Author: loopy
Category: Action - Adventure
Summary: The clones left behind on Altair are unhappy with their lot...
Set: After Tin Man (season 1)
Spoilers: Tin Man
Rating: G
Content: Action-Adventure
Status: This story is the first of a series, and the only one written so far.
After seeing the human versions of SG-1 disappear through the stargate, the others returned to the lab, which was now beginning to feel horribly like home. Jack sat on a bed moodily swinging his foot against the nearby wall with a thudding regularity that made Daniel feel it was a clock ticking the seconds of his life - his non-life- away. All 10,000 years of it. Sam lay on another bed, staring at the ceiling. Daniel paced up and down the room.
"It's not fair", Daniel burst out suddenly. "We should've been able to go with them. With both teams working together, especially since we're smarter than they are, stronger than they are - hell, with our longer life span we have a much better chance of finding Sha're - "
"And which one of you would get her?" Jack broke in fiercely. "Do you think she'd accept a metal substitute when she could have the real thing?"
"The Colonel's right," added Sam softly. "The outside world's no longer our concern. We should try to forget."
Jack rounded on her. "Forget!!!" he exploded. "I didn't say anything about forgetting! How can anyone expect us to forget our whole lives? I don't feel any different from before. Just because my body's now made of metal and I don't have a heart beating inside of me, doesn't mean I've stopped caring!"
Sam nodded. "I agree, Colonel. But we can't do anything now, it's up to our real selves to continue our - their - lives."
"Do you feel like they're our real selves, Sam?" Daniel asked. "Because I still feel like I'm my real self. Although I know that the other Daniel is exactly like me, I feel that I need to be there, to return to my life. I certainly don't feel I belong here, in this wreck of a place."
"Exactly, Daniel," agreed Jack. "I'm glad I'm not the only one who believes that."
"It doesn't matter what we believe," said Daniel. "Whatever happens, we're stuck here." He settled on a nearby bed. "For the next 10,000 years."
"Do you really think I intend to meekly sit here and do as I'm told?" Jack rose from the bed and turned to face the archeologist. "Because I sure as hell don't."
"Sir, we have no choice," Sam pointed out. "If we leave this world we - run out of power, for want of a nicer phrase."
"Didn't Harlen mention portable power supplies? If we had one of those we could go anywhere."
"Oh sure, all we would need to do is fit ourselves with an adaptor and we could just plug ourselves into the mains and recharge our batteries," Daniel commented sarcastically.
Jack ignored him. "Carter, see what you can find out. I'm going to explore, see what I can find that might be useful."
Daniel stood up too. "I'll go with you," he offered. "I'd like to find out what I can about the Altairs, what happened to them, if they left any written history behind."
Jack nodded. "Sure, but please bear in mind that if we can't get out of here you'll have a long time to keep yourself entertained with local history. Right now our priority is escape."
As they strode along the seemingly-endless corridor, Daniel asked, "even if we do find a portable power supply, what then? I mean, we don't have a transmitter to open the iris, and even if we did, they would arrest us as soon as we got through."
Jack stopped and turned to face him. "Why, Danny?" he demanded. "Tell me why they would arrest us."
"Well, because we're us, we're the metal ones, not the flesh ones." Daniel stopped too.
"But even if we now have artificial bodies, we can still be of use to the SGC." Jack strode on again. "All we need is a chance to prove that."
"But they won't give us that chance. They're afraid of us."
"How will they know we're not the flesh ones?" Jack demanded. "If we time it right, if we turn up while the others are away..."
"They'll know because of the medical checks."
"Medical checks, hmmm," Jack muttered. "Another point I need to cover. Okay Daniel, go on, assume we pass the medical test - " "How?" "I don't know, I'll come to that later."
Daniel took a deep breath, then thought hard. "Well, assuming that the - Others - aren't there when we first turn up, which is making a pretty big assumption in the first place, they're bound to return sometime, and then we'll be found out."
Jack nodded. "Go on."
"And the General will want to know why Teal'c isn't with us." The Jaffa's original clone had malfunctioned, and the cloning process had been stopped before Teal'c's consciousness had been transferred into the second body.
Jack smiled. "There's only one Teal'c", he murmured fondly. Then his expression grew more serious. "I suppose that until our cover is blown we will have to say that Teal'c was killed during the mission."
Daniel's eyes widened. "And you think the General will believe that?"
"And who's to prove otherwise? Besides, it's true." He remembered again how he felt when Harlen had disintegrated his friend in front of him. Harlen had saved Jack's life, and the real Teal'c was still out there - somewhere - but it had still felt to Jack like losing a friend.
Daniel pushed experimentally at the door next to him. The door swung open easily, and the two men walked inside.
Meanwhile, Sam had found Harlen, who was busily manipulating wires inside an inspection hatch. "Cumtria", he greeted her cheerfully. "What can I do for you?"
Sam knelt down beside him. "Harlen," she said very carefully, "you mentioned something about portable power sources."
"Oh yes?" Looking suddenly very shifty, the alien twisted the last pair of wires together, shut the hatch, then stood up. "Where are your friends?"
"They've gone for a look around," Sam answered him. "Harlen, we need some of those portable power supplies."
"Sorry, out of the question," Harlen replied quickly. "A look round, where?"
Sam refused to let him change the subject. "Portable power supplies, Harlen, now!" she ordered.
Harlen cleared his throat nervously. "I do believe the last ones were taken 4,374 years ago, when the last Altairians left," he uttered.
"You're lying," accused Sam.
"Oh, dear me, no, there are no more portable power supplies here," he replied with more confidence.
Sam thought for a minute. "There are plans somewhere," she said. "Bring them to me."
Harlen made as if to obey, then turned back. "You want to leave." It was a statement, not a question.
"Yes, Harlen," Sam sighed. "I'm sorry, but we don't belong here, and there's no way any of us are living out 10,000 years on this godforsaken planet doing nothing but working to maintain equipment so it can keep us alive. I can't imagine a worse fate."
"I will help you, but on one condition." Harlen looked as if he had made a momentous decision.
"What is it?" Sam asked warily.
"Take me with you. I know more about your bodies than you do, at present. If I go with you I can teach you, how to repair yourselves, how to improve yourselves - I've been working on the design for thousands of years, I need someone to pass that information on to."
Sam was not sure how O'Neill would view this. "I'll talk to the Colonel," she promised. This seemed to be enough for Harlen, for the moment at least, and he led her to a room deep in the complex, whose door had not been opened for a long time.
"In there," he stated confidently. Sam looked at him, wondering whether to trust him, then pushed the door open. It was stiff, and needed all her now superhuman strength to force it open, but she knew it was worth the effort when she looked around inside. "Wow," she breathed. "There's everything here we could possibly need." She picked up a few bits and pieces lying on the bench, then caught her breath as she caught sight of another collection of oddments. "We can even build our own transmitter. That solves the problem of the iris, anyway."
It was 19 days later - or 467 hours, 39 minutes and 22 seconds, Jack mused, exercising his new-found mathematical skills - that they were ready to leave. They had worked solidly for 20 hours at a stretch, spending the last four hours of every day sitting around talking about old times, and about how the General would welcome them with open arms when he realised their use. "After all," Jack argued every time the subject came up. "We are better now than we were, we're stronger, smarter, can work longer, live longer - "
Privately, Sam and Daniel harboured a few doubts. Surely Jack couldn't think it would be that easy to slip back into life at the SGC. "I don't see why we have to go back to the base," Daniel argued back. "We could just as easily use Chulak or Abydos as our base. After all, I thought our main aim was to rescue Sha'are and Ska'ara."
Jack shook his head. "We need the weapons at the SGC, we need their back up, and as important as it may be to rescue Sha'are and Ska'ara, we also need to work to protect Earth from the Goa'uld."
Finally the work was done. The team gathered around the Stargate, with all their new equipment in a pile in front of them. Sam had rigged a new transmitter so they could open the iris, Jack had got the power supplies organised, and Daniel had found a way of simulating a heartbeat and pulse in their robotic bodies, in a hope of fooling a medical check. After all, it was the heartbeat that had caused problems before, and only after those problems had been discovered had Dr Frasier attempted anything more invasive, like taking blood. Jack looked round his team, taking in Harlen who had proved to be an unlikely ally, now he had the possibility of carrying out a life with more purpose than the one he had lived for the past few thousand years.
He knew he was taking a big chance, but knew that if they did not leave soon, the Others would probably be back from their next mission, and after that it would be impossible to predict when they would be off-world again.
"All set?" he asked cheerfully. Daniel nodded, feeling his pulse once again. Oh boy, how he'd missed being able to check his pulse whenever he felt like it - not that he had done it particularly often, back when he had a flesh body, but it was the fact that it was there if he wanted it.
Sam glanced up from where she had been checking the power supply. "Yes, Sir, everything's set. As long as we have either an electrical source or a solar source wherever we're going, we can keep working indefinitely."
"Good." This no-sleep business had proved invaluable when working on all the preparations, and he was sure he would be able to sell it to the General as a good reason to let them stay on Earth. "After all, we were the best team even before this happened," he thought out loud. "How can they refuse to accept the new, better version?"
Harlen bustled over to him. "Are you sure this is safe?"
Jack was too busy plugging in the co-ordinates on the DHD to reply, so it was left to Daniel to reassure the alien.
"It's perfectly safe," he assured him. "Of course, if you'd rather stay here..."
"No, no, no," Harlen said hurriedly. "I'm looking forward to new places to see, new faces..." he paused, listening to an explosion in the distance. They had rather neglected the maintenance of the complex over the last few days. "...to not having to work on this place any more."
"Where are we going?" Sam asked Jack. They had decided not to go straight back to Earth. After all, there were no other clothes on Altair, and turning up in the same black jumpsuits they were wearing last time they returned to the base was just asking for trouble. Not to mention the fact that they really needed to ditch Harlen somewhere.
"To P3X595. We made some friends there, they should be willing to help out with a change of clothes."
Sam and Daniel both nodded. "Good thinking, Jack, " agreed Daniel.
As the Gate whooshed into activity, the three friends picked up their equipment, waited for Harlen to finish fussing over his power supply, and stepped together into the wormhole.
Coming soon - part 2, Paradise Regained, or Send in the Clones.
