Complete
Drama
Set in Season 5
Spoilers for Meridian
FR-OC
Disclaimers:
Stargate SG-1 and its characters are the property of Stargate (II) Productions, Showtime/Viacom, The SciFi Channel, MGM/UA, Double Secret Productions, and Gekko Productions. This story is written purely for my own entertainment, and that of anyone else who may happen to read it. No infringement of copyright is intended. It is not intended and should never be used for commercial purposes.
The original characters, situations and ideas contained within this work are the property of the author.
Author's Notes:
This is the second story in the Ballad of Louise Stillwell. It is dedicated to Jonas converts everywhere.
Acknowledgements:
Many thanks to Sho, reader of betas and Louise Stillwell's sort of transfictive godmother. Thanks also to her successor, Sarah.
Extracts from the diaries and correspondence of Louise Stillwell.
"Most people live their lives pretty much untroubled by violence. Before I joined the SGC, I never thought much about that; it just wasn't something I ever had to think about. Sure, when I was fourteen my sister Ash had a run-in with a certain son-of-a-snake – who shall for legal reasons remain nameless and for genetic reasons remain gutless – who tried to take advantage of her. Fortunately, she gave as good as she got and escaped unscathed, but my Uncle Anakie – ever impulsive – got pretty het up about it. It's a matter of public record, but suffice to say that as recently as 2020 the gentleman in question wasn't allowed within a hundred yards of Ash or me and the restraining order against Uncle Anakie kept being renewed until his death.
"But being in – or at least around – the military is a different matter. Peace may be their profession, but violence is a fact of life.
"I made friends quickly at the Mountain; there was Molly of course, but also now Amy Kawalsky, Daniel Jackson and Lauren Collister. Amy was doing a PhD, supervised by Lauren, while Daniel supervised me. It was like being back at university, except that, unlike Molly, my colleagues in the anth lab were on the field list; most of them on SG-teams in fact. That meant that they would come in every so often, after a few days offworld, covered in bruises, cuts, or occasionally even with broken limbs. Lauren almost died of a major gut wound and one day Amy came in looking like she'd been hit by a car and Daniel followed her, having lost his skin.
"I wasn't used to classmates suffering anything worse than a broken heart or a fall from a bicycle.
"This was all bad enough, but then, a year after I joined the program, it all got so much worse."
– Louise Stillwell, July 22nd, 2041
Date: 16.5.02 10:21:32
From: Louise Stillwell <lkstillwell@cheyenne.usaf.mil>
To: Ashena Smith-Stillwell <ashenasstillwell@stillwell.com>
Subject: Dear Mummy
Dear Mummy,
Something dreadful has happened. I'm fine, but I've lost someone rather close and a friend of mine is hurting so badly that I don't know how to help her.
Daniel was in an accident; he got sick and died not long after that. I can't say any more than that, even to you.
Sitting in the lab, all nice and safe, I sometimes forget the risks so many of my friends take every day. Daniel's death reminded me of that and it also made me think of something you once told me. When I was about nine, I guess, I asked you why you didn't seem happy to see Uncle Anakie come to visit, when I knew that you loved him. You were in one of your fey, Roma moods and you told me that he spent his life walking hand-in-hand with death and it broke your heart to see it. At the time, I thought it sounded very romantic, but now one of my friends is holding hands with the reaper and it isn't romantic; not at all.
I know I don't – can't – talk much about my work. You understand, I know, but although I've mentioned Amy, I guess I haven't said much about her. She's doing a PhD as well, but she's Air Force all the way. She was the one who worked so hard to get me this job, while I was sabotaging myself all-unknowing. We're real close, having so much in common; the only person I see as much of is Molly and I live next door to her. I wish I could hang with them both at the same time, but Molly doesn't want to hang out with an officer, least of all the youngest Captain on the base, and besides, we can't talk shop in front of Molly.
But I digress.
Amy is a great gal. She's a good friend and loyal to the hilt; brave as well, if reports are to be believed. We don't talk about it much, because everyone...I should say, we didn't talk much – because everyone knew, so what was there to say – about the fact that she was head-over-heels in love with Daniel. It was a tragedy, really; I'm sure that Daniel absolutely adored Amy, but he just couldn't reciprocate her feelings. He loved her, but he was never in love with her.
Daniel and Amy were the heart of the anthropology team. Everyone here loves their work, but they are...they were like a couple of school kids on a trip to the zoo.
I'm sorry, Mummy. I'll have to stop now, but I'll write again later.
Lots of love,
Louise.
*****
From: 16.5.02 21:35:46
From: Louise Stillwell <lkstillwell@cheyenne.usaf.mil>
To: Ashena Smith-Stillwell <ashenasstillwell@stillwell.com>
Subject: Dear Mummy
Dear Mummy,
I'm sorry about that, but it is tough to talk about this, particularly when trying to avoid saying anything I shouldn't. I had to go away and cry for a bit, then there was work and...Well, I'm back.
Just about everyone was out on field assignment this week. I was on my own in the lab, working on my thesis; there's been another new find which could form the core of a theory regarding the sudden termination of the Mayan civilisation. It's been a bit of a muddle, even with the evidence that the field teams are bringing back, but it's beginning to come together.
There I go again. I'm getting like Daniel and Amy.
But that was what I was doing when I found out about Daniel. The base went berserk after they brought him in; the intercom was jammed and everyone was finding excuses to hang around in the corridor outside the infirmary, at least until Colonel O'Neill ran them – us – off in a rage.
I went back and spoke to the Colonel. He was apologetic when he remembered that I have a legitimate connection to Daniel and he explained why he was so upset. Daniel was dying; he was dying a particularly swift and unpleasant death and there was nothing anyone could do.
I stumbled back to the lab and tried to work; tried to forget. It was too much, however and I cried instead; I cried a lot.
I should have remembered that Amy was due back, but I couldn't think straight. She somehow managed to reach the lab without anyone having told her; I guess no-one wanted to be the one and I just got stuck at the end of the chain. Why is it that I'm the only one in the family who can't find the right words when it matters the most? Dad and David are professional talkers, you always seem to know what to say and even Ash has that faultless social sense of hers, but I couldn't tell someone their favourite TV show had been cancelled without creating a scene.
It took me a while this time to force anything out and what I managed was pretty meaningless. I think I managed to mutter Daniel's name and mentioned the infirmary. Amy was gone in a heartbeat.
I suppose that I've been thinking a lot about you and your damned Roma wisdom lately. There's the hand-in-hand with death thing and also there was something you told Ash and me when she was waxing histrionic about that louse whatshisname being the love of her life. You told us that love could keep you going through anything, that you could eat and drink love, but if it went bad, it would eat you.
Sorry to say, I thought you were full of it at the time; but as with so much else in life, I've since come to see that you're right.
Well, Amy had eaten more love than anyone else I ever knew. She adored Daniel, but never flinched from telling him if he was wrong. She wanted him, desperately, but I saw her watch him with another woman and be glad for his happiness. She knew as well as I did that Daniel would never – could never – return her love in the way that she wanted, but she never gave up hope. Her devotion never wavered. I envied her that purity of emotion.
I don't envy her anymore, because I've never seen anyone so eaten up by love gone bad.
I'm sorry if I'm rambling a bit, but I have to say these things and if I called I'd probably say something I shouldn't.
Anyway, I kept out of the way. Daniel and I were friends, as well as student and supervisor, but not as close as some. I kept out of the way and let his best friends stand with him. Amy wasn't there at the end and somehow that made my mind up; if she wasn't there, I knew I shouldn't be. I guess he persuaded – or more likely tricked – her into staying away.
He died...it's about thirteen hours ago now. An hour ago, Amy found out. I've never seen anyone lose control like that; it was terrifying. They've got her in the infirmary herself now, under mild sedation. Even before they put the needle in, she looked...blank.
I want to come home, Mummy. Not for good, but I need to be with you and Daddy for a while; I'd like to visit David as well, and even Ash if she's in the country and vaguely cognisant at the moment. I'm heading home now. I won't try to call tonight, but maybe in the morning.
Goodnight, Mummy,
x x x
Louise.
*****
16.5.02 21:51:18
From: Ashena Smith-Stillwell <ashenasstillwell@stillwell.com>
To: Louise Stillwell <lkstillwell@cheyenne.usaf.mil>
Subject: Re: Dear Mummy
Dear Lou,
If I can't catch you at home, I'm sending someone to pick you up at Colorado Springs airfield at noon tomorrow.
If you haven't worked it out yet, I've always been full of it, but I love you.
See you soon,
Mom.
*****
Sunday, June 2nd 2002
Dear Diary,
It's been a while. I haven't written since Daniel's death, two weeks ago, so I guess we should catch up.
Daniel died of radiation poisoning. Dr Collister came to let me know. She found me in the locker room, trying to take stock in silence.
"Penny for them?"
I don't remember quite what I said to her; something about Daniel, but it was pretty inconsequential.
"Tell me about it," she agreed.
"It's almost like losing family," I admitted, which is a pretty big thing for me to say. From their radically different perspectives, Mummy and Daddy both have very strong feelings on the subject of family and they passed both sets on to me. "Is he...?"
"He's gone," she replied sadly.
I hung my head.
"Actually, I'm not sure that he is," Lauren admitted. "I mean, he's...He's literally gone. He changed. Vanished. There's not much but hearsay yet, but from what little anyone beyond SG-1 knows, he...Ascended."
This is difficult for me to come to grips with, so I'm still trying not to think about it. Being home was a help, although I must have gone weird every time Daddy or David mentioned Daniel 'going to a better place'.
Anyway, Dr Collister...Lauren sat with me; we held each other and wept. I guess I can call her Lauren, even if she will be taking over as my supervisor. If you've cried your guts out with someone you get to use their first name, it's like a rule, and we both cried a lot that afternoon. It was a good cry, though; cathartic. I felt drained afterwards, but peaceful, as though all the hurt and anguish had all been washed out. There was – and is – still an ache, but no pain.
I hope that Amy can have that kind of cry at some stage, I really do, but although she has wept, the pain is still raw in her. It turns out that I was right: Daniel did get her out of the way by trickery; he told Amy that he had days, not hours. He lied to her to get her to go home and when she came back in the morning, he was dead.
She took it hard, not least because she feels that he didn't want her there – which clearly he didn't although probably not for the reasons she thinks. She had the news from Colonel O'Neill, of course, and he was kind of shell-shocked himself. I somehow don't think that he managed much in the way of sensitive handling; roughly the equivalent of letting someone know they have a cut by pouring lemon juice into it. I felt bad about going home and leaving her, but I doubt I could have been much help; not when I still had my own grieving to do.
I had hoped that Amy would have recovered somewhat, but if anything she's worse than when I left.
I doubt that the Kelownan helps much. Apparently, Daniel got to someone over there, the way he does. Did. This guy, Jonas, was ashamed of the lies his government told about Daniel – well, damn straight he should be – and risked everything to bring us some sort of technological Holy Grail. They say he's quite the hero.
I wish I could think of him as anything but the man who killed my friend, but I can't. I've not seen him yet. I don't look forward to it.
Monday, June 3rd
Dear Diary,
I am afraid, as I have never been afraid before.
Amy wasn't in yesterday, of course – she doesn't work Sundays on Earth – so I popped by to see her on my way home last night. I had tried to phone, but she must have had the receiver off the hook and I decided to visit her in person.
There was a storm coming on as I drove over. I think I had a premonition something bad was going to happen – though I won't tell Mummy that, since if Granny Ada ever got to hear of it she'd be camped in my hallway trying to teach me to read the tealeaves – and I took about twice as long as usual to get there. The big old house looked creepy in the half-light and I almost turned around and drove away again. I got spooked again when I got to the mezzanine; again I almost scrammed.
I rang the bell and I waited. And waited. And rang the bell. And waited. And waited some more.
I knocked and called Amy's name through the letter slot. I knocked again.
"Amy! Come on, Ames. It's Louise," I added, in case, I don't know, she'd forgotten my voice in a fortnight. "Amy!"
At last, there were footsteps behind the door; the lock clicked and the door opened.
"Hey," Amy said. She looked like death warmed over.
"Hey, Ames," I replied. "You look like death warmed over." Mummy always told me that honesty was the best policy and, since the farce surrounding my entry into the SGC, I've tried to live by it.
"Flattery will get you nowhere," she assured me, in a hoarse, croaking voice.
"Can I come in?"
"No."
"Please, Ames?"
"I'm not ready to talk," Amy told me, curtly. "Go away and leave me alone."
Well, I like to think I'm quite a tough cookie, but just now I'm not in a fit emotional state to take that kind of rebuff and I'm sorry to say that I just burst into tears. For a moment, I felt sure that Amy was going to slam the door in my face; instead, she grabbed me by the shoulder and propelled me into the apartment.
"Amy..." I choked.
"For God's sake, Louise!" she snapped brittlely, as she slammed the door again. "Like my neighbours don't gossip enough about my love life without you coming round and acting like a spurned girlfriend on the doorstep!"
"Ames!"
"And don't whine, it...Oh, crap," she muttered, then she started shaking. "Now look what you've done! I said I don't want to talk. I just can't...I'm not ready...I can't..." And with that she let rip.
Seeing it was me crying that got Amy going, I guess it's ironic that seeing her go made me dry up. Maybe just because I realised I could still connect with her, I stopped crying, put my arms round her and shushed her while she...
Actually; not sure what you'd call it. It wasn't crying, exactly, because that involves tears and she didn't have any left. Hugging her, I could hear a worrying, ragged sound in her chest and these dry, choking sobs just went on and on until I didn't think she'd ever stop.
At length she recovered herself a little, which was a relief as I was starting to worry she'd shake herself to bits, and I took her through to the lounge.
"How you doing?" Amy croaked at last.
"Not good. Like I've lost a brother, a teacher and a friend all at once. How 'bout you?"
"Like all my insides have been ripped out and replaced with chilli oil and bile."
I forced a smile. "Good to know you haven't lost your turn of phrase, at least."
Amy attempted to smile back, but failed. "I'm really not ready to talk about it," she told me. "I promise not to do anything stupid, though. I'm too Catholic for suicide."
"Ames..." I began, and then stopped. I stopped because of something that I thought I could see and prayed that I could not. "Okay," I agreed. "Cup of coffee then?" I suggested. "I could..."
"No," Amy interrupted. "No, no; I've got enough pride left that I won't have my guest making her own coffee. You wait here and I'll see what I've got that hasn't gone off."
I smiled nervously. "Thanks."
She got up and went through to the kitchen. I lurched for the cushions where she had been sitting, hoping against hope that my eyes had played me false.
They hadn't. I had seen a pistol on her settee. It was a squat, black, FN-Herstal Five-seveN, Amy's sidearm of choice; good armour penetration, decent stopping power and it used the same ammunition as the P90. From the weight, this one was fully-loaded. Corporal Greaves would have been proud of my ability to identify the weapon; he would have gone into flights of ecstasy – literally, he's admitted to fantasising about this kind of thing, which is intensely scary – to see the professional way I thumbed the safety catch, ejected the magazine and cleared the chamber. The last was just habit, but as it happened, a cartridge popped out.
"You've been practicing," Amy noted from the kitchen doorway.
I didn't feel I needed to look as though I'd been caught out. "Got to; if I want a field assignment, I have to know my way around a gun."
"It's a pistol."
"Don't screw around with semantics, Ames! How close did you get?"
She shrugged, as though it was of no consequence. "Didn't pull the trigger," was all that she would give me.
I stared, dumbstruck.
"You want to take that with you?" she asked. "I don't have another in the house and if I can't shoot myself, I doubt I've the guts to even try with a knife."
"Don't talk like that!" I begged.
Amy hung her head. "I won't get worse," she promised quietly. "I'll be able to talk...not soon, but eventually. Don't worry about me; I'll see you tomorrow."
"Alright," I promised, but I took the pistol with me, anyway. It was only later that night that I realised that she almost certainly did have the nerve to use a knife, on herself or on someone else, if she had to. As I said, I like to think I'm tough; Amy is.
I thought about going back, but I doubt it would do much good. All I can do is wait...and pray.
5pm, update
Dear Diary,
Amy was back in work today, thank God. She's still a way off okay though, always inches from tears; people are tiptoeing around her, which doesn't much help. I wish I could have been more normal around her, but then I saw the gun...pistol...whatever.
I haven't told anyone about else about that; I've a feeling that would end her career and I don't want that.
Saturday, June 8th
Dear Diary,
I've been avoiding the lab as much as possible since I got back; lots of library work and museum visits. It's seemed as good a time as any. I've been trying – with considerable success – to keep away from the Kelownan and especially to avoid getting in between him and Amy. Apparently she's been threatening to kill him every time they meet.
Lauren tells me he's using Daniel's office now. That should be Lauren's office now – not that she minds – so I'm pretty pissed at this Jonas Quinn myself, now. I've a mind to have a word with him.
11.33am, update
Right; that's it!
I just heard that I'd been bumped up the field list to the active register. Just a few steps – and I've booked a firearm's assessment with Greaves for tomorrow – from an offworld survey group posting; it's not an SG-team, but it's closer.
As soon as I heard, I ran down to tell Amy; that was how I found out that I'd gone up the list because she was off it.
Amy is leaving the SGC. She's shipping out to the Antarctic facility tomorrow. She says that the place reminds her too much of Daniel, but I think it's this Jonas; she can't stand to be around him; the man who killed Daniel.
Whether it does any good or not, I'm going to give him a piece of my mind.
3.18pm, update
Well, that didn't go as planned; not quite.
I stormed down to the lab; that much I carried off with real, apocalyptic style. I got good notices: 'Like an avenging angel with a pencil behind her ear' – Lauren Collister.
He was in the office, damn him, and I crashed in, ready to tear a strip off him. He was standing in the middle of the office with one of Daniel's journals held in his hands with the kind of reverence usually reserved for the Dead Sea Scrolls. He had a melancholy expression on his face; the kind of expression Lauren gets when she's thinking about our departed friend.
And he was gorgeous. I mean...gorgeous!
He looked up at my violent entrance, shock in his soft, gentle eyes. "Good morning," he said pleasantly, giving me a shy smile. He set the journal carefully on the desk. "I'm Jonas Quinn," he added, when I said nothing.
I wanted to look stern and angry, but his nervous smile was genuinely touching and he had the sort of eyes that plead with you to be friends. And I wanted to be friends with him. I'd only just met him, I'd come to lambaste him and I was already harbouring thoughts of being more than just friends.
"I'm Louise," I replied quietly. I tried to remember some of my well-considered reasons he should be taken outside and given a good going over, or at least sent home to face public censure and the fuming hatred of his government; I came up blank.
"Dr Jackson's student?" he asked, almost apologetically.
I nodded. "You...want to get a coffee?" I offered.
I guess it's true what Mummy used to say: Life is what happens when you least expect, the rest is just marking time. I wonder, will it turn out that she was always right? She always said she was, and she's been spot on with everything else.
Sunday, June 9th
Dear Diary,
I am conflicted. Part of me says that loyalty to Amy demands I smite Jonas Quinn hip and thigh, while the rest of him...well, there's an interest in his hips and thighs, certainly, if not so much with the smiting.
He's so sweet, Diary. I mean, he's really, really hot and he has those soft, love-me eyes and that warm, frightened smile, but on top of that, he's just so sweet. I know that he was, on some level, responsible for Daniel's death, but I know that because he told me. I doubt even Amy blames him as much as he blames himself.
He can never go home, now. He was so moved by Daniel's sacrifice that he turned his back on his people in order to save them from themselves. He stood up to his friends and his colleagues in order to bring a sample of naquadria to Earth, all in the hope of providing an alternative to an inexorable process of weapons proliferation. In his way, he's a hero as well.
And did I mention? Really hot.
Monday, June 10th 2005
Dear Diary,
Amy is gone. She shipped out to Antarctica last night, on the quiet and two days early. Given the inappropriateness of Lauren's planned farewell party, I'm almost glad; I can't imagine it would have helped her state of mind. God bless Lauren, but I don't think she really understands how bad Amy was.
Jonas is more relaxed now that Amy is gone, which is understandable. I stopped by to see him after I found out about Amy and he was already looking calmer. The poor man was living in terror of Amy and I can hardly blame him, not when I've been so afraid myself. Admittedly, I'm more afraid for her than of her, but I am scared. She's been very intense lately, and I don't just mean the suicide attempt.
Jonas might not have been the best person to talk to about Amy, but Lauren was busy and Molly's on a course at the Academy, learning to fix the bugs that the new electrical system has but the old one didn't. Apparently it has all the old bugs as well; Molly isn't very impressed with it. But that only left one sympathetic ear for me to bend, and a very nice ear it is.
"Do you think she's alright?" I asked.
"I'm more worried about anyone around her," Jonas admitted. "I'm sorry," he added, almost at once. "I know you're really concerned."
I sat down on the edge of the desk. "She's a good friend," I told him, a touch defensively. "Amy's been looking after me ever since I came to work here."
"She doesn't seem the type," Jonas replied. "But then I guess I haven't actually seen her at her best."
"No," I agreed.
There was a pause. "Tell me," he said.
"Huh?"
"Tell me about her," he explained. "About Amy; your friend, I mean, rather than the woman who wants to rip out my heart and" – he mumbled a word I couldn't make out – "in the hole."
"Jonas!"
"Her words; not mine!" he insisted. "Will you? Tell me about her?"
I thought for a long moment. "She cares about people," I said at last. "She's one of the few officers here who really share Daniel's attitude to the project. I mean, Major Carter and Colonel O'Neill are good people, but there's still an element of loss and gain in their outlook; an eye for the balance of power. What can this planet do for us?
"Amy always looked for what we could do for them."
"Like Daniel," Jonas agreed. "Do you think she would have done...what he did?"
I shrugged uncomfortably. "I'd like to say yes," I replied, "but how can you tell? There's no way you can predict that sort of thing. Daddy says that God made adversity so we could know the kind of person we really are."
Now it was Jonas who looked uncomfortable. "I guess I know now," he said disconsolately.
I took his hand and smiled. "You know what you did the last time," I reminded him. "What you do the next time is a whole different matter."
"Is it?"
"Yes it is," I assured him, firmly. "You're a different man now. Why else would you have brought us the naquadria? What you saw; what you did and didn't do; what happened because of it: All that will have changed you. Would Daniel have done what he did before his wife died so that he could live? Before..." I stopped.
Jonas looked at me, quizzically. "Before what?" he asked.
I tried to turn away, but I found myself captured by his gaze. My resolve crumbled and I found myself telling him things that I never even told you, dear Diary.
I told him about the men and women in another world who died to save ours. I told him of the mission to stop Apophis' invasion; well, all that I'd heard of it from Daniel. I told him how Daniel, wounded, stayed to cover SG-1's flight from Klorel's ha'tak vessel to Apophis'.
"Was he always a hero?" Jonas asked miserably.
"He didn't think so. After the others had gone, Daniel managed to reach the sarcophagus in Klorel's quarters, heal himself, then escape through the Stargate."
"Resourceful," Jonas noted.
I nodded. "But what haunted him – so he once told me – was that he never could remember, with his brain all frazzled from the sarcophagus, whether he had seen how to escape in a brilliant flash of inspiration as he lay dying, or if he had it in mind when he offered to stay behind. It was the difference between being a canny hero and a weasel who saw a way to escape the inevitable death of his team. It bugged him."
"I can see how it might."
"Some people are born brave; others not so much," I said. "But real heroism, it seems to me, isn't something you can just have. It's something you earn throughout your life and you never know if you have it until you're tested."
"How did you know?" he asked.
"Well I...I mean, I never have been...So I don't...That is..."
"How did you know just what I needed to hear?" He clarified.
I shrugged awkwardly. "Don't know," I admitted. "Not usually my strong suit. Daniel never believed that he had it," I added. "Like you, he thought he was a coward at heart; he was his own worst critic and he never seemed to know his own worth."
"And Captain Kawalsky?" Jonas asked.
"Much the same."
I started to cry then and Jonas put an arm around me. I laid my head on his shoulder and he held me close.
Result.
*
Wednesday, August 8th 2005
Dear Diary,
It's...been a while, hasn't it? I'm sorry I haven't been writing so much recently, but I've had Jonas to confide in. Diary writing was always something of a release valve and I haven't really felt the need to let off steam; or rather, when I have done I've gone to speak to Jonas. He's almost as good a listener as you.
But this is something that is difficult to talk to Jonas about, because he's still rather frightened of Amy...or something.
You see; Amy has disappeared. She came back and then she went away. She acted a little weird when I saw her, but I never suspected...Amy was possessed by a Goa'uld!
This Goa'uld called himself Thoth and he took her through the Stargate. No-one could stop her and now there seems to be a problem getting to her. The anthropology team have been charged with finding out all we can about Thoth and Jonas is really throwing himself into the work, but it's just marking time really.
Lauren thinks Jonas has a crush on Amy, but that's ridiculous. Isn't it? I mean, he's working very hard on this, but...
But that doesn't seem to be the thing I should really be worrying about right now. Amy is the one I should be worrying about. I just can't think of anything worse than being taken by a Goa'uld. Death seems rather mild by comparison; it is at least final. I could mourn for Daniel – well, almost – but Amy is still out there somewhere, in body and soul and suffering...who knows what.
She threatened to kill him! How could he have the hots for Amy?
God; am I really so very shallow?
I should say something to him. We're already good friends. I could really use a good cuddle right about now and if I said something then maybe I could get that cuddle without having to pretend to feel faint. I swear, Jonas must think I have serious blood pressure problems, the way I keep swooning against him. I wouldn't have to, if only he could take a hint, but for a man who can be so good at spotting how people feel...Well, he can be adorably clueless.
Maybe I should say something.
Or maybe this isn't the time. After all, he is worried about Amy, whether he's got it bad for her or not. He might well think that it was rather insensitive of me to hit on him while she's still missing.
Damnit.
12:20pm, update
Damnit, damnit, damnit!
3:15pm, update
Alright. So Thoth, as a Goa'uld, is something of a legend. The Tok'ra have confirmed that he has not been heard of in centuries, which makes sense since he seems to have been frozen in an ice-floe for the past thousand years. This gives us very little to go on, unfortunately. It's quite infuriating.
Lauren has us going through absolutely everything that so much as mentions Thoth. I guess I always knew that Amy was Lauren's favourite student, but it would be nice if she could play it a little cool for the sake of my ego.
Molly is taking me out tonight. For once, I feel I need her breed of revelry; drunkenness has never seemed quite so attractive. I'd quite like to ask Jonas along, but he isn't allowed off the base; something about being an 'illegal alien'.
I wasn't sure if that was a joke or not.
God. I'm getting dangerously close to writing 'why, oh why won't Jonas notice me?'.
V. bad. V.v. Bridget Jones-style life crisis.
Drastic action may be called for. It may be time for the whiskey.
Thursday, August 16th 2005
Dear Diary,
I've been doing a lot of soul-searching lately, a lot of it regarding my feelings for Jonas. Do I love him? Is this a passing infatuation? The last time I thought I was in love I got the shaft, so maybe infatuation would be preferable. Then again, my last major Jones was for Steve, so I'm boned either way. Love or lust, they both turn sour in the end.
Well, it's a moot point now anyway. The way I feel this morning it must be love. Mere infatuation could never engender such a colossal hangover. I think I may call in sick, then crawl into a hole and hide. I was having a lot of fun lusting after Jonas, but I'm not sure I can deal with being in love.
Friday, August 17th 2005
Dear Diary,
I think Jonas is in love with Amy, you know. Or perhaps he's just infatuated. Whatever, I'm sure he's missing her terribly; death threats and all.
Colonel O'Neill seems to have started moping around the lab again and I still see Major Carter doing a quick turn in the corridor whenever she catches her feet wandering towards Daniel's office. Of course, Colonel O'Neill was a lost closer to Amy and things got pretty messed up between them after Daniel died. I reckon he's getting the jitters because they never had the chance to square away before she was snatched off. There were harsh words spoken that were never taken back and...
Okay; talk about perspective. Things went a little nuts a few hours ago and now it turns out that the world is about to be destroyed.
My problems seem a little small now, don't they?
Saturday, August 18th 2005
Dear Diary,
It's been nice knowing you, then. It looks like it's all over; a Goa'uld called Anubis – major drama queen, by all accounts, but I guess having a doomsday weapon means never having to read your notices – has jammed the Stargate and is doing something to make it blow us up in a pretty apocalyptic fashion.
There isn't even a chance of evacuating a Genesis list to the Alpha site, not that I'd be on it. I could have a place if I wanted – as a civilian employee of the SGC, I qualify for an automatic place on the list – but I refused. I couldn't leave Earth knowing that I was leaving Mummy and Daddy behind. Oh, I know they might just have a place, but David wouldn't and certainly not Ash. I just couldn't bear it.
I guess this is why most of the Genesis personnel have so few family ties. I suppose that I can't really get behind a list which rates some has-been professor who was just the thing in astrophysics ten years ago above someone like Ash. Okay, so maybe he can help to build stuff on a new world, but could he build a new life? Could he possible want life as much as Ashley does? How can it count for nothing that she has all that life in her?
And never mind me. How am I more worthy than my sister? I speak a few dead languages; surely with the rest of the world naught but ashes, a lust for life would be the most important thing?
But I don't want to die. This is something I have only recently discovered. I suppose I always suspected it, but I never really knew it before. Now it comes to it, I find that I really, really don't want to die. Even if I have nothing to live for but a small job, a hopeless crush and my Tom Jones collection, I want to live.
God! I want to see my family again, but even with the world about to go foom, I'm not allowed to tell them why all I'd want to do is hug them tight and watch old musicals. They think I'd gone barmy and I'd spend the last days in a nuthatch.
So here I stay; here I die.
Goodbye.
Monday, August 20th
Dear Diary,
Alive!
Oh, dear God, we're alive!
I can hardly believe it, dear Diary. I know that some people around here just took it as a given that SG-1 would save us by dint of some piece of astonishing brilliance in the eleventh hour, but I guess you just have to see them save the world once before you can really believe they can do it again.
Actually, there were quite a few doubters in the anth lab; I guess they were all used to counting on Daniel.
Lauren took it in her stride, but then very little ever seems to ruffle her feathers. When we first found out about this exploding Gate, she told me that the world was overdue some major peril by a couple of months and I should be glad it was all or nothing, since that way we mere mortals couldn't get caught in the fallout.
"Every eighteen months or so," she told me, confidently. "In between, someone we know will usually get blown up. I guess it sucks not to be Earth." She has a weird sort of cynicism, but truth to tell it's been a major source of comfort the last few days. It's just really helpful that someone isn't panicking.
I'm going to go home now. I've booked a flight to Virginia in the morning and I want to see David in New York after that. I couldn't see them when it was going on, so now it's over I just have to reassure myself that my family are still there. Ridiculous, I know, but there it is.
Tuesday, September 4th
Dear Diary,
Amy is back; unconscious, but alive.
I went down to see her in hospital. Jonas was already there and I immediately felt like an intruder. I tried to slip away, but he'd already seen me and he waved. I waved back and went in; I could hardly turn and bolt once he knew I was there.
"I wouldn't have expected to see you in here," I noted. Like Hell I wouldn't, I thought. He is in love with her; it's so unfair.
Jonas shrugged. "I feel I should. The rest of the team are taking turns and...I want to apologise to her."
"I don't think that's what she wants from you," I said.
He shrugged again.
"What?" I demanded. "Are you actually looking to have your head bitten off?"
Suddenly, Jonas couldn't meet my gaze and that was when I realised: He wasn't in love with Amy; he just hated himself and he wanted her to tell him what a vile and worthless little toad he was. He wanted her to vilify him for letting Daniel die and perhaps, deep down, he even wanted her to do what Anubis hadn't and finish him once and for all.
"It's not your fault," I told him, sternly. "I thought I knew you, Jonas, but I never suspected you could be so selfish."
"Selfish?"
"Blaming yourself for what happened to Daniel isn't healthy," I said. "I accept that you can't rationalise that yet, but letting Amy blame you isn't healthy for her. If you try to make her your Telltale Heart, you won't let her get over her loss."
And then I told him about the pistol. I know I'd sort of promised – to Amy and to myself – that I wouldn't say anything, but it just slipped out then. I guess I figured it was okay to tell Jonas, because I was helping Amy in the end, and because I trusted him. So I told him how devastated Amy had been; about the tears she hid behind her rage and about how fragile she had become.
"If you insist on keeping that pain alive, and if you rope her in to do it, she'll never recover," I told him. I could see that my words were stinging him and I didn't mean to hurt, so I laid my hand on his cheek. "I won't let you do that to her, Jonas, and I won't let you do this to yourself."
"Thank you," he said at last.
I think I surprised myself more than I surprised him when I kissed his cheek, but it did seem to perk him up a little.
I sat with him at Amy's side until Colonel O'Neill came to take over. He gave us a funny look and we went off to get a coffee. I listened while Jonas poured out his doubts and fears, then I held his hand and told him that Daniel had died because of who he was, not because of anything Jonas may or may not have done.
"If you'd tried to do it, he probably would've knocked you down," I said. "I think this was his destiny and he wouldn't have allowed anyone to take his place."
"Really?" he asked.
"Hell if I know," I admitted, "but it's what Mummy would have said and she's a lot smarter than she tends to let on."
"I think I'd like to meet your mother," Jonas said.
"I'm sure you would," I replied. "Most men do."
He smiled and asked: "Is she as pretty as you then?"
God; I must have gone bright purple! I think he was just being polite, but I got all tingly anyway. Bless his heart, he didn't say a word about my sudden change of hue. I squeezed his hand and he squeezed back, but he wasn't being forward or even anything approximating to forwardness. It's a good start, but this could take a while.
Still; at least I know that I have a chance. Just that little bit of progress feels...good.
Thursday, September 27th
Dear Diary,
Amy is awake at last.
I went down to the hospital to see her as soon as I heard. When I arrived, she was just seeing the last of her other visitors; some limey archaeologist she met in the Antarctic. I wondered if she were getting back on the horse, but when he came out he hooked up pretty solidly with a girl in a military haircut.
I watched them go, then went in. Amy looked weak, but...peaceful; certainly more at ease with the universe than she had been before she left for the Antarctic.
"Hey, Ames!" I called.
"Lou! How are you?"
"How am I?" I asked incredulously. I gripped her hand tightly and stared at her face. "How are you, Amy?"
"I'm fine," she assured me. She gave a broad grin. "I saw him, Louise. I saw Daniel."
"Okay," I said, wondering how quickly I could withdraw my hand and make a run for it.
Amy laughed, but it was a good laugh; the kind I hadn't heard from her in a long time. "He's not dead, Louise. We knew that already; I guess I just needed to understand what it meant. Thoth was a great help."
"He was?"
"Uh-huh."
"The Goa'uld?"
"Yes; the Goa'uld."
"Was a great help?"
"Yes," she replied firmly.
"Well...I'm glad you're feeling better," I said, after a long pause. "So has this put you in a forgiving mood?"
She nodded. "I've already spoken to Colonel O'Neill and we're friends again...I think. He never meant to hurt me and it hit him pretty hard that I took on like that."
"And Jonas Quinn?" I asked, as casually as I could manage.
She paused in thought. "Yeah. We're good," she said at last. "Actually, he's a bit gorgeous, isn't he?"
I gave a cool shrug. "Guess so," I agreed, as though it had never occurred to me. I wanted to shake her by the shoulders and scream: 'you can't have him, he's mine!', but she was ill.
Amy leaned over and whispered conspiratorially. "And what a kisser! Oh, you would not believe!"
"Nice." I sat back, a rictus grin plastered across my face. Inwardly, I promised myself that I'd run her down in my car as soon as she got out of hospital and I was able to afford the car repairs.
She burst out laughing. "Your face!" she cackled. "Oh, sweetheart, I'm sorry. I just couldn't resist it."
It took me a moment, but I got there in the end. "You're evil!" I accused.
"I'm sorry," she said again, "but you sounded so jealous. What were you thinking, Louise? I've spoken about five words to the man before today and those were: 'Rot in Hell you weasel bastard.'"
"That's six words," I groused.
"Anyway, you deserve it for making me a liar," she returned.
"What?"
"Well, I told him the stalker didn't come with the office," she explained. "Guess I'll have to send him a memo."
"Don't you dare!" I exclaimed. "God! I'd die."
She fixed me with a long, serious look. "Just...don't leave it all unsaid, Louise," she said. "I don't want to see you go the same way as me."
"Amy..."
She caught my hand in a fierce grip. "Don't let it stew," she commanded. "Make this one work. For me. For Daniel."
"Okay," I agreed. Really I was thinking that I'd make it work for Jonas and me, but it didn't seem worth arguing over.