers.

Sam nods, though that seems like he should be more bored than scared down here. Except he’s like twenty years old and his friends just died needlessly in front of him, jerk.

He pushes forward. “What I meant was, I know I signed up to risk my life. I’m certainly not complaining about that—I’m not the one that’s dead.”

Sam just barely manages not to wince at that. She fights the urge to withdraw.

“But…” he raises his gaze to over her shoulder. “If I could, ma’am I’d like to finish this tour with a NORAD flight upstairs. I’m eligible for it, and I’m probably going to lose my reliability certification anyway.”

Sam freezes her features. “Why is that, Airman?” God, she should already know the answer to that. To all of this.

Gil looks above her captain’s bars as the anger slices him again. “Matt Pearce was my roommate, ma’am.” Matt tried to say something as he died, six feet in front of him. Gil’s not sure what it was.

Dammit, why has she not read his damn file?

He talks as her mouth opens. “With all due respect, ma’am, when I gave my life to my country, I guess I wasn’t truly prepared for it to abandon me in return.” He doesn’t chance to see her reaction. “I know my job, but I think right now I’d be useful in a less sensitive assignment.” He’s almost begging through the formality.

Sam’s brain finally starts racing. ‘You can’t do that.’ ‘We need you here.’ ‘I can’t help you with this.’ ‘Please don’t’? Damn, she’s a jerk. “I understand.” Sam considers putting his first name there, but she doesn’t even know it. Is this how you prepare for an assignment, Captain? ‘Let’s give it some time’? ‘I’ll consider it’? She presses her eyes closed and breathes once. “I’m so sorry, son. I know nothing can change what we just put you through. What we need from you.” ‘Trust is a difficult thing’? ‘But the Needs of the Air Force’? ‘We have to be strong now’? Stop lecturing him. “I truly wish that I could. I know how much it hurts not to have what you need to keep your people safe.” Yeah, like right freaking now. God, she just killed this kid’s roommate. She just killed this kid’s roommate by literally making a twenty-year-old wait around to be slaughtered. With seven chevrons of warning, and no shields. No orders.

He’s still studying the stitching of her rank. “Do you know what it’s like to have someone die needlessly like that, ma’am?” he reaches blindly. “To know that if you’d just…” Gil chokes. Just been there. Just been ready. Just run. Just known. His throat gags. I’m sorry, Matt. I’m so sorry.

Sam nods shakily. “I do know that.” It’s poignant, but it doesn’t budge him. “And I want to be here for you. For all of you. You have my loyalty here, Zayas. You always have.” God, she’d never wanted to give up Cheyenne, give up Giza. What was she thinking in this mess last year? You weren’t thinking about them.

Gil tries to look grateful.

Sam leans forward and looks up at him. “I’m not going to pretend you owe me something that you don’t, Airman. We all want the best for all of you, and I’ll do everything I can to get it.” And that’s her job. Too bad she doesn’t know whether that means keeping him or letting him go. Which is really the whole freaking point. God, they’re on the brink of an interstellar war, and the first thing she does is start to lose security personnel. The first thing. This is six so far.

Gil finally nods. He can’t tell how honest the captain is, but he doesn’t really get anything anymore. He’s not supposed to give up like this. Not supposed to burden his unit. Service before Self, Excellence in All We Do. Whatever Our Tasks. He’s not supposed to break. The captain draws his gaze eventually, and he’s struck by the water in it.

Sam struggles to meet the full reflection of his jade eyes. “Is there anything else I can do for you now?”

Gil shrugs the hulk of his shoulders. And then stops. “What do you really think of me, ma’am? I know I have a responsibility here.” His eyes drop off her automatically.

Sam nods to their common core values. “We do ned to put the mission first.” He winces hard above her. Sam chances hand on his shoulder. “But we put our people always.” It’s just a quote. She doesn’t have a real answer.

He rests on his elbows but stays under her hand.

Chapter Text

A shadow trails into her doorway for a minute. Zayas doesn’t notice it, and Sam’s loathe to move too much. She just hopes it’s not important and tries hard to ignore her guess as to who it is.

Gil eventually manages to shift in his seat. Damned if he’s going to start crying in front of a woman that has eight pay grades on him. Especially when he’s got seventy pounds on her. He sits up and sniffs. “Sorry, ma’am.”

She finds his eyes. “Don’t ever apologize for that.” It strikes Sam briefly that Kersh basically left this to blindside her. He’s gonna need some guidance too.

Gil straightens his collar and scrubs his face. Dernit, he wants to make sergeant in a year, and here he goes breaking down in front of some officer above his flight commander. Freaking brilliant. “Thank you, ma’am. I can get out of your hair now.”

“You’re certainly not wasting my time, Zayas.” Exactly the opposite; Sam doubts she used that time to really help him much. She doesn’t want to let him leave at all, but she stands anyway. He needs a first sergeant, not some captain he just met.

Gil nods formally. “Thank you again, ma’am. Have a…” He blinks. “Have a good…”

Sam turns around to follow his gaze. God, she is really freaking bad at this. “I’m sorry, Airman.” She reaches over quickly and switches off her computer screen.

Gil swallows. “Is that it, ma’am? The weapon that killed him?”

The flashback struggles with his features. Sam nods. “Yes.”

“Can we…can you stop it?” He sees it again, the burning hole in Kev’s chest. The smell is everywhere he goes now. Can’t sleep in the apartment, can’t eat right. They’d sprinted in there with no shields, no nothing. If she can’t stop it…

“We’re working on it. I think so.” Sam steps back next to him. “We’ll figure it out.”

He backs up to her door automatically. “We don’t even have enough shields for the new protocol. If it happens…”

Sam shakes her head. “We do now.” And they have the Iris, but he really isn’t supposed to be working on this yet. Or, “Hold on a minute, would you?”

Gil stares at the doorframe while the captain grabs her phone.

Sam scans the call list and dials her provisional CO. “Major Kawalsky? It’s Captain Carter, sir. Did General Hammond check in in yet?” She forces herself to slow her probably-embarrassing speed. It’s a stupid question with four seconds of retrospect. The general might be a little busy handling the ‘destabilized galaxy and needlessly dead airmen’ issue in DC.

Charlie snorts amiably. “What? Talking me into backing you on the SFs wasn’t enough?” He reclines in his chair and deliberately stops staring at his fifth training curricula draft.

Yeah, they’ll tease her for this. So what. “I was just wondering if anything’s changed yet. I have an airman here.”

Charlie shifts back to his desk quickly. Okay, serious. “Looks like…all but Blackmar and Demarinis.” He checks the clock. “They should be at psych now. Hammond’s got the suspension lifted but still no critical duties.” Though what really constitutes a ‘non-critical job’ when you work here, Charlie has no idea. Poor kids.

Sam blinks. “Wow.” That was fast. She turns on the monitor and grabs her mouse.

“Yeah, he’s really been Johnny-on-the-spot from out there.” Charlie is definitely up for working with a general that’s this responsive. Even if he does insist on service dress. “That all you needed?”

Sam looks back towards Zayas, who’s still standing stiffly by the doorway and pretending to ignore her quieter exchange. “That’s it. Thank you, sir.”

“See ya later.” Charlie hangs up and grimaces at the all-too-short distraction.

“Zayas?” Sam asks, raising her voice slightly.

“Yes, ma’am.” Gil turns back and continues trying not to think about anything. He just gets stuck with that smell. Acrid smoke and charred bone.

“Do you want to talk about this?” She gestures to the now relit screen. “I could use the help.” And couldn’t she.

Gil manages to look appreciative. The prodigal doctor of whosawhatsis that ran the magic wormhole machine at twenty-something-years-old needs his help understanding the space fire blaster. Right.

Sam registers the skepticism. “Really, you can deal with this stuff now.” She hits ‘print’ quickly and waits on his eyes. “If you want to.” She really is thinking about it as a morale move this time. Not that she knows whether scanning her battlelab notes will help a twenty-year-old junior enlisted SF cope with seeing his friends killed by a space gun. But she picks up the printouts and walks over to him.

Gil’s mouth finally flaps. “Did you—did you really get us back in that quickly?”

Sam nods and holds out the folder. “For almost everyone now. But I just asked again.” She looks out into the new SGC. “It’s a team effort. We really are here for you guys, you know.”

Gil nods and finds himself leaning against the wall inside her door. His eyes are welling up again. “Thank you, ma’am.” He reaches blindly for the folder she’s offering. It takes him a second. Breathe, goddernit.

Sam waits a minute until he’s standing straight and looking at her. She’s impressed.

“Sorry though, ma’am. I’m not really a science guy.”

She smiles. “You are the security experts, though.” He looks at her doubtfully, but her plan formulates quicker this time. “You’re up for sergeant when?”

Gil blinks. “Um, a year or two, I hope. If I…” he lets it trail off. If he makes the cut. And lives that long. Weterings is a staff sergeant select, and it certainly hasn’t helped her any.

“So step it up,” Sam reminds lightly. It seems to catch him. “Tell you what, bring this to Lieutenant Kersh and we’ll work it out.” Sam studies him. It feels more natural than his eight inches on her should make it. “That is if you’re up for it.”

Gil turns over the folder in his hands. Didn’t he just try to quit this place? “Um, yeah. Yes, ma’am.”

Phew. “Great.” She gives him a smile and tries very hard not to jinx the fact that a guy who just wanted to move to NORAD is holding her notes on the weapon that killed his roommate.

“If that’s all, ma’am?”

Sam nods and waves him out informally. “That’s all.”‘Have a good day’? She manages not to be that stupid and just heads back to her phone. Half a crisis averted, at least.

“Colonel! Sir.”

Sam’s head jerks back to her doorway. Did he really stay out there this whole time?

“Sorry, sir, I.” Gil cuts off and swallows.

Jack grins lightly. “Relax, Airman.” God, the kids around here. It’s like they…don’t typically run into a colonel wandering around their hallways. Whodathunk.

Sam swings around the doorway and watches her airman fall to parade rest. She swears, if the colonel freaks him out now…

“Coffee?” Jack asks lightly, holding one out to her.

Sam blinks. “Thanks.” She is going through it pretty quickly now.

“My apologies, sir, ma’am, I’ll just…”

Jack manages not to smirk at the ‘please don’t be about my reprimand’ look on Zayas’s face. They’ve really gotta chill things out around here. “You want to leave without your coffee, Airman?”

Gil freezes and then fumbles slightly with his folder. “I, uh, thank you, sir.” Did a full colonel just make him coffee?

Jack cocks his head and lets him go. “Enjoy.”

Gil doesn’t quite bolt around the nearest corner before stopping. He raises the large paper cup. It’s soothingly hot, but he’s not a big coffee guy. Well, he is, but only with about four sugars in it. He sips anyway. And looks back at the hallway. Four sugars?

Sam hides her gaze down the corridor for a little too long. But the coffee is hot, and she should really actually look at her superior.

Jack tilts the captain a careful smile when he finally gets her eyes back. “Wanna talk?”