Title: Untitled as of yet
Number of Parts: 1
Setting: Season nine/future season
Category: Angst, Character Death
Age: 15+
Pairings: Very slight Sam/Jack
Spoilers: Speculation, small spoiler for 'Threads'
Synopsis: The world is ending. Again.
Author Notes: Not a happy ficlet so be warned. I just needed to get it out of my system. Only posted on my LJ and Intel_Fanfiction.
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The world is ending.
Again.
Ten minutes to go.
They're counting on her to save it, breathing down her neck. Eyes burning bruised skin.
Waiting.
She stares at the monitor, at the pages and pages of scrolling programming running passed her eyes and wonders.
What if she doesn't do it?
What if she just lets it end?
They want her to save the world again so they can get on with their lives and enjoy living in it.
They don't think about her.
Don't think about her life.
Whatever that is.
After her father died, her world went to hell.
At first it was okay - better than okay - and she remembers wistfully sitting on a wooden dock fishing as the sun beat down on her back and wishes she was there again.
Wishes she could be there again.
She doesn't even like fishing but she'd give her all to do it again.
To be with them again.
Teal'c was the first to die. Ironic since they all thought he'd be the last. He died well, Bra'tac said, in a battle with a Jaffa who'd claimed to be one of them but wasn't.
The General - Jack - had returned from Washington for the service and afterwards he'd taken her home and tried to convince her it was going to be alright. That he was still with her and wouldn't leave.
He lied.
Four months, two weeks and five days later he left her.
Hit by a car crossing the street in DC.
Of all the ways for the infamous General O'Neill to die that wasn't one anyone had envisioned.
Nothing so pointless, so stupid.
So carelessly breaking her heart.
Nothing was the same after that. She remembered, vaguely, standing on numb legs as she was handed a folded flag.
Her second folded flag in a year.
Then Daniel went on a mission with SG-11 and didn't come back.
The third folded flag.
Colonel Myers had apologised, his glazed eyes numb with drugs to help combat his guilt.
But Daniel had chosen death. That's what the whispers said. He'd walked into enemy fire with a smile on his face, knowing what was to come.
Knowing it was the end.
Was it time for her end, too?
The base could explode - would in eight minutes and counting - and that would be it.
No more pain, no more nightmares.
No more waking up and thinking for a split second that she'd see them before reality hit her in the gut.
Before she realised they were only alive in her dreams and not in the waking world.
"Colonel Carter, can you stop it?"
Yes. She could.
She doesn't want to.
"No. I don't think I can."
The words leave her mouth but aredisjointed to her ears.
As if she's already gone.
She dimly hears General Landry's orders to clear the mountain - thank God they'd started evacuating the area earlier and only had a few members of staff to get to safety - but she stays in her seat.
Even when he's beside her, ordering her to stand.
Ordering her to live.
"I'd like to stay, Sir. See if I can stop it."
He can't argue with her. Can't make her leave. It shows in her eyes, on her face.
She's already gone and he knows it.
He could have her removed physically but thinks that will just slow someone else down.
Endanger someone who wants to live when this woman clearly does not.
"Colonel. It was an honour serving with you."
"Yes, Sir. You, too."
And he's gone.
And she's alone.
Counting down the minutes, counting down her last seconds on this Earth.
There are tears in her eyes, down her face, but they're not caused by fear.
They're caused by relief.
It's over. Finally over. That's all she thinks. All she feels.
Then time runs out.
Nothing happens.
Her heart still beats, still hurts.
The screen in front of her flashes with an error message. A malfunction.
The world is safe. The SGC still stands.
She still lives.
Still wishes she didn't.