One Final Time

By Badgergater

Email: [email protected]

Season: 8

Episode: Moebius 2

Spoilers: Moebius a bunch, actually anything S1-8

Pairing: None

Category: Sequel, drama, angst

Warnings: AU Character death, in canon. Kleenex required.

Summary: What happened to Jack and SG-1 in Ancient Egypt

Rating: Teenagers and above I guess, due to the mature subject matter and several four letter words

Disclaimer: Disclaimer: Don't own Jack or anyone or anything else from Stargate, I'm just a lowly, unpaid fanfic writer who borrows the characters for no motive other than fun. No profit involved. And remember, don't post this without asking.

Author’s Pledge: Badgergater fics are posted with fair, honest and accurate info about the fic, its topic and focus. Potential readers deserve the opportunity to make an informed choice on whether or not to read.

Author’s Note: Though I have often said I’d never write a death fic, cannon has dictated the necessity of it. Thanks as always to all those who feedback.

I hate this place.

I hate the desert. It’s dry. It’s sandy. It’s hot. There’s no snow, only sand and sand dunes and the occasional camel.

No one within a thousand miles of here plays hockey, if it’s even been invented yet. There’s no curling, no baseball, no opera, no guacamole sauce, no Mary Steenburgen.

Okay, so they do have beer, of a sort. But it sucks. What I wouldn't give for a cold Heineken, an iced tea or a bucket of Ben & Jerry's.

I miss Froot Loops and burritos and pumpkin pie. Hell, I even miss hospital food.

I hate the clothes. They billow. Clothes shouldn’t billow.

And the underwear? Really, don’t get me started on the underwear.

It’s Thursday. I miss The Simpsons. Then again, maybe, since we messed up the timeline, The Simpsons aren’t on TV on Thursdays. Hell, maybe they never existed. Now there’s a sad thought.

Have I mentioned that I hate being stuck here? I’ll never find out how Jack Bauer saves the country in this season’s 24. I’ll wonder forever if the NHL ever managed to get their strike settled. Or if the Cubs ever win another World Series.

Okay, to be honest, it’s not all bad. Not entirely. I’m not a general here, so there’s no paperwork and no ringing phones and no politicians. But there’s no Air Force, either. And honestly, I miss it.

I’ve tried to tell myself that this is just an extended off world trip. I really did work at believing that it’s only a really long visit to another primitive planet.

It ain’t workin’.

And Carter’s no help. She won’t let me forget, not for a single, solitary freakin' minute.

Carter nags me worse than my first drill instructor. Or my mother. I don’t dare touch anything, I don’t dare do anything, I don’t dare talk to anyone, as if I could talk to anyone. Languages have never been my area of expertise, and while I picked up a passable amount of Spanish over the years, Egyptian just makes my head hurt.

The inability to communicate in any real way makes my circle of friends pretty damn small. One, actually, that’s Teal’c. Neither one of us fits in here.

Daniel, of course, is like a duck back home on his favorite pond. He fits right in, hell, he’s enjoying himself here. And Carter, she’s like him, she’s fascinated by it, too. I think she spends all day with her mind going around in obsessive circles trying to figure out ways to be sure we haven’t screwed up anything else. Yet.

Honestly, I don’t resent it, that the brain twins are keeping themselves busy.

I wish I could.

Me, I’m bored.

Hiding from Ra is not a profession.

It’s worse than being retired.

/---------\

Maybe, eventually, I could have gotten used to it, if I’d been able to find something to do. But no one’s ever said I was a patient man. In fact, there have been a hell of a lot of people, over the years, who have said that my lack of patience would be the death of me. I’m actually rather amazed that it’s taken this long, but they’re finally going to be proven right.

Though none of them will ever know it.

Oddly enough, the events that will be the death of me started when I saved a life.

I mean, how the hell could she expect me not to?

After all, it was a kid, for cryin’ out loud. What did Carter want me to do, ignore it? Pretend I didn’t see him? Just close my eyes, walk away and let a child die?

Not me. I couldn’t stop myself. Okay, that’s not quite true. I could have, I suppose, if I’d wanted to. But I didn’t want to, not anymore.

I’d had enough.

From the first day we got here, I had to not do so many things I desperately wanted to do. Like kill that slimy snakehead Ra, and save myself the trouble 5000 years from now. Like save those poor bastards, the ones back in the temple, the guys Ra shot just because their offerings weren’t glam enough for him. Or take back the time-ship. I never should have let Carter talk me out of that. I've never stopped kicking myself over that one.

At some point, I finally reached the end of my rope.

What good is living if you can’t live? If you have to be afraid of every little teeny tiny thing that you do? Hell, what if the fish I catch means that someone else goes fishless and starves to death, today, tomorrow, next month, next year? What if the water I drank today means someone else dies of thirst? What if someone stops to talk to me, and because of it, he leaves the village a minute later and gets run down by a herd of runaway camels? What if I stop to rest in the shade and scare away a snake that crawls away and bites a guy who was supposed to become the twenty times great-grandfather of someone important like Wayne Gretzky or Nomar Garciaparra?

What if, what if, what if.

There’s no end to the what ifs.

And I couldn’t live by what ifs.

Not me.

Not anymore.

I spent most of my time fishing. Fishing was something I could do, a way to feed myself and my teammates. The fish didn’t seem to care that I couldn’t speak Egyptian or that I wasn’t actually supposed to be where I was, when I was. Fishing was something simple, something I could accomplish with the tools at hand. All I needed was a bit of string and a bit of bait, and patient waiting.

Fishing, sometimes, if I closed my eyes, I could almost imagine I wasn’t so far from home.

Almost.

That’s what I was doing, sitting and fishing, eyes closed, swatting the occasional buzzing fly and trying not to think of the divine scent of pine trees and cold Minnesota ponds, when it happened.

There was this kid, Babar or Barbar or Bubba, something like that, that was his name. I saw him walking along the riverbank, like some of the kids did, looking for whatever it was they were always looking for. Next thing I knew, I heard a splash and screams for help.

Okay, so I didn’t know for sure that the word he was shouting was ‘help’, exactly, but I could recognize the sound of fear and panic in any language.

I ran down the river and saw him, floundering, looking like he was going under again.

I didn’t stop to think. What was there to think about? He was a kid in trouble. I pulled the robes up over my head, and just in my little underwear wrap thingy, dived into the Nile.

Half a dozen long smooth strokes and I was there at his side.

Bubba was little, but he was tough. Kicking, flailing around in the water, terrified, he damn near drowned us both. He grabbed onto my arms and I went under with him, swallowing a couple of gallons of oh-so delicious Nile River water. I fought my way back to the surface, coughing and spluttering, dragging him with me. What with the language barrier, convincing the boy to relax and let me save him was harder than getting to him had been. Finally, he was so exhausted he couldn’t do anything but wrap his arms around my shoulders and let me tow him to shore.

I climbed out of the water and dropped down onto the riverbank, spitting up muddy river water. Exhausted, dripping wet and damn near naked, I finally looked up only to see at least half the village and all of my team looking at me. The villagers looked grateful; my team looked horrified.

Carter’s face, beneath the tan, was absolutely white, her eyes huge. "Sir, what did you do?"

"The kid," I paused to cough up more river, "was going to drown."

"Sir, you aren’t supposed to do things like this. You’ve just changed…"

I coughed again and sat up, glaring at her, sick to death of the endless constraints of the past few months. "So what is it you want me to do Carter? Throw him back?"

"Sir, you know we can’t be doing things that change--"

"Well, I just did change things," I let my too-long pent-up frustrations boil over. "What, you honestly expected me to stand by and do nothing while a kid died? Then you might as well put a bullet into my head right now."

"Sir--"

"Carter, face it, our timeline is gone. It’s gone. Kaput. Over. Erased. Undone. Defunct. We've been stuck here for months and without a doubt, we've done something as innocuous as breathing that's already changed things. And don't try to tell me differently." I glared at her, defying her to contradict me.

"Sir, we have to minimize--"

"Carter, there’s no more minimizing. We can’t minimize every goddamned thing every goddamned minute of every goddamned day."

"We have to," she insisted.

"No, we sure as hell don’t. We can’t. It’s just not possible." Teal’c had brought me my robe, and I slipped it over my head and stalked away.

I didn’t speak to her for a week. I was too damn mad to say a word.

Instead, I spent my time with Teal’c, plotting. We were warriors, and warriors fight wars. Otherwise, what the hell were we good for?

After all, we knew there would be an uprising to get rid of Ra. So if I couldn’t kill him, the least I could do was oust him. It was what was going to happen anyway, right? How could that possibly mess things up? Maybe, just maybe, it was supposed to happen this way, needed to happen this way, already had happened this way.

So we began recruiting. Securing weapons. Making plans. Forming alliances. Gearing up.

Every night, under the cover of darkness, we’d leave the village and roam the countryside, conducting reconnaissance. We began to build an underground army, preparing for the fight that was to come.

Until we were betrayed.

Luck had been on SG-1’s side over and over again for eight years. It was, among other things, one of our trademarks. Now, I’ve always believed that luck is on the side of those who plan better, fight harder and shoot straighter, but honestly, sooner or later, it’s bound to run out on you. Carter could probably figure the odds.

If she wasn’t dead.

Ironic, isn’t it, that her death started the whole chain of events that led to our deaths?

Of course, Daniel is still alive, as far as I know. I hope he was able to bury her body, though I doubt he’ll get to do the same for ours.

Hopefully, though, Daniel can leave clues for our future selves to fix the mistakes we’ve made here. Though a part of me keeps hoping that we’ve somehow, in some way, made the future better. Maybe there won’t be any Simpsons, but maybe there won’t be a Hitler, either.

But I digress. Guess it’s my feverish mind wandering. It does that a lot lately. I think sometimes I’m even hallucinating.

/---------\

That day, when our luck finally ran out, Daniel, fortunately, was off with some of the locals, learning how to do stone carvings I think. At least the last of our luck saved him.

Teal'c and I, we saw Carter taken.

It was near dawn and the two of us were making our way back to the village. We heard the commotion as Ra’s Jaffa unexpectedly stormed into the village and randomly rounded up a dozen or more people, defiant men, frightened women, crying children. While half a dozen Jaffa stood with their staff weapons aimed at the innocent villagers, their leader stood up and began shouting out something.

I, of course, didn’t have a clue to what he was saying. "Teal’c?" From the look on his face, I could see it was bad even before he began to speak.

"All-seeing, all-knowing Lord God Ra," Teal’c translated for me, "knows that there are unbelievers residing in this village. He knows that you are concealing those who would defy the Great God Ra and plot against him. In his mercy, he will spare you if you reveal them. If not," the Jaffa pointed at the huddled group of villagers, "these will die in their stead. You have until the evening meal to bring the outlanders, the shol’vah, to the temple for Ra's judgement."

I sank back onto the sand, stunned. First, because I knew someone had betrayed us, and we had no way to know who. Second, because we couldn’t let the villagers die in our place. Not just because of what it could mean to the timeline, but because we just couldn’t. Because it was wrong. And because they already had one of us, even if they didn’t realize it yet. "Come on," I waved a hand at Teal’c and turned to hurry away.

"O’Neill? Will we accede to Ra’s demand?"

"Hell, no. We’re going to rescue those people."

"Some may be killed," he warned.

"They’ll all be killed if we do nothing."

"And if we were to surrender?"

"Teal’c, you know the gould even better than I do, but I can’t imagine that he’ll spare the hostages regardless."

"He will not," Teal’c agreed.

"So, there. Decision made."

We already had our weapons, and those ungainly robes were good for that one thing at least, providing a place to conceal them. We ran across the desert, between the dunes, reaching the road breathless but arriving before the Jaffa who undoubtedly had been slowed by their terrified, reluctant hostages.

Looking back, I realize now how much I relished the opportunity to act at last, to shrug off the never-ending demand to do nothing, because now it was truly out of our hands. We were at a point where doing nothing would be as disastrous as doing something. That day, for the first time in a long time, I felt alive. I felt like Jack O’Neill, Special Ops warrior, SGC team leader.

Fool.

For the first few minutes, I thought we’d succeeded. We laid down a perfect ambush, reaching and freeing the hostages after taking out the first four Jaffa,. Where that fifth one came from, I’ve never been able to figure out. One minute, the path to escape was clear, the next, he was shooting at us.

The staff weapon blast went clear through Carter before burning a hole in my thigh. She was dead before she hit the ground. She should have married Pete and had a life in Colorado Springs, instead of dying alone in the sand in a place where none of us should ever have been.

My injured leg all but useless, I was down, and Teal’c came to help me. I tried to wave him away, but he charged into the middle of the fray and a zat took us both.

We woke up in a cell, stone walls, sand floor, locked door, primitive but effective.

I don’t know how many days we were held in that cell. It was hard to tell, it being so dark and all. No one brought us food or water. No one came to talk to us.

Teal’c was holding up pretty well, of course, he still had his tretonin, thanks to the little subcutaneous pump implant the docs had rigged up for him. He could have gone on quite a long time I think.

Me, I was beginning to feel the effects of hunger, thirst and fever. To be honest, my fitness level wasn’t what it once was. After all, I’d just spent the better part of a year, well, actually, it wasn’t ‘better’, but most of the last year I’d spent behind a desk instead of out in the field. And okay, yes, it’s true, I’m not as young as I used to be, either.

There would be no search and rescue teams showing up to look for us. There would be no modern medicine to patch up the damage that had been done, either. I was pretty sure the wound in my leg was already fatally infected. It was red and hot, swollen, driving the relentless fever that was sapping my strength. I knew that the best I could expect would be a slow, ugly death, while my friend looked on, helplessly.

I was dozing, conserving my strength, when Teal’c woke me.

"O’Neill. Someone is coming."

I sat up and by taking T’s offered hand, pulled myself to my feet. I was a little wobbly, and a lot dizzy, but I managed to stay upright as the sound of marching feet grew closer. Squinting at the light cast by the torches they carried, I could barely make out the bulky forms of the approaching Jaffa.

Several stood back, staff weapons in hand, while one stepped forward and unlocked the door to our cell. "Kree. Nak mal cha din parak mat Ra!" he ordered, giving me a shove toward the open door.

"I don’t suppose they’re apologizing for the misunderstanding and sending us home?" I asked T.

"They are taking us to stand before Ra," Teal’c whispered to me. "For final judgement."

I nodded, licking dry lips, and stumbled out into the hallway. Hobbling along, leaning on Teal’c as we started down the hallway, we were marched out of the darkness of our cell. The bright light of outdoors was blinding. My eyes watered. Damn, I missed my sunglasses.

Finally, we reached Ra’s temple.

The Jaffa didn’t have to push me to my knees this time. I pretty much fell, glad of the chance to catch my breath and rest.

Ra sat on the low dias, on his fancy chair. He had opened his mask, and the familiar face looked down at me.

He was just as ugly now as he would be in 5000 years when I met him the first time. How’s that for a conundrum?

He started to talk. I didn’t need to understand the words to know he was pronouncing our death sentences.

I looked over at Teal’c, and he looked back at me, and we nodded, knowingly. No words needed to be exchanged. After all, we’d said them long ago, or, er, actually, we’d be saying them a few thousand years from now; words of brotherhood, friendship, and a warrior’s understanding.

And the understanding that, as warriors, we would not go meekly to our deaths, on our knees.

I’d always known that I would die fighting.

"…nam dak kronk ta!" Ra finished, eyes flashing, waving a hand in our direction.

I took that as my cue. Calling up the last of my fading strength, I surged to my feet. Okay, it wasn’t much of a surge, more like a stagger, but it was enough. Taken by surprise that their heretofore meek captives had not simply waited for death, I managed to spin toward the Jaffa behind me, and get a hand on his staff weapon. Adrenaline giving me strength, I yanked the weapon out of the Jaffa’s grip. From the corner of my eye, I saw Teal’c had a weapon, too, and we both turned toward Ra.

It felt like a vicious punch in the back.

Somehow, I found myself on my knees, not knowing how I’d gotten there.

It didn’t hurt, not at first, I just felt weak and drained.

I could smell burned, charred flesh, taste the coppery warmth of blood in my mouth, and feel it trailing down my chin.

I fought to bring up the staff weapon, to point it at the Gould, but already, it weighed a ton. And I couldn’t really see the damned snake, everything was sort of hazy, blurry and gray, and moving in slow motion.

My fingers, seemingly working of their own accord, triggered the weapon, and I saw sparks fly, and Ra’s chair disintegrated.

But he was no longer in it.

I heard Teal’c’s shout, as if from a distance. "O’Neill!"

Somehow, I turned my heavy head toward him and saw the look of horror on his face.

And then I was no longer looking up at him, but instead lying face down on the sand covered floor, with the sand soft against my cheek and tickling my nose.

"Brother--" I whispered, and knew he couldn’t hear me, even as I heard the snap and crack of another staff weapon blast and heard the sound of a body falling.

"Teal’c, I’m sorry," I whispered, as the cold settled into my bones and the numbness seeped through me. "Sorry--"

In a choked whisper I could barely understand, maybe because he was dying, maybe because I was dying, I heard Teal'c utter his last words. "I die free."

I could feel my body growing heavier and heavier, the blackness rushing in to surround me, the final harsh breaths rattling in my throat.

Darkness swept over me.

It wasn’t unfamiliar.

I’d been dead before.

But I was pretty sure this time would be the final time.

Suddenly, the gathering darkness swirled and retreated, beaten back by an incredible brightness. Though it was intense and pure, strangely, it didn’t hurt my eyes.

Someone was running toward me, running in the light, bringing it with him.

‘Dad?’

Oh God, Charlie, he shouldn’t be here, not here, not now, not in this ugly place, not watching me die. But it was so good to hear his voice, to see his smile, to remember--

‘Dad? Is it really you?’ The youthful voice was filled with excitement.

"Charlie…" I whispered with my dying breath.

‘I’ve been waiting for you, Dad. It was such a long time to wait--’

"Charlie…" Ah God, no, please, don’t let my son see me like this.

And then I wasn’t lying in the sand, I was standing. I felt strong and light and free. My knees didn’t hurt and my back didn’t hurt and the fever seemed to have disappeared just like that. I wasn’t thirsty or hungry as my eyes drank in the sight of my boy. I dropped to my knees and opened my arms, and Charlie ran into them, laughing with delight.

My face was wet as I pulled him close, as I hugged him as I remembered hugging him, and as I’d longed to do so many times over the past nine years. ‘Is it really you?’ I whispered, knowing I wasn’t really saying the words, not out loud anyway.

‘Yeah, it’s me, Dad. I brought my baseball glove and my fishing pole.’ He grabbed my hand and began tugging me forward into the light. His smile was dazzling. ‘There’s a pond here, and it’s full of fish. And the best baseball diamond ever. And there’s ice cream--’

I started to follow him, and then my footsteps slowed. I looked back, once, as if there was something back there I hadn’t quite completed. Down a very long and dark tunnel, I caught one final glimpse of two bodies, lying side by side in the sand, robes stained crimson. There was a smile on my face, and it looked-- peaceful.

I was no longer where I didn’t belong, I was no longer unforgiven. I was home at last.

------------FINISH---------------