The planet Hakter's name could be roughly translated 'Celebration of Life'. For the Standers, 'Place of Death' would have been more appropriate. Its white sandy beaches turned pink with their blood. According to plan virtually all the Aschen in the galaxy had been forced together into one huge group on Hakter. Unfortunately, the intel had far underestimated the numbers that would entail. Far superior to the Stander Army in men, weapons, technology, and resources, they almost brought the Standers' Rebellion to its knees at Hakter. But, the Standers struggled on to finish their objective: the enemy were driven on to the next battlefield.

The Aschen dominated fifty-one planets in the galaxy. The battle plan called for systematically driving them from planet to planet, ever pushing them closer to the galaxy's edge. It required coordinated and synchronized attacks on the first several worlds, followed almost immediately with similar attacks on the next to force the Aschen from one world to the next and on from there before they had time to regroup and put up an organized defense. Each strike was engineered to force the Aschen ever closer to the defense web placed at the galaxy's rim. Once the Aschen could be driven past it, the web would be activated. With a hope and a prayer, it would send a pulse all along the border and through the StarGate system to keep the Aschen from reentering the Milky Way by ship or by Gate. The Standers would be free to repair what they could and to mourn what was irretrievably lost. The plan was working, but the price was far greater than they had ever imagined.

When the last Aschen ship winked out of the darkening skies over Hakter, Carter was huddled over Colonel O'Neill, desperately trying to staunch the blood spurting from the wound in his chest. She called for someone to open the StarGate back to Danara and ordered the withdrawal. Dragging their wounded and dying with them, the Standers stumbled back through the Gate.

She arrived on the other side drenched in the colonel's blood, her hands still pressed tightly into his chest. Word must have already reached the support personnel on Danara because hands pulled her away and began to minister to the colonel almost before she'd drawn in the first lungful of air unsullied with the acrid smoke of the battlefield they'd left behind on the other side.

Officials called to her as she numbly stared after the medical personnel carrying him away. "It did not go well, then?" She looked at her hands still wet with his blood, listened to the moans of the injured still being brought through the Gate behind her, and shook her head. No, it had not gone well.

"It's over then?" Chancellor Golant said, closing his eyes and shaking his head in deep regret. "This is where it ends?"

"No," she answered, "we were successful in driving the Aschen on to Torantay. And we will go on to meet them there as planned."

The officials looked at her with doubt and hope warring in their faces. She met their gaze without flinching. A small amount of blood oozed down her forehead from somewhere above her hairline; a rag was tied around her left leg and the torn material under it was dark with dried blood; her hands, chest, and bulging stomach were sticky and streaked with the congealing blood of their battle commander. But her blue eyes burned with the resoluteness and determination of one who would Stand until the end.

"You will lead them on then?" the chancellor asked.

"Until the last Aschen is driven from this galaxy," she promised him vehemently.
Satisfied, the officials nodded their heads as one and turned to spread the word. Despite appearances, the war was not lost. The fight would go on and, in the end, they would still be Standing while their enemies fled before them or lay still on the battlefield.

Someone pressed a cup of cold water into her hand. She drank it though it was coffee she wanted. Someone else stitched the cut on her head and the gouge in her thigh as she gathered those still able to fight and revamped a battle plan developed for an army of 150,000 into a strike plan for barely a tenth of that number. And all the time a part of her was bleeding away in grief and horror. Despite her brave words, she was shaking inside with the fear this really was the end.

They'd expected heavy losses at Hakter but not this. The dead and wounded there would cost them dearly at Torantay. And from there, they'd have to have enough still Standing for the final battle on Eonal. Victory was only two Gates and a jump away if only, somehow, they could pull off these last two battles. With the colonel down, it fell to her to pull it off. She knew what had to be done. The master plan was as much hers as his. But, she didn't want to carry on. Not when he was bleeding out in a field hospital somewhere. She tried to convince herself he would survive like he had more than once before when it had looked impossible. But, she didn't believe it. Sick at heart, she prepared to lead what was left of his army into battle. She had to carry on...this was what he was dying for.

It was time to go. She wanted to stall, wanted to give the doctors time to send her word. But the longer she hesitated, the longer the Aschen had to set up their defenses. And, there could be no word she wanted to hear: she had literally touched his erratically, beating heart when she'd pressed her hands into his chest to slow the bleeding. She turned to give the order to move out, but someone pulled off her body armor which wouldn't close around her stomach and replaced it with one that must have been made for someone larger than Teal'c...someone who had fallen on Hakter and wouldn't be needing it on Torantay. She fastened it over the protesting kicks of her unborn baby and nodded her thanks. Securing her pack, she gave the order and stepped through the Gate.

Their objective was clear...fight through the Aschen to high ground; assemble and activate what O'Neill had affectionately called Carter's Anti-Aschen Devise, the CAAD; stay alive to head back to the Gate when it drove the Aschen to their ships; and then start the whole process over again on Eonal. It would have been simple enough if the CAAD could have been taken through already active. It would have driven the Aschen off before they had time to inflict much damage on the attackers. Unfortunately, the design was by necessity too difficult to carry into a battlefield in one piece and had to be on high ground in order for its pulse to reach into space and force the Aschen to jump their ships. She was certain she could have revised the design given enough time. But, they'd had no time...Earth had signed onto the Aschen bandwagon. The clock was already ticking.

The suns were high in the sky when they came through the Gate. The Aschen had been expecting them and the fighting was fierce from the very beginning. Fifty of the Standers arriving on the planet carried a pack containing the CAAD components in the hopes at least one would make it to high ground. The rest of their army was along for the ride, providing firepower and acting as shields. They did their job as well as they could under the circumstances. The majority fell within the first twenty yards of the Gate.

From what she'd seen on Hakter, Carter had estimated they'd have only twenty to twenty-five minutes to make high ground before there wouldn't be anyone left to set up and activate the equipment. At the eighteen-minute mark, she abandoned hopes of making the top of the hill. All around her and behind her, Standers were falling. Her injured leg was slowing down her advance, and the air was so full of the battle's smoke she couldn't catch enough breath to make the climb. Shielded by her fellow soldiers, she moved quickly. Even so, by the time the CAAD was operational, she was the only one left standing as far as she could see. She issued the order to move on to Eonal before she herself was thrown to the ground by an explosive blast. Seconds later, the sounds of battle faded away as the CAAD drove away the resistance.

The bloodbath of Torantay was over.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Twenty thousand died in the white sands of Hakter and ten thousand more during the trip to Danara or within the first two hours after arriving. As many as 70,000 or more would probably have followed them in the ensuing hours, days, and weeks, but for the arrival of the one Aschen-decimated population that had answered O'Neill's call to arms too late to make a difference on Hakter or Torantay.

In fact, the Asgard arrived to find they were almost too late to make any difference at all. Stunned by the wounded, grieved their late appearance had contributed to such a waste of life, and unaware a battle was already being fought elsewhere, they went to work to save as many as they could.

Among the more than 55,000 lives they managed to pull out of the fire that day was one Colonel Jonathon Charles O'Neill.

His first thought was of Carter and how he didn't want her to see him die. Slowly his mind cleared enough to recognize it was Thor beside him, not Carter, and he wasn't dying after all. And then the awful truth penetrated his mind: his army had moved on to Torantay without him, without the vast majority of their number, and with Carter.

Healed from their wounds physically, if not emotionally, the first waves of Hakter survivors rushed to Torantay through StarGate and by Asgard ships far too late. The last of the Aschen fleet jumped outward toward Eonal just as the Asgard arrived in the system. Having been briefed on the battle plan, the Asgard gave chase immediately.

O'Neill had led the group through the Gate. He stood at its base and gazed out at the battlefield. The air was full of the smell of the blood of his people and the sound of their cries. In time, he would find there actually had been those among Carter's men who had survived the carnage here and found the heart to follow her order to move on to Eonal. But from what he could see as he surveyed the area that day, it seemed the whole of the Standers of Torantay had fallen.

Everywhere he looked there were dead and wounded. The historical records would show that O'Neill who had recruited them, trained them, and sent them into battle wept when he saw their brave sacrifice. But like most such accounts, they weren't true.

The air was charged with Carter's anti-Aschen pulse--he knew the exact technical term for it and even had a rudimentary understanding of how it worked, but it suited him to let her think otherwise. It told him, regardless of the carnage all around him, the Standers had done what they'd set out to do. The Aschen were one step away from defeat. He could take no satisfaction from that as he looked on the fallen all around him, but neither did he weep.

"You, Solomon," he said to Lt. Solace from Reteli, "as soon as the Gate shuts down, dial Eonal. Wait until we've gone through, then dial up Danara, and get what help you can for these people..." Every minute the wounded lay untended, more of them were lost. Even as he spoke, the moans and cries around him grew fainter. He didn't want to know how many would die before his battalion passed through the Gate, but the priority must be the Aschen. Not the wounded and dying at his feet. Not Carter and her child out there among them somewhere. He didn't search for her. He couldn't, no more than he could take the time to cry for any of these who had lain down their lives at his order.

He busied himself offering water and useless words of comfort to the wounded near him while he waited for his troops to all arrive so they could move on to the next battlefield. But, the Battle of Eonal would go on without them. When the Gate finally shut down behind the last incoming Stander, and Solace turned to dial the DHD, he found it had taken its own deathblow.

O'Neill received the news quietly. It took energy to curse, and his had bled out on the white sands of Hakter and under the five suns of Torantay. He nodded, quietly issued somber orders to care for the wounded anyway they could, and went in search of Carter. He knew where he should have found her...on the high ground desperately fought for and bought with the blood of so many good men. But, the hilltops were clear of bodies...she, or someone, must have known they wouldn't make it and chosen to set it off sooner. "Good choice, Carter," he assured her in his mind. The Asgard would have cleared out any stragglers her machine hadn't chased away.

He found her not quite halfway up the tallest hill. He quietly called her name and ever so gently turned her onto her back. She was breathing, and he sent up a prayer of thanks for that. He was no medic, but a hurried, fearful look revealed no spurting blood or gaping guts. She was as pale as the sands of Hakter, cold and clammy with shock, and he could see the pulse in her neck beating wildly. Scrapes, cuts, and bruises covered practically every visible inch of her body. He pressed a shaking hand under her body armor and rubbed her stomach. Almost immediately, he felt Carter Jr.'s answering kick. He gave a small, reassuring pat in return and turned to assess the soldiers who had fallen getting Carter this far. They were all dead. He pulled off his flack jacket and outer shirt to wrap around her and gingerly picked her up to carry back to the others.

Help would come eventually he told himself. The Asgard made the victory sure. And then the cavalry would arrive...he just had to keep her alive until then. He hadn't wanted her on the frontlines. She had no business being there in her condition, but if the pulse would have failed...they couldn't afford that. She'd trained others to help produce the CAAD and their counterparts which made up the defense grid, but he hadn't been able to give her the time she would have needed to turn farmers into engineering technicians. If something went wrong, she had to be on hand.

He'd made the call because he hadn't seen another way out of it, and she hadn't objected even though the life she risked was not just her own. But, it was obvious now; he'd called it wrong. She wouldn't have Stood long enough to effect any repairs if they had been needed. She should have been safely back on Danara cursing him for making her stay behind.

This fight was his; she had wanted no part in it. She'd heard all of his concerns and hadn't considered any of them valid. She was half in love with the ambassador. With the Aschen on board, she'd have had the freedom from fighting Goa'uld to seek a life with Joe Whatshisname. He had meant for her to have that chance. He had.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

He hadn't intended to ask her to join him when he walked into his self-imposed exile in protest of the Aschen Alliance with Earth. Yet, at the last minute he'd turned away from the various concerned and angry protests still being raised by the Aschen delegation, the rest of SG1, General Hammond, and her ambassador. "Come with me," he'd said to her.

Joe had angrily and indignantly objected, "Just what are you asking her to do? Join your ridiculous fight against the Aschen? Or marry you?" Good Ol' Joe had instinctively known from the beginning O'Neill stood between him and Carter even if there'd never been, never could be, anything between the two of them.

O'Neill had answered without heat as though he wasn't at all concerned with how things were going to play out, "She knows what I'm asking." But, how could she when he didn't himself? He started up the ramp to the Gate, and he didn't look back to see if she was seriously considering joining him...he wasn't that strong. Even when he heard her boots on the ramp behind him, he'd kept on through the Gate.

This past year, they'd been brought face to face with just how much they meant to each other more than once. He'd stood on the wrong side of a forcefield and refused to leave her, but still, he hadn't had a clue he wouldn't be able to walk away from her. He'd known it would be hard. He hadn't known it would be the far-side of impossible. It would have been so much easier if he'd never been forced to admit his feelings for her in that room or felt her snuggle against him contently when he had admitted he remembered having feelings for her when they were Therra and Jonah and not Colonel and Major.

When, after an eternity of waiting, he saw her step through the event horizon on the other side, he'd been too weak with relief to do anything except sit there looking up at her. She had sat down beside him.

"Glad you could make it, Carter," he had said nonchalantly as though she'd just shown up at a barbeque.

"What exactly did I make, Sir?" she asked him hesitantly. They'd been having a very heated discussion while the Gate had been dialed. The same heated discussion they'd been having ever since he first voiced his reservations about the Aschen. It seemed highly unlikely he had expected her to leave everything to take up a fight with which she disagreed. "I really don't know why you asked me along."

He looked away and said, "Maybe because I'm not so sure myself."

"Maybe," she said.

"But, you came anyway."

"Yes. Yes, I did," she said, sounding like she was more than a bit surprised by that fact herself.

"Because you thought I might be right?"

"Not a chance, Sir."

"Then?"

"How come I have to know why I came when you don't have to know why you asked me?"

"Because."

"Because?"

"Because if you came thinking I was ordering you to, or you figured you owed it to me after all we've been through...well, then I'd feel pretty silly getting down on my knees and asking you to marry me! Besides you know how much my knees hurt when I kneel."

She could have shrugged it off as the joke it seemed...but he so often hid what he really meant behind flippancy that she had to wonder if there wasn't something behind his words. Usually, she took a measure of pride in being able to read what lay under his banter and even enjoyed the challenge. But not today.

She had just left home and country for him. Not because she believed in his cause, not because he'd ordered it, but just because he asked. For weeks, he'd been raining on their victory parade. Finding the Aschen should have caused the celebration to end all celebrations at the SGC. Instead, he'd turned it into a time of suspicion and accusations. She had found herself at odds with him: a situation which always left her feeling sick both physically and emotionally. She hadn't eaten or slept well since the whole mess had started. He'd made her feel every accusation he made against the Aschen was against her as well. She'd heard each angry, frustrated word as though he shouted it at her alone. When he'd chosen to just walk away, she'd felt that as a personal blow as well. A death blow. And now he wanted to hide behind dumb jokes. Not today. He had put her through the wringer, and she was too spent to play his game today.

"I'm not laughing, Sir."

"No," he flinched against the anger and weariness in her voice. "I'm not either, Carter. I'd get down on my knees right now if I wasn't so afraid of your answer."

"Sir?"

He should have spoken the words to her right then, but, if he was anything, he was a coward. Standing up, he said, "We need to get off this planet before they change their minds about letting us go. Come on." He reached his hand down to help her up. She hesitated only a moment before accepting it.

He ran from her need for an answer through the next hour or two; Gating from world to world until finally settling on a quiet planet where, without speaking, they made camp under the trees. She'd come with nothing but the clothes on her back, but he'd thrown in two blankets and his favorite sleeping bag. Food wasn't an immediate problem either. He had brought enough rations to see them through the first several days. The night was beautiful. Bright stars twinkled overhead. Birds sang in the distance. A soft, summer breeze rustled in the trees. But the night's peace didn't extend to the two of them.

"It's no good, Sir," she finally said after playing with her food for several minutes without being able to choke down a bite.

He stuck his fork in and took a big bite. "Tastes fine to me, Carter."

"It's not the food, Sir." He knew that. But, it was no good. He couldn't bring himself to tell her why he had asked her to come. Not openly and honestly. Speaking the truth would make him vulnerable. Vulnerability led to sitting on the side of a bed with a gun in his hands. He had a disbelieving world to save; vulnerability was something he could not afford.

He frowned at her. Why did she have to make everything so difficult anyway? She knew how he felt about her. Without actually saying the words, he couldn't come any closer to telling her than he already had hooked up to that stupid zantac machine.

She waited, hoping he'd say something but knowing he wouldn't. She was afraid to force it...afraid he'd walk away from her as he almost had already today. In the field, he was the bravest man she knew, but when it came to facing his feelings...he was afraid. As afraid as he'd been when she'd been trapped behind that forcefield. And she'd known good and well why long before he'd been forced to admit it in that room.

But, a lot had happened since then. The incident with the terra-forming ship. All his anger over the Aschen. All his biting words, shouted accusations, and snide remarks about Joe. But...he had asked her to come with him.

One second she'd been feeling as though she was dying and half-hating him for it, and the next, he'd said, "Come with me." She could lose him forever like she'd feared she had on Edora and again when he and Teal'c had been hurtling through space in an out-of-control death glider, or give up everything she had on Earth. Her home, her friends, her job, her brother, her only link to her father, everything and be with him. He'd taken weeks to come to the decision to leave the SGC and Earth behind. She had made the decision in less time than it took him to walk up the ramp and through the wormhole. She sighed, that pretty much said it all. She wasn't going to chance losing him again just because he wouldn't say the words she wanted to hear.

"You don't have to get down on your knees, Sir."

"I don't?" he said faintly. That was it then, he'd missed his chance. She'd continue on being his second-in-command, fighting beside him even when she disagreed with what he was fighting for, and that would be it. She'd given up everything to be there with him; if that's what she wanted, he owed it to her. Even if it killed him.

"No, you don't," she continued. "I certainly won't insist. Bit undignified for an Air Force Colonel, don't you think?" He blinked at her in confusion. "Where you're sitting would be fine, Sir," she prodded him.

He stared at her dumbly. Oh, great, she thought. He never meant anything more than to ask me along to help fight the Aschen, and I'm a fool. "Or, you could just tell me what your plans are now you're free to fight the Aschen."

A slow smile of understanding spread over his face. "Tomorrow," he said, "tomorrow we fight the Aschen. Tonight we solve this little problem we have about being exiles without a lawful government to issue marriage licenses and ordain ministers to say the words and make things nice and legal. I wouldn't want you to be able to just walk away when you find out I snore."

She grinned at him in relief, "I already know you snore, Sir. I'm not going to walk away."

He turned suddenly serious. He'd intended to walk away from her even this afternoon. And Sarah had walked away before he could come back from Abydos and tell her he'd found a reason to keep breathing. "I need to know you really mean that," he told her soberly.

"I mean it, Sir."

He took a step toward her and took her hand. "Well, then, Carter," he said. "This will have to do. I, Jonathan Charles O'Neill, take you as my wife. For as long as we both live, I promise to be a good husband to you and to never walk away. And," he paused and in all seriousness added, "I'll try to talk to you about things and stuff like that."

She didn't laugh though for the first time in days she felt like it. "Thank you, Sir. I, Samantha Elisabeth Carter, take you as my husband as long as we both live. I promise to stand by you no matter what," she said gravely, but then couldn't help adding with a smile, "and I promise to try not to talk too much."

A wide grin had split his face, and for a moment the past weeks' struggles melted off his face. "You can talk all you want, as long as you don't always expect me to listen."

"So, what else is new?"

"This," he had said as he leaned over and kissed her.

The next day they'd begun their fight against the Aschen. They'd spent weeks traveling from world to world, following his instincts and rumors of Aschen duplicity and devastation. Tracking down the truth behind their promises and lies. Gathering evidence to convince others to join them in the fight. One world led to another and long before they'd reached the last, she was as convinced of the evilness of the Aschen as he was.

That day she'd cut the implant out of her arm. He'd winced when he saw the wound she'd left and said, "Um, Carter, maybe I shouldn't have been the only one to promise to talk about stuff?"

"I'm sorry, Sir. I should have...I can't...not knowing the Aschen are..." she had floundered trying to explain. He'd drawn her to him and comforted her distress as much as he could.

"Shh. It's all right. I understand," he had said. Although her words had made little or no sense, he did. The Aschen systematically wooed their prey into an 'alliance' like a benevolent, wiser, older brother. They promised to freely share their advanced technology and all the benefits of it without asking anything in return. But, in truth, they fulfilled only the barest minimum of their promises while decimating the planet's population with manufactured plagues which they then 'cured' to further their image as saviors. And, in the process they sterilized a huge portion of the population without their knowledge or consent. Most of the planets continued to believe the Aschen were their allies and friends even as their own civilization slowly dwindled away and their people died out. If their true nature was discovered, it was too late; there were not enough left to take a stand against their oppressors. The Aschen were free to exploit the land to provide grain and other resources for their empire. "They won't, not Earth. We'll get them first," he had promised.

But, his words didn't change what she had done. She'd been pregnant by the time they'd begun their campaign to strike back at the Aschen and drive them from their galaxy. The pregnancy terrified him. He had hoped it wouldn't happen. Not when they were on the threshold of war. Not when he might need her expertise on the battlefield.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
He gently settled her down among the other wounded of Torantay and tried not to wonder if the pregnancy had helped put her there. Carter was undeniably the smartest person he had ever known. She usually acted only after a great deal of thought but removing the implant had been a visceral reaction to the Aschen's evil. She hadn't given it any more thought than she had the decision to follow him into exile. He had asked; she had come.

She'd never given him reason to think she regretted either decision, and God help him, he would ask her again if he had it to do over again. And the baby? His relief when he'd felt her respond to his touch earlier revealed more than he'd acknowledged to himself before. He gave her a loving, reassuring pat and turned back to his men.

An army 165,000 strong, his Standers were not an army of young men eager for the romance of war. Their numbers were almost exclusively made up of men in their 40's, 50's, and even into their 60's and women past any hope of childbearing. The young were too precious a commodity to throw into a battlefield, even he wouldn't ask that of them.

For the most part they were simple farmers and their wives who had never fired a gun before he'd trained them, never watched anyone die a violent death until he'd sent them into battle, and never knew they were heroes until they Stood against a common enemy. He called them 'the recruits', 'the troops', 'the army', and, privately to Carter, 'the kids'. They called themselves 'Standers'.

And Stand they had. Against an enemy superior in almost every way except guts, determination, and rightness. They'd fallen at Hakter and Stood themselves up again to continue the fight. He had loved them, admired them, taken pride in them, and then he had ordered them into harm's way. Every cry of the wounded was on his head; every death on his soul. Like Carter, they were here because he had asked them to be.

~*~*~*~*~*~~*~*~*~*~

The Aschen had entered the galaxy by ship. Their first stop had been Eonal just inside the galaxy's edge. Following their path, O'Neill came to it five weeks into his exile. There had still been hope for Earth and other of the Stander worlds, but for Eonal the rebellion he planned to start was already much too late. The Aschen had wiped out its population, depleted its resources, and left it a wasteland generations before he had stood with Carter on its empty ground and vowed to rid the galaxy of the Aschen. He had left there determined to do so, though, as yet, they had found no advantage against such a technologically advanced enemy. He had ordered Carter to find something, anything, they could use against the Aschen and began to raise and train an army.

The task of recruiting an army had appeared daunting initially, but the intel they'd gathered did the convincing for them. Worlds once dotted with thousands of cities reduced within three or four generations to farmland providing food for the great Aschen Empire. Worlds which had once teemed with millions and billions of folks now barely home to thousands. Their own homes, empty of the laughter of children, bore mute testimony to the truth.

Chakon Abrary, a Stander from Gresht who lost his wife and two brothers on Hakter, described the recruiting of the Standers' Army:

She was the most beautiful woman we had ever seen, and she would
stand there before us and with a voice as sweet as honey show us
the true nature of those we had considered our saviors. We could
hardly believe it. We had taken them for angels, but they were
demons. Women clutched their arms over their empty wombs and wept,
and we men, well, we cried, too. It was that devastating to know
we'd traded our future for a pack of lies.

Then he would stand and with a voice so determined, so resolute,
it left no room for doubt, tell us it wasn't too late to do
something to stop the Aschen...if not for our own world, then for
the worlds of others, others who still had life to pass on. People
who still had a future. He never passed on the hope we'd be able to
reverse the damage and regain our own futures...they kept that hope
close to themselves. They had thoughts even then, that somehow
there'd be a way to return to us what the Aschen had stolen, but
that's not how they got us to join them...not by what could have
proven to be nothing but more empty promises. No, every word they
spoke they backed up. Every word.

She'd convince us how powerful the Aschen were, and then he'd convince
us we could stand up to them and chase them from our worlds anyway.
And when at the end, he would say, 'They're not getting away with this.
We're going to run them out of this galaxy. Will you join us? Will you
stand with us?' Well, the whole crowd would stand to their feet and
roar, 'Yes, we will Stand with you!'

It was a glorious thing to hear. It was a glorious thing to be a
part of. On world after world the call was heard to Stand, and on
world after world we rose to answer that call. That's how we drove
the Aschen out, that's how we found the strength to rebuild our
worlds. And we'd do it all over again. Believe it. After Hakter,
after Torantay. All over again. If he asked, we'd do it again.

Abrary and 165,000 like him answered O'Neill's call to arms. Most of the Aschen worlds offered up many more volunteers than he would have dared asked; they were dying out and if his war failed they would have sacrificed what little time their people had left for nothing. But, he didn't refuse them. He was determined not to fail, and he needed them, perhaps worse than their individual worlds did.

He recruited anywhere he could gather a crowd on many of the Aschen worlds. They would simply Gate in, assemble an audience and give their spiel. The Aschen had so decimated the populations of these planets they had no fear of an uprising and no longer bothered to secure even the StarGates. They maintained a presence on these planets to oversee the grain shipments, but they did not interfere in the lives of the natives on a day-to-day basis. O'Neill found it easy to avoid them and therefore was able to recruit openly on such worlds. These were the worlds the Standers would strike first when the time came. They fell to the rebellion without a single weapon fired in opposition. The Aschen never knew what hit them.

The planets which had not yet been reduced to an easily controlled number of serfs did not prove so easy to contact or to attack. Their Gates were securely guarded and equipped with deadly built-in defenses. For recruiting and recon purposes, the Standers were forced to waylay Gatetravelers from these worlds and individually convince them of the danger their peoples faced. These travelers were completely under the Aschen spell and hard to convince, but here too the evidence was clear and damning. In most instances, the travelers came to the Standers' side in the end. They were then sent back to their homes to form an underground resistance and quietly send recruits and whatever supplies they could through the Gate to Danara where the army was being trained. Those who could not be convinced became the unfortunate victims of random Gate 'malfunctions'.

Because they could not afford to rouse Aschen suspicion, the numbers these more populated planets could offer to the resistance were severely restricted. Yet, large numbers of Standers gave their lives to hold off the Aschen and neutralize their defense systems until the CAAD's were operational. The cost, for even one of these planets, would have been too high even to contemplate if Carter hadn't found a way to turn their defense systems into amplifiers for her anti-Aschen pulse. There simply would have not been enough Standers in all the army to survive a push to high ground like what was necessary on the planets of Torantay and Hakter.

Like Eonal, Hakter and Torantay were no longer inhabited by either their native peoples or the Aschen, and their defense systems had long since fallen into disuse or been dismantled. The huge numbers of Aschen the Standers faced on them were those they'd driven there themselves. Cornered and massed together, the Aschen more than made up for the ease with which they'd let their attackers take the first worlds of the rebellion.

The one planet among those ensnared by the Aschen where O'Neill refused to recruit was also the one planet he did not directly attack. It, like so many others, fell to his rebellion without bloodshed.

Earth. Though it had the largest population of all the Aschen worlds, the planet that sparked the Standers' Rebellion lent only two soldiers to the war: O'Neill and Carter themselves. Earth hadn't heard his concerns when he had been one of their own, and he had no hope they'd hear him as an enemy of the state. Likewise, he felt a direct attack would be futile and costly to both his former and present forces. So he waged a different type of battle on his homefront.

~*~*~*~*~*~~*~*~*~*~

"What is it, Sergeant?" General Hammond asked as he rushed into the control room.

"Incoming wormhole, Sir."

Hammond frowned. It wouldn't be one of his teams as they'd all been recalled. It wasn't worth sending them out. The Aschen were providing much more intel and resources than they could ever hope to gather.

"Incoming radio transmission, Sir."

"Let's hear it."

"This is Samantha Carter to General Hammond." Hammond felt his jaw drop open. He grabbed the mike, "Major Carter, this is Hammond. It's good to hear your voice." To the sergeant he said, "Page Jackson and Teal'c."

"Thank you, Sir. I was hoping you'd feel that way. I know I don't have the right to ask, but I'd like a favor, Sir."

"What is it, Major?" he asked even though she'd lost the title the day she followed O'Neill through the StarGate. In his mind, she'd always be one of his people regardless of the discharge papers filed somewhere.

"Well, Sir, I'd like to pick up some of my things...family photos and such, if they're still around. It would mean a lot to me."

Hammond looked at the ceiling as the complications and possibilities ran through his mind. She'd been dishonorably discharged but not branded a traitor like O'Neill. There were no warrants for her arrest. With the StarGate all but shut down until the Aschen moved it to the new Travel Complex, he might just be able to get her in and out without too much fuss. He looked pointedly at the tech sergeant who met his look and moved his hand to the panel that opened the iris. Hammond held up a warning finger to him.

"Let me clear the room, Major," he said into the mike. It was a decision he made more from his desire to see her and know she was really all right than anything else. If it was the wrong decision, well, he was about to be retired out anyway.

He ordered the skeleton crew of SF's to clear the Gate Room. Only when they were gone did he give the ok to the sergeant.

"Very well, Major, you can come on through," he said. He took the steps two at a time and met the two remaining members of SG1 on their way up.

They entered the Gate Room just as she emerged through the wormhole. Three men who had been so much a part of her life she knew them better than her own father and brother. They threw all the usual cautions to the air and swept up the ramp to engulf her. In the midst of the welcome, she managed to press the straps of a regulation SGC pack into Daniel's hand.

It was heavy and full. He looked down at it. The label read 'Jackson', but there was no reason Jack would have taken one of his packs when he'd deserted them, and Sam hadn't even taken her own. He met her eyes. They begged him to trust her.

She'd left without so much as a wave goodby over nine months before. He still felt the pain of that. But he gave her a small nod. Was there ever a question he wouldn't do anything she asked?

"Major Carter?" Hammond waved a hand at her obviously pregnant belly.

She blushed and with a smile said, "We've been busy, Sir."

"Here I thought the old cuss would take up fishing," Hammond joked. "How is he?" Jack O'Neill, traitor or not, mattered a great deal to him, and he'd regretted his loss everyday he'd been gone.

"He's fine, Sir. He sent his regards," she said somewhat hesitantly no longer sure of the general's view of the colonel. Though the general had not supported O'Neill's decision to leave, he had not condemned him for it either. But, they had been gone for months, and a lot could have changed in that time.

"Glad to hear it. What's he up to?"

"Actually, Sir, he's doing a lot of Standing around, but it suits him."

Hammond didn't buy that. Just standing around would never suit O'Neill. "That doesn't sound like the Jack O'Neill we all know and love," he said, doing a little fishing of his own.

The fish weren't biting; she changed the subject, "How are things here?"

"Quiet. You couldn't have called at a better time. We're pretty much shut down while they get things set up to move the Gate to the new Travel Complex."

"We were afraid they might already have taken it," she admitted. "I'm glad I came when I did." She looked directly at Daniel, "It's really important to me."

The general caught some hint she was saying more than her words were speaking,
"Any reason in particular, Major? Besides the obvious, of course," he asked.

She shrugged, "You know how it is for the colonel and me, Sir."

"A long way from home, Major. I understand. Unfortunately, all the colonel's belongings were confiscated. But, Daniel and Teal'c were able to collect your personal belongings. They're here on base."

"That's great, Sir. Thank you. I know you're taking a risk letting me come. I won't stay and make it worse."

"You can't leave without seeing Janet," Daniel objected. "She's here closing the infirmary, and we really want a chance to get to talk at least a minute before you go."

"A few minutes won't hurt, Major," the general told her with a smile.

Janet hugged Sam like the long lost friend she was. "I've missed you. I can't believe you ran off without even saying goodby."

"I had a problem with that, too", Daniel admitted. Teal'c nodded his head in agreement.

"I'm sorry, guys. I never meant to leave like that...I hadn't even thought about going with him at all, but then when he asked--" she shrugged unable to express what she herself had never quite been able to understand.

"You just walked away," Daniel finished for her. She could hear the hurt behind his words. Biting her lip, she reached out a tentative hand to his shoulder.

"I really am sorry, Daniel."

"Enough to stay?"

"I can't...the colonel."

"Talk to him, Sam. Get him to come home...we'll work something out."

"You know him, once he's set his mind on something..."

"He's wrong, Sam," Daniel said with certainty.

"How many times have you known his instincts to be wrong when he really felt strongly about something?"

"That's why you went when he asked? Because you thought he might just be right and the whole world wrong?"

"I'm not sure why I went, Daniel."

"They're the good guys, Sam." Daniel could be just as tenacious as the colonel.

Teal'c joined in, "O'Neill is wrong to distrust them. They will free the Jaffa and all the human slaves."

She was glad she wouldn't be there to see Teal'c's optimistic hopes crushed when they drove the Aschen out. She couldn't tell them the truth. Not here where security cameras blinked from every corner.

"Ok, guys," Janet interrupted, "Can we not get into this? Sam's only going to be here a few minutes. You two shoo a minute and let me play doctor." She pulled the curtain shut after them.

"So, you and the colonel?" she asked and laughed when Sam blushed. "Well, it's about time. You two belong together."

"Really?"

"Really. So no regrets? You're happy?"

"No regrets. I'm happy."

"Lie back and let me see what you've got here." Sam reluctantly obeyed and willed herself to not flinch when Janet felt her stomach. There was no way she could explain what being pregnant on a Stander's world was like. The sight of her swollen stomach had moved many to tears. Some of them could not remember seeing a pregnant woman before. Everywhere she went people would reach out a tentative hand and touch her stomach like it was the Holy Grail. In many ways, the baby was as much theirs as hers. A symbol of what had been lost, of what their sacrifice would be all about. She had dreams of stepping through the Gate into battle with a Stander walking beside her with his hand on her belly.

She shook off the intense discomfort she felt from this violation of her personal space and answered Janet, "A girl according to the colonel."

"So he's all right with this?"

"He worries," Sam answered quietly. This had been one of those 'things' they should have talked about but hadn't. At first, he had seemed to ignore the pregnancy altogether. But since the baby had started moving he spent what time he could with his hand resting on her belly feeling its kicks and squirms. He called it CJ or Carter Jr. and swore it was a girl.

"Well, someone needs to," Janet said. "How far along are you?"

Sam shrugged, "The implant messed things up a bit--I don't really know."

"Aren't you being followed by someone?"

"I've seen a few doctors," Sam answered evasively.

"But, have they seen you?"

"Janet, I...well, medical care isn't quite the same where we are." That was true enough. The Aschen had provided the medical equipment available on any of the Stander worlds. Danara was the only place she'd been lately where she would let anyone near her with anything remotely resembling a medical instrument. So far, she'd managed to escape the notice of the docs on Danara, and she certainly wasn't volunteering to visit them. She'd been poked and prodded more than enough before and after every SGC mission. Not that she was going to say that to Janet.

"I'm sure. You've got no business running around without someone to look after you. You're not leaving here without some prenatals, and I want an ultrasound, too."

"Janet, I don't have time for that."

"Well, maybe not for the ultrasound, but this will only take a minute. Honestly, Sam, what are you planning on doing? Have the baby in the bushes?"

She hadn't thought that far ahead, there hadn't been time. When she was first pregnant, they had been traveling the galaxy drumming up support and men for the fight. When they stopped to rest, she'd had the pressing problem of coming up with a weapon to use against the Aschen. Then they'd moved onto Danara where weapon research and development had kept her going day and night. They had only now finished placing the defense web. The rebellion was days away from being fought; she'd think about the baby after. If she survived.

"Ouch, Janet! Do you have to poke me!" she said, drawing the doctor's attention away from her unanswered questions.

"All done. You can sit up," Janet answered. Sam swung herself awkwardly up to sit on the edge of the bed.

"You're measuring 27 and a half weeks. Everything looks good, but promise me you'll get a midwife or someone to keep tabs on you and be there when the baby is born."

Before Sam could answer, Daniel called, "You guys done yet? We've raided the mess for chocolate, Jell-O, and coffee."

"As well as Fruit Loops," Teal'c added. "We have also delivered your belongings to the Gate Room."

Sam jumped up, "Wow, guys! Thanks. You're the best!"

"No coffee for you, Sam. And watch the chocolate, too," Janet ordered.

"Yes, maam," Sam had grinned. She'd gated offworld minutes later.

It was evening before Daniel smuggled the bag she'd left behind off the base and opened it to find several machine components and a paper with a diagram and directions written in Sam's careful script. Scrawled across the bottom in O'Neill's handwriting were the words, "I know you won't like it, but trust me on this." Sam had added a 'please' beneath it.

Jack was right; Daniel didn't like it. But, in the end, at the time Sam had instructed he assembled and activated the CAAD from the mountaintop. Of all the hands that struck against the Aschen in the Stander's Rebellion, his was the only one which struck a blow not because Jack O'Neill asked it of him, but because Sam did.

~*~*~*~*~*~~*~*~*~*~

So many things could have gone wrong with her mission, O'Neill felt sick the whole time she was gone. And that made him feel even worse. He was about to embark on a war. He couldn't afford to let personal feelings cloud his judgment or distract him from what had to be done. He'd been right. Loving her had made him vulnerable.

When she finally appeared, he sat and looked up at her just as he had that day she'd walked away from everything for him. Standers rushed around to hear her report, and he managed to nod at all the right places and maintain a façade of normalcy, but he was running scared inside. It wouldn't do, but he didn't know what to do about it.

Gradually, the others moved off, and she was left standing looking down at him with a slightly confused look on her face.

"Sir?" she asked quietly.

"Everyone fine back home?"

"Oh, yes," she said bursting out with sudden enthusiasm and filling him in on her visit. "Daniel wanted me to talk you into coming back," she said.

"Not going to happen," he said.

"I know. I told him that," she said and they fell silent.

"What is it, Sir?"

He stared at her intently. "Did you think of staying? Daniel'll do what needs done...the Aschen will be outta there and..."

"I...no. No, Sir! Is that what you wanted me to do?"

Never he thought, but he didn't say it. "So they sent real coffee, huh?"

He had promised to talk to her about 'things', and she had never called him on it. Until now. "Sir."

"No, Carter. I didn't want you to stay...I've been sick the whole time you've been gone afraid something would go wrong and you wouldn't be coming back. Or you'd be glad to be home and--"

"I am home, Sir," she said with enough conviction in her voice his heart finally began to beat again.

He leaped up and pulled her to him. "This isn't good, Carter," he said. "I can't lead an army scared to death for you."

"What choice do we have? I'm not sitting home wringing my hands, Sir."

"You could bake cookies?" He joked, but she didn't laugh. "What?"

"I used to bake cookies."

Ouch. "Oh? For Jonas?" he guessed.

She shook her head. "For my dad."

"Oh...you'll see him again. It's not like the Tokra don't have the resources to find us if they wanted. He'll come," he said and then frowned down at her again. "Do I always do that?"

"Do what, Sir?"

"Make empty promises whenever you're upset?"

She shrugged against him, "I guess maybe so?"

"I'm sorry."

"It's ok. It isn't what you say that matters."

"Are you saying, Major, that you don't give proper attention to the words of a superior officer?"

"Oh, can it."

"OK," he agreed easily. The discussion had wandered far away from 'things' and that was fine by him. Talking about it wouldn't change anything. In a very short while, he would order her into battle. In a matter of days, he'd take her and his 'kids' into the line of fire, and some of them were bound to die under his command.

He'd trained the recruits on the planet Danara, a world untouched by the Aschen. A split-second's distance from both Earth and Eonal by StarGate, Danara was many light years away from the Aschen path. It was a planet with the resources and willingness to take up a battle not its own. Their equivalent of an SG team had heard one of the earliest recruitment speeches, taken the information and need home to their government, and returned to officially offer whatever support their people and world could give.

O'Neill had gratefully taken them up on it. He sent them home with the plans for building training grounds and facilities to house the recruits. It was on Danara he had turned farmers into soldiers while Carter devised and built the CAAD's and the defense grid itself largely with resources the Danarian's freely provided. It was on Danara they had hammered out their battle strategy, and it was through Danara's StarGate O'Neill had launched the Standers' Rebellion.

And when the time came, Danara had converted its training facilities into field hospitals and soup kitchens to receive the wounded and weary off the battlefields. It was those Danarian hospitals the Asgard had emptied before finishing the war at Eonal.

Backed by the Asgard, not one Stander died on Eonal's wastelands or in the space above them. If not for the Asgards' untimely, timely arrival, the desperate, but hopeless, attempt to finish that battle would surely have ended in tragedy. But with it, the Aschen fled the galaxy, jumping their ships beyond the rim.

The Asgard, who had taken up the fight so late in the game, followed them through. They were waging another war in their home galaxy where the Replicators threatened to finish what the Aschen had started when they had decimated their population and forced them to take up cloning to keep their race alive. They had already given O'Neill as much time as they dared spare from their own battle.

It was left to the Standers to finish what they had begun. And finish it they did. The defense web was activated twenty-eight hours after the war had begun. The Standers' Rebellion was over.

Burying the dead would take five times as long as fighting the war. Caring for those left wounded and maimed would drag on for months. Finding ways to return fertility to entire worlds would go on for years and be only partially successful. But the fighting was over.

It was a time for celebration, but the Standers' weren't celebrating. First they had to rescue the fallen on Torantay and bury Hakter's valiant dead. The first rescue teams should have reached Torantay the day the war ended. But, they didn't. Danara assumed the Asgard had done for the wounded on Torantay what they had for those on Danara and then taken them on to the fight at Eonal. The dead on Hakter had been lying for longer than those on Torantay. They were their first priority. Those on Eonal assumed Danara had cared for the wounded on Torantay and sent them to join the burying details on Hakter or recover in the hospitals on Danara. With Standers split between Danara, Eonal, and Hakter those who looked to see an individual on one planet could naturally assume they were on another. Even someone like Colonel O'Neill.

The mix-up was deadly. The Rescue of Torantay, when it finally came, was hours away from being no rescue at all. As it was, it came too late for 11,312 of Carter's 15,000.

To O'Neill's battalion the Long Night of Torantay was an endless nightmare of giving what little comfort they could to the wounded and lining up the dead for identification and burial. They'd used up what medical supplies they had very quickly. They'd given their water rations away sip by sip to those who needed it worse than they did. Their battle rations had gone the same way. They had stripped the clothing from their backs to warm others, and still the cries of the wounded continued on. Their feet had grown numb, their arms and backs cramped and felt as though they would never straighten again; yet there seemed to be no end of bodies to be gathered.

For the wounded the night was much worse. The temperature plummeted with the setting of the last sun, and the cold seeped into their shattered bodies and ate away what little reserves they had left. Those spared the torture of consciousness, slipped quietly into death without any awareness. But, most of the wounded lay through the dark hours with the specter of death beside them. Some cried in fear and pain, some begging for release others pleading for life. The men who ministered to them could do precious little for them.

Carter listened to the cries around her and bit her lip to keep from joining them. Her body painfully shook from the cold and, she supposed, shock. Whatever had hit her, had hit her good. She had to fight through pain for each ragged breath, her vision blurred in and out, and her body ached everywhere. Her soul, too. The people she had led into battle were dying all around her. And the baby within her was still. She tried to move her hand to her stomach and almost passed out from the pain. Through it, she thought she heard the colonel call her name, but she had left him to die at Danara.

"Carter," O'Neill called to her again. He was almost certain he'd seen her move when he had kneeled down beside her. Kneeling was no longer a problem; his knees were beyond complaining, his arms and back, too. He couldn't spare but a minute to check her now and again when his duty brought him to her section. This was the first time he had thought she might be conscious. He reached out to check CJ, and Carter gave a small, choked whimper at his touch.

"Hey, Carter, you in there? It's me...the colonel." He'd tried a time or two to call her Sam, but it hadn't felt right. She had never even bothered to make the attempt to switch to Jack. Only in times like this when he had to identify himself to her did it seem awkward.

"Colonel," she rasped out sadly. "You're dead."

"No. I'm not dead. The Asgard finally decided to answer the phone, Carter."

"The Asgard...phone?"

"Yeah, they showed up on Danara after you left and did their little magic trick on us...I'm alive."

She struggled to open her eyes and focus on him in the dark. He briefly turned his flashlight to light his face. "It's me."

She gave a small shake of her head in disbelief, and he winced to see the pain wash over her and hear her stifled gasp of pain. He reached out a hand to her bruised and swollen face.

"The DHD took a hit...we can't dial out, so we're waiting for some help. The fighting has to be over by now, one way or another. They'll come soon, and you'll be all right."

Tears formed in her eyes. "The baby...can't feel..."

"She's been moving every time I've checked her. She's just sleeping right now. She's fine," he promised. She drifted off and he went back to the dead.

~*~*~*~*~*~~*~*~*~*~

She stirred uncomfortably on the hard, cold ground. She had been fading in and out of consciousness for what felt like hours. But, it couldn't have been. The Battle on Eonal would have been long over and help would have come by now. Even if the war had been lost, surely those on Danara would have come for them. No. It was only her pain and fear that made the time seem to pass so slowly. She had managed to work her right hand out from under her to carefully rub her stomach, but the baby had not responded. Please, God, let the colonel know what he is talking about, she prayed. Don't let this be one of his empty promises, let the baby just be sleeping. She'd tried to check her watch, but her left clavicle had to be broken. She'd ended up passed out from the attempt to get her arm to work already. She'd have to wait and ask the colonel for the time when he came by again.

As if on cue, she heard his voice. But it was in the distance, harsh and shouting, "Get away from there! Get back! Get back!" Surprised and frightened cries answered his order, and then an explosion rocked the ground she lay on. It's reverberations echoed through her aching head, and she knew.

Moments before the thought of moving had been too much, but now she struggled to her feet. Waves of pain and nausea rocked her, but she had to find him. She stumbled past rows and rows of injured, nothing but her fear keeping her up and moving.

Standers came toward her, their faces grim. "Major Carter. Let us help you lie down."

"Is he dead?" she asked them desperately.

"We didn't get close enough to see. Others are there...we'll know soon."

They reached out their arms and steadied her. "Maam, please, let us help you. He won't thank us for letting you hurt yourself."

"Take me to him," she begged.

"Maam," they protested.

"Now," she ordered.

"Yes, Maam," they said together. Although O'Neill had never been a soldier to accept orders without question, he'd taught his men better. Supporting her between them, they headed back the way they'd come.

"What happened?" she asked.

"A couple of the fellows were moving the dead. Tripped a live one. The colonel...he was close," the soldier closed his eyes and stifled a sob. "He ordered them back, but he...he threw himself...guess he thought he could shield them or something. The blast hit him pretty hard, Maam. I'm sorry. We're all sorry." She nodded and struggled on.

As they got closer, she could see the group of men squatting around him. He was alive then, he must be or they wouldn't still be with him. One of the men stood and came to her. She recognized him. He'd taken a crash course on field medicine to serve as one of their medics. He was older than most of the Standers, but in his uniform it wasn't usually noticeable. Now, though, he walked stooped over like the old man he was. She knew he would have nothing good to tell her.

"It's...bad, Major. The blast shredded his left leg from the thigh down; did the same to the right, midcalf on. I think...we might save him, just. But I'd need your order to do that, Maam. I can't...not the colonel."

She wanted to shout at him, that, of course, he could and he would do whatever it took to save him, but she knew exactly what he meant.

"I don't want to lose him," she told him weakly.

"I know," he said kindly, "but..." But, would he want to live? Would he hate them for making him?

She looked behind the medic to one of the other soldiers, "You're from Hazeldor, aren't you?" The soldier nodded. Hazeldor. Where only two children had been born in 3 decades. A barren world which would stand as empty and lifeless as Eonal within another 30 years. They hadn't asked Hazeldor for recruits, just whatever supplies and rations it could spare. They hadn't expected a dying world to sacrifice what little it had. Yet percentage-wise, Hazeldor had sent more Standers into battle than any other planet.

"You stood with us, even though..."she began but couldn't continue.

The soldier from a dying world knew what she was being asked. "Yes, Maam. We're cut off, but we're not cut down. We're still Standing. And so will he. Don't worry, Maam. He'll Stand taller on two stubs than most men will ever stand on two legs."

Carter knew the colonel better than anyone, and she believed her. She locked eyes with the medic and said, "You have my order. Do it."

Wispy clouds moved in to cover the moon, and a cold drizzle began to fall as the medic nodded to Samin Grate. Samin Grate had been a butcher from Gresht before the war. Using the colonel's own knife and working by flashlight and what little moonlight there still was, Samin called up his old skills and did what was required of him. O'Neill shifted in and out of consciousness as he worked on him, but Samin could do nothing for him but finish the job. When he was done, he stepped aside to allow the medic to take his place. He carefully wiped the blood from his hands and the colonel's knife, sheathed it, and handed it to Major Carter. Then he stumbled away to be sick.

The medic had turned 68 the day O'Neill recruited him. When he'd stepped forward, he hadn't been sure there was much he could do, and neither had the colonel. He'd tried to persuade him to stay home and help with the war effort in other ways, but he wouldn't have it. O'Neill had relented, changed his name from Qroisthanghei to George, and sent him to the Danarian doctors to train as a medic.

O'Neill had given him a second chance and now he returned the favor. He closed the colonel's surgical wounds with thread Standers carefully unstitched from their clothing. He washed the blood from the colonel's stumps with rain water caught and boiled in their helmets and wrapped them in strips of cloth torn from his own shirt. And then, as there was nothing else he could do for the colonel, he turned back to his work among the other wounded.

~*~*~*~*~*~~*~*~*~*~

O'Neill figured the worse must be over for the time being. They'd left him alone with Carter. She didn't look too good, but then he probably didn't either. He wanted to talk to her, but his voice was harsh from screaming. His body wouldn't quit shaking and his hand trembled when he carefully squeezed hers. He didn't blame her when she winced. It was probably black and blue, if not fractured, from the hold he'd had on it when that butcher had went after his legs. She gingerly shifted beside him.

"What can I do for you, Sir?" she asked.

"Walk away, Carter," he whispered harshly.

"Sir?"

"You don't want stuck with an old cripple...and you deserve better. Go," he motioned with his head and fought down the wave of nausea that brought on.

She was crying. She hated crying. But, the tears wouldn't stop and moving hurt too much to bother wiping them away. "I won't. You know that."

"I'll make it an order, if I have to!" he said angrily. Couldn't she see he was hurting here? Couldn't she make things easy for once in her life?

She hadn't expected him to react any differently, but shouldn't he be passed out or something to give her time to find the strength to deal with this? "I'm not walking away, Sir. Ever. I love you!" He frowned at her and opened his mouth to speak, but she didn't let him, "Look, I'm tired, I hurt, I think the baby's dead, and I've had to see you almost die twice today already. I can't deal with any more of this right now. Just pass out, will you and let me rest!"

Except for when the mess hall ran out of blue Jell-O, he'd hardly ever heard her complain. He'd pushed her too hard. He was instantly sorry. He wanted to spare her pain, not cause it. "If that's how you feel about it," he said, "but this discussion is not over."

She sighed. "You're never going to be easy to love are you?" she asked.

"Suppose not. While, you, on the other hand, are extraordinarily easy to love," he said with biting sarcasm. He should have swallowed it, and he knew it.
The clouds had lifted and in the light of the emerging dawn he could clearly see her battered face close up at his words.

She was silent so long, he thought she'd slipped into unconsciousness before she finally said, "If you can't say it because you mean it...please, don't say it at all."

"Carter, I...I do mean it." She didn't bother to open her eyes. He sighed in frustration. It sent him into a muscle spasm, and by the time he'd somehow survived it, she'd let it go. He gave her an apologetic smile. She really was easy to love, he thought right before she made him change his mind again.

"Look around you, Sir. These people need to know you're not going to just roll over and give up...I need to know you aren't."

"I thought we were going to let that go for a while, Carter," he scowled at her. He really should have listened to her and passed out. He'd taken a few deathblows before and they hadn't left him feeling nearly as badly as he did now. Maybe because he'd been dead through the worst of them while this time he was wretchedly alive. He could see in her face and hear in her voice she wasn't in much better shape then he was. She hadn't even been able to turn away from him to hide her tears. Neither of them was in any shape to be having this argument. But she answered his scowl with a glare anyway. He hated that. It put him in the position of having to do the talking. Of course, that is what he'd promised her when he'd married her. But, still...

"I'm not going to be any good for you, Carter. You'd be better off if I did give it up. What can I possibly do to help you or them? It's my fault any of you are out here in the first place. From where I'm lying, it looks like I wasn't much good to any of you to start with!"

She opened her mouth to say something but never got a chance. An injured Stander lying beyond her beat her to it, "That's not true, Colonel, Sir. You saved us from a death far slower than we've faced tonight. You made our lives count."

From their other side a Stander who'd taken a gut shot the day before and had held on to her tenacious hold on life longer than anyone could have imagined possible, raised her feeble voice enough for them to hear her say, "And our deaths." A violent spasm of pain hushed her for a minute, but she fought on to say, "There'll be children born because of what we did here."

All around them other voices echoed their agreement. It was as though the whole field of Standers, wounded and not, were surrounding him insisting he had been something he had not. "You did that," he said simply.

"No, Sir. We didn't," said Samin Grate stepping forward into his sight. "Most of us didn't even understanding we were dying. Those of us who did, well, we just rolled over and gave it up like the Major was saying. We would have died that way, and any hope for our worlds with us, if not for you."

Another Stander stepped forward, "You told us we needed to go on even with our futures wiped out before our eyes. You told us even if the Aschen had destroyed who we were and stolen our future, we could still Stand and fight. We believed you. Are you saying it was all just more lies?"

All around them everyone had grown still giving him the uncomfortable feeling the entire world, galaxy even, waited for his answer. "No. Of course not. Look what you've done...the Aschen are out of here, you can go home and rebuild your lives...maybe, maybe even find a way to reverse what the Aschen did. You don't need me for that. I'm just a soldier."

"You're more than a soldier to us, Colonel." It was George, the medic, who answered him. "Don't you know that? Don't you know why so many of these people have found the strength to keep going this night? You, Sir. You walk down a row of the wounded and the crying stops and people who were just about to give it all up decide they can hold out a little longer. You give up and what are you telling them? We're only asking you to do what you asked us."

"We want to keep Standing, Colonel. Like you taught us. But we need you. Stand with us, Sir?" Samin Grate begged him tears streaming down his face.

O'Neill frowned at them. He was a soldier; he knew how to command on the battlefield. But, he had never intended to lead them once the war was over. He had had in mind settling on the quiet little planet where he'd married Carter. Him and her, the baby, and a nice fishing spot. And two legs.

"You guys know better than anyone, I don't have a leg to Stand on," he said and didn't wince when he saw his shot hit home. Served them right for ganging up on him and throwing his own words back at him. "Just how do you expect me to Stand like this!" They were quiet before his attack.

He chanced a look at Carter. "You promised you wouldn't walk away," she accused him.

"Well, I think it's safe to say, I was right about that one," he snapped.

"We're not laughing, Sir. These people are telling you they love you and they need you. You can't just turn that aside with jokes."

"No. I can't," he said ashamed. Quiet hung in the night demanding his answer. "All right," he told George. "Help me up a bit."

"Not sure that's a wise thing, Colonel," the old man told him even as he moved to obey and motioned for Samin to give them a hand. It was a very foolish thing to do, but he clung to his consciousness and after a few minutes seemed to have weathered the worst of it. He looked from Stander to Stander. "It's been my honor to Stand with you, to see your bravery and endurance, to be your leader," he told them. "If it's what you want, I'll Stand with you again. We'll overcome the damage the Aschen have done, and we'll find a way to have a future despite what we've lost."

The men of his battalion cheered, and those that were able among the wounded of Torantay struggled to Stand beside them. Carter didn't have the strength to join them on her feet and cheering took more air than her injured chest could pull in. But she lay beside him as Colonel Jack O'Neil, commander of the Stander Army, wept.

The cheers of his Standers almost obscured the sound of the StarGate clanging into action beyond them; the cavalry was coming. The whoosh of the StarGate startled the baby into stirring within her, and Carter cried with relief. The Long Night of Torantay ended as the first sun pushed its way over the horizon and covered them all with its warmth and light.

The Standers' Rebellion was fought and won without Earth's involvement, consent, or even knowledge. The Aschen had been a welcome presence on the planet, promising protection from the Goa'uld and prosperity and health to everyone. And then, without a word of explanation or promise of return they were gone.

When Daniel Jackson activated Sam's machine on top of Cheyenne Mountain, he'd assumed it was some sort of communication device or maybe a homing beacon. He'd never considered it was a weapon; never thought his friends would drag him into a battle he had no desire to fight. When its soft, pulsing hum filled the air around him, he hadn't been sure what he should do. He hadn't expected it to emit an audible signal and considering he was aiding and abetting a known enemy of the state he found it more than a little disturbing. He'd built the thing and started it, but he hadn't meant to sign up for a prison term. He backed carefully away from it, but not too far because he was still hoping he'd hear from Sam.

The unexpected chirping of his cell phone doubled his heart rate. He breathed a sigh of relief when he answered and heard Teal'c's calm voice. But, it didn't last. His friend was calling to report the strange exodus of all the Aschen from the planet.

"That's odd," he said, trying to sound casual while looking with growing alarm at Sam's machine. "Are we looking at a full scale evacuation or a call to battle stations?" he asked. It's a coincidence, he told himself. It can't be the machine.

But, he knew it was. He had trusted Sam. It had never occurred to him she might ask him to paint a big, red target on Earth. And he tried not to believe that was what she'd done even now. He sat down in a discouraged hump next to her machine, but he couldn't convince himself to disconnect its power source. Deep down, he still trusted her. But, he'd have a lot to say if he ever saw Jack O'Neill again.

The next call was from the President. He was needed at the Travel Center. The StarGate had been activated, and they had received a coded transmission on the Center computer. He was to report there immediately to begin work on the translation. He was given clearance back into the abandoned SGC where the Aschen had installed a travel pad in the early days of their time on Earth.

Leaving the device still humming away, he was there within minutes of the call. Security met him at the pad and rushed him to the command center where he found General Hammond dressed in the casual clothes of his retirement and Teal'c in the robes of Chulak. He glanced down at his own sweater and jeans. They had come a long way from the SGC.

"What do we have?" he asked. He desperately wanted to tell the general of the machine he'd left running back in Colorado, but he bit his tongue. If it was the biggest mistake of his life, he didn't want Teal'c or the general drawn into his complicity.

"You tell me, Son," Hammond drawled. "The computer techs have managed to decompress the data stream, but we're not sure what language we're looking at. Get to work on it right away."

It didn't take Daniel long. The computer had not recognized the code, but he did. He had devised it years ago trapped in a cell along with the rest of SG-1. It had simply been an exercise to keep the monotony of imprisonment from driving him mad. Jack had spent the time snapping his watch cover and snarling at everyone, Teal'c had kelnoreemed, and he and Sam had played with numbers and letters to make a code known only to them. The one he was staring at right now. Amazing they'd both remembered it...more or less. There were a few things he had to guess at where either his or Sam's memory must have failed, but the message was clear enough when he was done.

Moments ago the Standers' Army initiated an attack against
the Aschen Confederation. You are asked to stand down and not
interfere in any way. This conflict does not involve you.

The Aschen are not the benevolent allies they appear. An
indictment against them is included in this transmission.
If, after you have had time to verify the facts we present,
you believe it would be of interest to your people to meet
with us, word may be left for us at (a set of coordinates followed).

The Stander Worlds will be seeking ways to minimize or repair
the damage caused by the Aschen. We believe you would be an
ally of great importance in this endeavor and offer you our
hand in friendship and mutual benefit should you wish to receive it."

Daniel felt sick. They had used him to strike a blow against Earth's one chance to defeat the Goa'uld and maybe get Sha're back. His anger and hurt over that was worse than his fear of Sam's machine being found and traced back to him. The discovery of the machine could lead to his imprisonment or even execution, but what did that matter? He had been betrayed by his friends and in return he had betrayed his world. With a sinking heart, he quickly set up a program to decode the large volume of material sent with the message, made excuses to the general, and rushed back to the Mountain.

There he found that the machine had apparently deactivated itself. He stared at it a long time as he replayed Sam's recent visit to the SGC. Despite everything, he couldn't believe she'd changed enough to destroy Earth's chances against the Goa'uld...not without good reason.

He carefully dismantled the device and secreted it away in his apartment. Sooner or later, he expected someone was bound to track down the pulse. When they did, it wouldn't be difficult to link him to it--the President had reached him at the Mountain after all!

The pulse had indeed been noted by several satellites and relay stations around the world, but in the confusion following the Aschen 'disappearance', questions which should have been asked weren't. The pulse was presumed to have been a worldwide warning signal the Aschen themselves had sent in response to the Standers' attack. No one even bothered to pinpoint its location.

In the following days, the SGC was reestablished and given control of the Travel Center until arrangements could be made to move the Gate back to Cheyenne Mountain. General Hammond was reinstated and ordered to try to trace the whereabouts of the Aschen and track down the 'evidence' the Standers had sent to verify its accuracy.

Tracing the Aschen proved to be impossible. Their 'homeworld' where SG-1 had first encountered them was deserted, no sign of them could be found on the planets the Standers had given them coordinates to verify their information, and they had no clue where else to look. The Aschen had been tightlipped about so much, but only now in retrospect did Earth realize how much.

Proving the evidence, however, was all too easy. Earth had come within a hair's breadth of disaster. Their hopes for a decisive blow against the Goa'uld were dashed. The Aschen had abandoned their technology, but without more knowledge it was next to useless. Deploying the bio-weapon without their expertise would be potentially too disastrous to contemplate. Perhaps in time, as they were able to access the Aschen computers and learn more, that option would still be available. For now, Earth was left just as vulnerable to the Goa'uld as ever.

The threat hadn't changed, but the political situation on Earth had been turned upside down. The world now knew of the StarGate and of worlds outside themselves. Though the power struggle over the Gate continued off and on, the revealing of the SGC worked in favor of the United States retaining control of the Gate. The world was fascinated with Gatetravel and was much more interested in seeing it continue than the fight over who got to control the strings. They basically wanted the program to just get on with it. Within the SGC, things quickly reverted to normal operations, albeit with civilian and government observers along for the ride.

The world was not as pleased with the Standers. The danger from the Aschen was past before they even knew it existed while the Goa'uld were still a very real and present danger. The general consensus was it was fine these unknown Standers had rid the world of the Aschen threat, but couldn't they have waited until the Goa'uld had been defeated? The distrust that should have been aimed at the Aschen was instead aimed at the Standers.

Earth felt they were best left alone. After the deceit of the Aschen, they could not take the Standers' offer of peace and mutual aid as gospel fact. Better to let it lie. Any race capable of defeating the Aschen was a potential threat to Earth.

That philosophy held true until the Goa'uld threat increased and threatened to swallow up Earth only weeks after the Aschen were eliminated. Suddenly, contact with the Standers was worth considering after all.

The Standers hadn't had the luxury to idly stand by and wait for Earth's response to their overture.

Their developed worlds had been thrown into chaos with the departing of the Aschen. The underground, which had been established on these worlds prior to the Rebellion, moved to create order and meet basic needs for which their worlds had become dependent on the Aschen. But, the transition was difficult and in some places protracted. They needed to understand the snare they had been freed from, and then brought together with the other Stander Worlds into a loose federation of planets working to reestablish their individual civilizations and find ways to aid one another in repairing the damage done to their worlds.

The less developed worlds were not so devastated by the loss of the Aschen. It was the loss of the men and women they'd sent to the Rebellion that crippled them. Many of the Standers weren't coming home. Over one-third had not survived to see the victory. Spread out equally over all the Stander Worlds this would have been a significant loss. Concentrated heavily on those planets with already limited populations it was a crushing blow. Action had to be taken quickly to provide the manpower they desperately needed to maintain their economies and social structures before they collapsed completely.

A ruling body of some sort had to be forged from the 47 worlds still supporting a population and all their varied peoples, cultures, and languages. Quickly. The task was formidable, but they had defeated the Aschen. Nothing was impossible. A rudimentary Council of Worlds was established within days of the Rebellion, but they had much work to do and a lack of leadership.

Besides the immediate objectives before them, they had the even more essential, long-term need of developing means to counteract the Aschen sterility practices. In a very real sense, they were building up their medical knowledge from scratch. Even the more advanced worlds had depended on the Aschen for their medical needs and allowed their own knowledge and technology to fall by the wayside. The Aschen had left behind a small amount of medical technology the Standers were capable of using, but they wouldn't touch it. They had learned the hard way; all too many of the Aschen 'cures' had not been cures at all.

Besides scrambling to set up the Council of Worlds and meet the immediate and future needs of their newborn federation, the Standers and their ally, the Danarians, were fighting for the lives of the casualties of their Rebellion. Except for the 55,000 the Asgard 'had done their magic trick' on, virtually all those who had Stood against the Aschen were injured to one degree or another; one-fourth of them were permanently maimed or disabled. It would be months before the field hospitals on Danara stood empty.

Among the wounded was the man the Standers believed had the leadership and determination to hold their federation together. He had led them to victory over the Aschen, and they needed him to lead them now. But, he was in no condition to Stand with them.

The beeps and hums around him told him he was in a hospital. A doctor moved into his line of sight. Not Frasier, but a gray-haired man who somehow managed to look the part without a white coat or stethoscope around his neck. O'Neill recognized him by the pinched, worried look on his face. Oh great, he thought, what have I done now?

"What's up, Doc?" he tried to say. He was shocked at how weak his voice sounded and doubted the doctor even heard him.

"Colonel O'Neill?" the doctor questioned him. "Can you hear me?"

"Yeah...I'm here," he managed to choke out wondering where here was. The walls were white and the room was far too bright for the infirmary at home. He blinked at them in confusion. Not home. "Where exactly would that be?" he asked.

The doctor peered at him with a concerned expression on his face and then answered, "You're probably a bit confused with all the pain meds we've pumped into you...you're in one of the field hospitals...on Danara."

Danara. The memories flooded in and drowned him. He was in a field of blood screaming while a madman chopped off his legs.

"Colonel O'Neill, it's over! It's over!" Someone was screaming in his face, holding his shoulders, and crying. George. The madman was done; it was George's turn. Only the man standing over him was dressed not in an ash-gray uniform stained with blood but in a clean blue shirt.

The field was gone, the blood was gone, but the medic remained. In a hospital room. On Danara. "I should have left you home," he gasped out when he understood what was happening.

The old man relaxed his grip on his shoulders and grinned into his face. "He's back. We can skip the sedative...think he's had plenty already," he said to someone out of O'Neill's field of vision.

"Looks like he's lost the IV and pulled stitches again...talk him down why we get him back together," that someone answered.

O'Neill looked at George, "Take it this isn't the first time I've been around?"

"You keep flashing back..." George answered, roughly wiping his cheeks and snuffling.

O'Neill decided not to notice. "Carter?" he asked instead.

"She's alive. So's the boy."

"Boy?"

"Yep, boy," the old man shrugged philosophically. "Nothing wrong with having a boy. Especially seeing he's so healthy the doctors keep shaking their heads about it. Seems the shape of your wife, he should be dead by now."

"How is she?"

"Well, Colonel," the gray-haired doctor pushed his way back into O'Neill's awareness to say, "I won't lie to you. She's not in good shape: multiple fractures head to thigh on her left side, trauma to her lungs, kidneys, and more significantly, her heart. Her left shoulder is basically shattered. The surgeons think they can put it back together with pins and plates, but...it's questionable if she'll ever regain the use of it again. The surgery will have to come later, right now we're just trying to get her stabilized...her blood pressure keeps bottoming out and her heart beat is erratic. Her pain level is unacceptably high, but we've already pushed the meds beyond anything anyone is comfortable with as far as the baby is concerned. We'd deliver him right now and hope he'd make it, but she'd never survive the surgery."

"Is she conscious?" he asked.

"She surfaces from time to time to ask about you, the baby, the men."

"Can I see her?"

"Colonel, I'm afraid you're not in much better shape than your wife. George and the others did a great job on you out in the field, but there was nothing they could do about the massive amount of blood you lost after the explosion. The strain on your heart from that loss coupled with the severe trauma of your injuries...personally, I thought you were a dead man when they brought you in. Second time in two days--I was the receiving doctor when they brought you back from Hakter," he explained. "All the blood you'd banked before the war, plasma, too...we pumped it into you then, though it was useless really. It ran out faster than we poured it in. If the Asgard had come even moments later...anyway, that's why we lowered your meds hoping you'd come to. We need to contact Earth."

"Earth?"

"Yes, presumably they'd have compatible blood...plasma if nothing else. There's none here for you. If we could contact your world--"

"No!"

"Colonel, I don't think you're going to make it if we don't."

O'Neill closed his eyes against the weariness and pain assailing him. "I can't..."

"You just have to give us the Gate coordinates, Sir," George encouraged him.

"You don't understand...they think I'm a traitor," he said as though it should explain everything. But it didn't. He dredged up the strength to continue, "All my adult life, I've served my country...the last few years, not just my country, the whole world. Now they think I'm a traitor. But, that's ok, see, 'cause I'm not. I can live with it, you know? But, if I was to give out Earth's coordinates..."

George broke in, "Colonel, we are your friends. You have to know that! You're lying in that bed because you were willing to fight and die for us. You must trust us!"

O'Neill shook his head, "I'm here because of Earth." George blinked against the truth in his voice. "I won't give you the coordinates...not for me. Carter?" The doctor and medic both shook their heads: blood from Earth might make the difference for him, but there was nothing more the doctors on Earth were likely to do for Carter than those on Danara were already doing. She would live or die regardless.

"She was arguing with me..." he protested weakly against what he saw in their faces.

"I've heard that," the doctor answered. "Frankly, I find it unbelievable."

"It's the truth though," George asserted.

O'Neill met George's eyes, "She made me promise I wouldn't give up...she didn't have that right if she's not sticking around."

The old Stander returned his look, "She's a strong one, Colonel. Don't be writing her off quite yet." He turned to the doctor and said, "None of you should."

He was right, of course. She survived day-by-day, slowly gaining strength until most of the doctors began to believe she was actually going to make it. Even then, several wanted to deliver the baby as soon as possible, but she would not consider it and the colonel refused to grant permission against her wishes.

In time, she was strong enough for the surgery on her shoulder. They spent hours rebuilding it with pins, screws, and plates and what bone they could salvage. And hours more removing bone fragments, finally having to close before they'd gotten them all or lose her on the table. Even after all their careful work, they still couldn't say whether she'd be able to ever use it again. The surgery set her back more than they had hoped, but she rallied and the doctors stopped whispering imminent doom in O'Neill's ears.

With access to compatible blood and plasma, his own initial recovery would have been relatively quick. Unfortunately, without it the Danarian doctors had few alternatives. By pumping saline solutions into him, they were able to keep his blood pressure from completely bottoming out, and by treating him in a hyperbaric chamber to hyperoxygenate what blood he did have, they managed to keep his organs oxygenated enough to avoid permanent damage. But, about the time Earth accepted the Standers' indictment against the Aschen, he was far from out of danger...and so was the Federation his actions had brought about.

Beeps and alarms going off...feet running, hushed voices issuing frantic orders. She came to alertness with the fear already rising in her throat. Gentle hands pulled her away from where she'd been curled at his side, settled her into a wheelchair, and pushed her out of the way. A doctor drew away from those huddled around him and came to stand beside her.

"His heart's failing...the amount of blood he lost is just too much." She felt the doctor's unspoken accusation in his words. If he died, it would be as much her fault as the Aschen's. When he'd refused to give them Earth's coordinates, they'd tried to talk her into it and she'd refused as well. The doctor cleared his throat and continued, "He's developed another fever...if it's an infection and we can't get it under control immediately--" he left unsaid what she couldn't bear to hear.

She was still at his bedside moments later when the news of Kaiyontra arrived. She thought the two blows together might be enough to kill her. She was glad he was unconscious and didn't have to know. If he was going to die, better he never had to know.

She looked into the mirror at a self she barely recognized. Deep and haunted eyes gazed back at her as though she were the stranger. The bruises on her face had faded to pale green splotches here and there. Only a few of the larger cuts and scrapes hadn't yet healed...they stood out as angry, red marks in her pale, gaunt face. Someone ran a comb through her hair and pulled a clean robe over her gown.

It was like facing Torantay all over again; leaving him for dead on Danara to lead her few against overwhelming numbers. They'd fussed around her then too, stitching wounds and changing body armor, but, in the end, it had fallen to her to be the one to give the word and lead them into the Bloodbath of Torantay. And today, she'd be the one to deliver this blow to all they'd fought for. The defense web linking all the StarGates of the Standers' worlds together carried with it the ability to activate the Gates simultaneously so the entire Federation could be addressed at one time. It had, up until now, never been used, but at her nod, the link was opened.

She struggled to say the words. They were the hardest she had ever spoken. "This is Carter ...it was just discovered the people of Kaiyontra chose to give up their fight. They are all dead. They committed mass suicide in the night." She faltered as tears choked her. Hands reached out to steady her. Somehow she managed to shake off both them and the tears to continue.

"This is not why we got up from the beaches of Hakter and went on to Stand at Torantay and Eonal. This is not why we held out through the Long Night. This is not why we have struggled through these endless days of pain and healing... please, we have only just finished burying the dead, the hospitals of Danara are still full of the wounded...give us time to seek solutions, to find ways to go on from here. Give us time to get our feet under us that we may Stand together for the future...please.

"Some might say that those on Kaiyontra chose life: not for themselves but for others we might be free to focus on now that their fight is ended. Some might call this a brave sacrifice...but, but...it isn't...it wasn't.

"This was an act of despair. I recognize it, because I've fought it from the moment the colonel fell at Hakter. You know it, too. You've fought it everyday knowing your worlds are dying out before your eyes. The colonel's fighting it even now. But I know the colonel. He will fight through this, and he will Stand again. And we can do the same! I call upon everyone of you to not give in to despair, to not follow Kaiyontra!"

The answers began to come immediately, harsh determined voices claiming hold on life and denying the specter of hopelessness and despair which had silenced an entire world and its people:

"Atal Stands and will continue to Stand."

"Gresht Stands and will not fall."

"This is Bralt on Hazeldor...we Stood with you at Hakter, Major, and followed you to Torantay. Glrat and Furta took the battle onto Eonal...you know we will Stand with you until there is none left to Stand."

There could be no answer from the dead worlds of Eonal, Torantay, Hakter, and now Kaiyontra, but all the others responded swearing their commitment to life. She clung to each of their statements as a lifeline, and the infant Standers' Federation pulled itself to a Stand.

Less than a week later, white-faced, gaunt, and very weak, their leader did the same. Colonel O'Neill painfully pulled himself to a Stand on prosthetic limbs to accept the Presidency of the Council of Worlds. Those who had followed him into battle had never doubted his ability to Stand against the odds. His unanimous election to the post had been made while the doctors were still holding out little or no hope for him.

"I think you'd be better off with someone besides an old, washed-out soldier to lead this new battle we're engaging in," he said in a voice so weak they'd had to put a mike on him. "But I promised the Standers on Torantay I'd Stand with them to regain what the Aschen took from us...if this is what you want, then it's what I'll do."

The shouts of affirmation blaring through the StarGate link in reply were enough to almost knock him down. His recovery was far from over. The prosthetics were cumbersome and his stumps painfully sensitive. The blood loss had been tremendous leaving him susceptible to wild blood pressure fluctuations, extreme weakness, slowed healing, and a continual overtaxing of his already failing heart. Phantom pains racked his body and threw him back to the scene of his amputations again and again. He needed time to rest and recover. Time to hold his wife and come to grips with all that had happened.

But there wasn't time to give it to him...he was needed to help set up the Council of Worlds. He was far too unstable to come to the Council so his hospital room became its first chambers. He faded in and out of sleep to the sound of voices arguing the fine points of its constitution as it was drafted and ratified at his bedside.

Council members were almost constantly in his room, working quietly while he or Carter slept and arguing vigorously when they were awake. Their arms steadied him when he took his first faltering steps on his prosthetics or overbalanced when he set at his bedside, massaged his spasming legs when he'd sat up too long, and performed his physical therapy as ably as any of his therapists. They called for his next dose of pain meds before he knew he needed it, and insisted he rest when he thought he could still push on.

And when he screamed on the field of Torantay, they wept in the hallway giving him what privacy they could until he returned to them on Danara. He hated every minute of it, but time was of the essence and only by working quickly could they hope to hold on to the more advanced worlds only loosely tied to the Federation. Without them the more devastated worlds had no chance for recovery or even survival.

The doctors weren't happy about it, but short of complete sedation they found it impossible to keep him down. And Carter was no different. Following Kaiyontra, she was driven to get the fertility research underway. She met with anyone who might have the training to begin that work at once. She had hoped they'd hear quickly from Earth. When they didn't, her disappointment was outweighed by her fear that without Earth's help whatever fix they were able to arrive at would come too late for Hazeldor and other of the planets with quickly dwindling populations. She couldn't allow the doctors' warnings to slow her down.

The physical battles she was fighting already kept her from accomplishing even a fraction of what she felt desperate to complete. On top of the demands her pregnancy made on her body, her injuries and therapies left her weak and exhausted. She spent more time sleeping than anything else, yet the doctors still felt she didn't take their concerns for her health seriously.

The opposite was actually the truth. If something happened, it was imperative that someone among the Standers understood the makings and maintaining of the CAADs and defense web. To that end, she spent what time she could diagramming every inch of her devices and writing out clear directions for anything that might require repair. It was a difficult task to perform one-armed from a hospital bed. Especially once the Council moved in. Mostly though, especially in the beginning, she slept through their noise; propped up in her bed next to the colonel's or curled on her side beside him in his.

She commandeered a nearby room to work in as her strength returned. Spending more and more time awake as her physical condition improved, she left them to their meetings to spend most of the day working alone or in Physical Therapy where the therapists tortured her in the hopes she might be able to use her left arm again. It was a painful process, but they were pleased with her progress.

The nights they spent together fighting through their own demons of pain and memories. His almost always came in the violent, loud thrashings of Torantay as though that one terrible incident had driven away everything else from his overworked subconscious. George was never far away and together they'd eventually bring him back to them until the next time. Hers came in vivid nightmares which jolted her awake and left her trembling in their wake. He'd hold her close while her breathing gradually calmed and she was able to sleep again.

He never asked and she never told him what they were about. The blast tearing through his body armor and into his chest on Hakter; his heart beating raggedly under her clenched fist as she tried to staunch the bleeding. Standers falling all around her while she desperately struggled up a hill she could never top. Lying in the dark surrounded by the cries and moans of the fallen on Torantay, fearing his child was dead within her and he was lying cold and lifeless on Danara. Hearing the explosion ripping him apart; watching the blood pouring out of what had once been his legs. And, of course, his nightmare was hers as well.

And there were others, too. The weird, terrifying nightmares of pregnancy made all the worse because of everything that had happened. Sad dreams of walking away from her dad, Daniel, Teal'c, her brother, even at times General Hammond. Finding herself on an unknown planet alone with his dead body. Nothing he needed to know about. Nothing she wanted to talk about it. She preferred even the time spent in Physical Therapy to the nights.

Unknowingly, George stepped into the colonel's shoes keeping a close eye on her: making sure she got her meds, ate, and rested. The old man had refused to go home, insisting his place was at the colonel's side and by extension then, hers. They'd both learned to depend on him and to sleep with his raspy snoring in the room. He'd been given a bed in a nearby room when one had opened up, but more often than not he got what little sleep he could on a cot in their room. He didn't let much escape his notice, but he did fail to recognize labor when it came. He could hardly be blamed as his training had skipped the pertinent material assuming it wouldn't be needed on a battlefield.

Working and refusing to acknowledge the contractions, she spent the day in denial. Only when night fell and she lay beside the colonel did she admit to herself she was in labor. The contractions had obligingly stayed irregular, short, and only occasionally intense enough to make her breath catch throughout the day. But now they came in ever stronger, relentless waves and refused to be ignored.

"Sir," she whispered into the dimly lit room and felt his arms encircling her.

"It'll be all right, Carter," he promised her. "You'll do just fine...and so will he."

She blinked back tears and tried to believe him. "You want George to call in the docs?" he asked knowing the old man couldn't be too far away.

"No! Not yet," she said. Even her orthopedist had found a reason he should be called when she started labor. Along with her internist, cardiologist, pulmonologist, two obstetricians who were adamant she would be wise to accept a c-section, and the pediatricians. Janet Frasier needn't have worried, this baby wasn't going to be born unassisted in the bushes: there would be enough doctors present to run a small hospital.

"Kay," he said and held her through the contractions. He could smell her fear, or maybe it was his own. The OB's and the cardiologist had each had a go at warning him of everything that could go wrong. He wished they'd kept their mouths shut.

But, he didn't have to be a psych to know only part of his fear was for Carter. She'd survived four years on SG-1 and Torantay; he had to believe she'd survive this.

He was afraid of being a father again. He'd been there in the temple when Baby Danel had been born, heard the cries of the mother and the ineffectual, worried words of the father, but he hadn't been there when Charlie was born. By the time he'd returned from the field it was all said and done. He was glad to have missed it. He'd never even asked Sarah about the birth. He'd held the little bundle that was his son and promised to be a good father. But, he'd failed miserably. Charlie was dead and he was to blame. He might as well have pulled the trigger himself. He didn't want that responsibility again.

And worse, he'd already failed this son. Already sent him onto the battlefield. Already almost cost him his life. He was afraid to look into the eyes of Carter's son knowing he'd counted his potential death an 'acceptable' risk in the war against the Aschen.

But, the contractions pulled them both farther and farther along. He'd broken two bones in her hand the night Samin Grate did his job, and her hold on his made him think she might return the favor. He rubbed his other hand on her lower back and wished he knew what to do for her. She labored silently, meeting each contraction with a death grip on his hand and a wide-eyed search for his eyes. Once she found him, she would relax into the contraction as though something she saw in him gave her the strength to ride it out. It left him oddly humbled.

Sometime in the night, George slipped out of the room for backup. The medical personnel entered quietly but thankfully kept their distance. They remained in the background except for applying more monitors as unobtrusively as they could, checking to make sure her IV port was still working, and topping off his own meds. He wasn't sure she was even aware they were there. Only when her breathing became loud and ragged and she cried out with the contractions did the Danarian midwife join them at the bed.

"It's all right, Sam," she said reassuringly. "You're doing fine. Almost done now." It was odd for O'Neill to hear that 'Sam'. The Standers as a whole referred to her as Major. It had been a long time since he had had the energy to wonder how hard she found the life to which he had brought her. Now he wondered, had she grown used to being Major Carter everyday to everyone around her? Did she daily long to hear Daniel or Janet or anyone at all call her Sam instead of a title of respect? Was she as sick as he was of always being the hero to those around them? As disgusted as he was they were erecting statues of them at the Council Chambers being built on Eonal?

"I'm sorry," he whispered to her, but she was far away from him, yelling back to the midwife, "I don't think so! I can't do this!"

The midwife gave a soft laugh. "Everyone says that, but you're doing beautifully. Look," she said laying out her birth supplies on the bedside table. "Your baby will be wrapped in this blanket and in your arms very, very soon now." Carter opened her mouth to answer but was hit by such a powerful contraction she drew in a breath to scream and found herself pushing instead.

That's it," the midwife said, "push whenever you need to." And she did, again and again. Sweat ran off of her and mingled with her tears. He could feel the anxiety of the doctors behind him rising with each push. They didn't come running so he knew the monitors must be showing things were fine, but he knew they weren't. He rubbed her hips and willed her his energy; brushed her damp hair from her eyes and wished everything over for her. "I'm sorry," he told her over and over again through each contraction, until she hissed at him to stop, just stop.

Suddenly in midpush she began to scream and move away from the midwife's hands. "That's your baby, Sam," the midwife told her. "Don't try to run away from him, stay with him. That's his head you're feeling...another push and it will be out. Reach down and feel it if you want...lots of hair on this boy. There we are...head's out. Rest a minute, no hurry here," the midwife said as she quickly ran an expert hand around the head feeling for the cord. O'Neill looked down at his son, still more in his mother than not, and couldn't begin to describe the feelings running through him.

"Here, Dad," the midwife told him. She guided him into place and with the next contraction the baby flopped into his waiting hands. For a brief second he held his son warm and wet against him and then he brought him up to Carter and gently settled him in her good arm.

"You're beautiful. You're perfect. And we love you," she told the baby even before she'd really seen him. She was right. The baby was perfect. He'd somehow survived the devastation of his father's war and been born perfect and whole. O'Neill could almost hear the relieved sighs of the docs behind him. Carter was fine and so was the baby. Careful not to lose his balance and fall on them, he gingerly leaned over and kissed the baby's soft head still matted with vernix and blood. Then he kissed her forehead and said, "You're beautiful and perfect, and I love you." She tore her eyes away from the baby long enough to smile at him. He smiled back. Life was exceptionally good.

Chance Jacob O'Neill was born at 2:22 in the Danarian morning, 20 and 3/4 inches long, 7 pounds even. When the news went over the Link, people on 46 separate worlds let out the collective breath they had held in fear for him in a rush of joy and optimism. The youngest Torantay Stander was alive and well. More than that, the symbol of all their hopes, the reason for all their sacrifices had endured the worst and emerged unscathed. His safe delivery came to symbolize the true end of the war in the hearts of the Standers...the dead were mourned and buried, it was time to leave them behind and embrace the future.

That day was also the day they finally heard from Earth.

The first thing Daniel noted about the planet designated as a contact point between Earth and the Standers was the smell...definitely a good deal more sulfur in the atmosphere than the standard Earth brew. It was like visiting Yellowstone.

The second thing was the computer interface sheltered in a metallic cabinet next to the GDO. It was as likely a place for a message as any. But there was no welcoming message on its screen when they booted it up. He shrugged at his teammates and then tentatively pecked out, "We're the envoy from Earth to make contact with the Stander Worlds." He hit 'Enter' and jumped back when the Gate began to dial. The others on his team took cover and raised their weapons as the Gate whooshed open, but it closed almost instantly. Apparently the computer activated the Gate to send their message and then shut it down. A nice piece of engineering he thought. Sam would love it.

They hunkered down to wait for an answer. It came less than two hours later. SG-1 took cover and waited with weapons ready when the Gate activated. Daniel felt it hardly made them seem like a peaceable envoy, but he wasn't in command.

He was still undecided about the new SG-1. Two military men had replaced Sam and Jack. They were competent and efficient enough on the field. Colonel Ramsey, the new CO of the group, had neither a sense of humor nor a weakness for eager archeologists who wanted to spend just an extra few minutes checking out the ruins. Major Drakel was a by-the-book type of officer. As the saying goes, he did have a sense of humor; he just didn't exercise it very frequently. Neither man had Sam's quick intelligence, optimism, enthusiasm, or curiosity. He missed the spark of discovery they'd shared going through the Gate to new worlds and the intellectual conversations they'd had along the way. For that matter, he even missed the dumb conversations he'd had with Jack. This new team hadn't gotten him killed and that had to count for something, but he missed the old SG-1.

He realized he was almost hoping it would be his old teammates themselves coming through the Gate to meet with them, but it wasn't. Instead it was a group of three well-armed soldiers. Older than he might have expected. Humanoid. They didn't seem to take offense at the weapons raised in their direction. But then they came through with weapons at the ready as well.

"You are those from Earth?" one of them asked.

"Yes, I'm Daniel Jackson, this is Teal'c, Colonel Ramsey, and Major Drakel."

"We are Standers," the first man said without introducing himself or his companions. "When we did not hear from you, we assumed you were uninterested in an alliance."

"Yes, well, perhaps you can understand, after the Aschen we're a little leery of alliances."

"Yet, you seek one now?"

"Yes."

The Standers obviously didn't believe in beating around the bush. "To offer aid or seek it?" they immediately asked.

"Actually, we've come looking for help," Daniel admitted cautiously.

"There is nothing we can do for you," came the abrupt reply.

"How do you know? You don't even know what we are asking do you? Are you aware of the situation with the Goa'uld?" This was definitely not going the way he'd planned.

"We are aware of the Goa'uld. We understood the Aschen had dealt with them."

"You ran them off before they had time."

"I see," the Stander answered while exchanging concerned looks with his friends. "You are then still vulnerable to their attacks?"

"Yes," he answered, "and they are preparing one even as we speak. We'd appreciate your help."

"I don't believe we can offer any but the Council would have to decide that. Brief me on your predicament, I will take it before the Council immediately upon our return."

Colonel Ramsey quickly explained the situation to the Standers. They seemed visibly upset by what they heard.

"Very well," their spokesman said, "I do not believe there is much we will be able to do to aid you, but I will present your need to the Council."

Daniel blinked at the Stander, "You have an army capable of defeating the Aschen...it is hard to believe you can't stand against the Goa'uld."

The Stander nodded and said, "It is understandable you would think so, but such is not the case. We defeated the Aschen not by military might so much as moral right and...desperation. The alternative was too devastating to contemplate. We won because we had to. And it was a costly all-out offensive using all of our resources and that of our allies. Even if we'd had the resources, we didn't have the manpower to sustain the battle for any length of time...our losses were great."

"We'd still be interested in just how you waged your war...what weapons you found effective against the Aschen. Perhaps they would work against the Goa'uld."

"I am afraid not. The weapon was designed to specifically target the Aschen. It was based on an inherent physiological weakness. It would not be useful against another race."

"Nevertheless?" Daniel prodded hopefully, but the Stander stood fast in his refusal.

"We depart at once," he announced. "We will return in 24 hours...Earth time."

"Earth time," Drakel said. "Are you that familiar with our planet?"

The Stander shrugged and said, "We are a federation of many worlds, each with their own times and seasons, it was necessary to pick a standard time to coordinate them all. Earth time was chosen for simplicity."

He turned away as though his explanation was complete, but it raised more questions than it answered for all the Earthers but Daniel. He could recognize Jack O'Neill in that statement, though how he'd convinced an entire alien army to accept his egocentric arguments was beyond Daniel. Probably by sheer force of character. He could clearly remember one of their earliest missions when Jack had declared, "Let's keep it simple. I really don't care if this planet's day is 2 hours or 30. If my watch says it's 0800, it's 0800--time for breakfast!"

Before the others could question the Stander more, he motioned for his men and moved toward the DHD. "We will leave first so you might be sure we will not read Earth's coordinates from the DHD when you are gone. We--"

"Excuse me," Colonel Ramsey interrupted him, "Are you saying you are familiar with Earth time, but we're to believe you do not know our coordinates?"

"Yes."

"How's that?"

The Stander frowned at him before answering, "We have no need to know your planet's coordinates as you are not part of our Federation."

"Obviously, you do have access to our coordinates. You sent a message to our world during your war. But that's not exactly what I meant," the colonel stated. "You seem to know a good deal about us...who else in the entire galaxy calls the Gate control the Dial Home Device?"

The Standers exchanged puzzled looks. One of them asked the colonel, "That's what DHD stands for?"

"Yes, what did you think it meant?" The Standers shrugged in unison and didn't venture an answer.

"It is irrelevant," their spokesman finally stated beginning to dial the DHD.

"I don't think your knowledge of our world is irrelevant," the colonel answered shortly, and Daniel feared the whole meeting was taking an ominous turn. But, the Standers were more levelheaded than most of the aliens he'd run into through the years. They did not bristle at the colonel's suspicions but simply sighed as though they found them inconvenient.

"Our knowledge of your world and ways is innocent, Colonel Ramsey," the spokesman assured him. "There are those among us from your world. They, of course, know your coordinates, but we do not."

"O'Neill," Major Drakel said with disgust. The Standers did not deny or confirm his guess. They simply ignored it and continued moving up the steps to the Gate.

"We understood you were in a hurry for our answer?" their spokesman said. "We should go."

"You should be aware that O'Neill is a traitor to our planet," Ramsey called after them.

Two of the Standers stepped through the Gate without replying, but one turned and looked directly at Ramsey. "And you should be aware on our worlds O'Neill is a hero." Daniel wouldn't have been surprised if that was the last they heard from the Standers, but they returned right on time the next day.

"We can offer you very little in your fight against the Goa'uld," their spokesman said, ignoring the colonel and speaking directly to Daniel. "However, I am able to offer you these," he said, motioning toward two boxes they'd carried through the Gate with them.

"And these are?" the colonel demanded. The cardboard boxes weren't large and didn't look at all helpful in a battle against the Goa'uld.

"Possible solutions to your problem. There is also a list of available resources we can give in support of your battle...let us know which of them you can use and where you will want them delivered."

"And the price would be?"

"There is no price. We deeply regret our actions have exposed Earth to this threat. We feel responsible at least in part for your present danger. We hope what little we can offer will be accepted as a token of our apologies. If there was more we could do, we would." The meeting was over.

The list of possible resources ran mainly to grains though it also included several raw materials and a limited stockpile of explosives and projectile type weapons. The boxes contained student notebooks...those of students of military strategy. A Goa'uld attack upon Earth had been theorized as a teaching exercise. They held in their hands the results with penciled-in notes on the sides asking for and receiving clarification on certain points and pointing out faults in reasoning in others. The handwriting on the sides was easily recognizable to both Daniel and Teal'c: Carter's careful script and O'Neill's scrawl.

"We should not find it surprising that O'Neill would have joined a group fighting the Aschen...that is after all why he left," Teal'c calmly informed General Hammond back at the base as they looked at the notebooks.

A loose page was stuck into the top notebook...

"Take a look at these if you get a minute and let me know what you think," O'Neill had scribbled on the top.

Underneath, Sam had written, "Quite a group you've got there, my money's on Hatschit. You should make him general. His plan seems the most feasible though some of the others also have merit...I've added notes and sketched out some ideas for technical support."

"Thanks," he'd written, presumably at a later date as he'd changed his blue, fine-tipped pen for a wide, black one. "Hey, don't you know colonel is the highest rank in this man's army? Hatch is good, but not that good!"

"Sure. Whatever. If you're not going to put him to good use, send him my way. I could use him."

"Nope. Hands off."

Hammond shook his head and grinned. SG-1 had often scrawled notes on yellow legal pads and passed them back and forth during long briefings, and he'd always looked the other way. It was good to know they were up to the same old tricks even if the paper they now wrote on was an odd gray with faint green stripes.

Carter had written next, "About the funding?"

"No can do...you've got the max."

"Promise the Itarians a Harvester if we win."

Apparently both grammar and syntax flew out the window at the audacity of her suggestion. "!? you're the one who keeps telling me once we win and they're ours we'll have to be careful with them...no replacement parts if they go down"

"There's no 'once we win' if we don't have the funding either, Sir."

"you're serious! sell a harvester?"

"Yes."

At this point, O'Neill had apparently appealed to someone else, "carter wants to sell a harvester to fund the web"

An unfamiliar hand joined into the conversation, "We don't have a Harvester to sell?"

Carter had responded, "We will once we win. We'll have plenty."

"How would we get one to Itaria?" the third party had replied.

"carter?"

"I'll figure that out when the time comes."

The unknown writer had taken the pad back, "You think they are capable of interstellar travel?"

"The Aschen had to deliver them somehow."

"It's called a cargo bay carter! i can't offer them something we can't deliver!"

"If I can't figure it out, I'll harvest their crops by hand myself! Danara can't fund the entire web alone. The Itarians are gamblers. They'll pay for the chance to have first dibs on one. Otherwise, we're left wasting precious time drumming up trade partners. We'll lose Kaiyontra and Hazeldor at the least and hit too late to spare Earth. Sir, please."

"Ok. I'll bring it up after the break."

"Thanks! I love you." Hammond blinked at that one. He was certain those words had never been scribbled on any of the yellow legal pads around his briefing table.

"Ok, if they won't sell a harvester, I'll give up my bubble gum fund."

"Wow, thanks, Sir. How about your baseball cards?"

"Don't push it too far, Major."

That was the end of the conversation. Hammond tucked the sheet of paper in his pocket. "Right, let's get these to the staff for processing...maybe they've come up with something new."

And they had. The Standers' approach was a fresh way of looking at an old problem. The powers that be decided Carter's assessment of Hatschit's plan was accurate. They put their money and their planet's fate on it with the revisions the two ex-Air Force officers had scribbled in its margins.

The plan was in easily recognizable military terms familiar to any member of the United States Air Force. The occasional unfamiliar term was often as not translated under O'Neill's "What is a grathiilsihnf?????? Speak English!" The theoretical engineering work was not so easy to translate. Apparently, Carter was more willing to work with the Standers in their own language. She hadn't demanded they work in English and had written her ideas and notes for them in terms they'd easily understand. To be successful the engineers had to flesh out and build two of her 'sketched out ideas for technical support' and without a translation the weapon development would have stalled. Fortunately, tucked in the last notebook was a handwritten lexicon along with a few supplemental diagrams and notes. It was easy to see Carter had hastily jotted them down, probably in just the last day. They were almost unreadable and barely recognizable as her usually careful work, but they'd do.

Daniel was disappointed to find she'd added no personal note...no miss everyone or even a good luck. He wondered what life they'd found among the Standers. Was she happy there with Jack? Was she content working and living among strangers? Was it really enough for her to have only sent the notebooks and not have come herself to fight for Earth one more time? Granted, from Janet's calculations her baby was due in the next few weeks and she wasn't exactly in fighting form; but it wasn't like they were asking her to fight on the battlefield. And where was Jack? Sure he'd been declared a traitor, but he could at least offer his services, couldn't he?

Daniel shook off his anger and sighed. At least now they knew she'd survived the Aschen Rebellion and had a clue where they were. It was more than they'd known before and he should probably be happy with it. And thankful. The Stander strategy and weapons proved effective against the Goa'uld. The threat was beaten back at least for the time being.

Interest on Earth turned to the Standers. Twice now they had intervened on Earth's behalf, and perhaps it was time to make peace overtures and learn more of these unknown allies. The list of available resources they had to share was also of considerable interest to many. With plans to expand onto more than a dozen planets within the next decade, Earth could use many of the raw materials and grains the Standers apparently had in excess.

SG-1 returned to the contact point and sent a message asking for a meeting. The Standers who answered their call were not those they had already met. And this time they were graced with an introduction.

"I am Fratith of the Council of Worlds...we hoped you would return and give us news of your victory against the Goa'uld," the oldest said formally in return to Daniel's introductions.

"Yes, well, with your help we were able to drive the Goa'uld away for now. What you gave us was very helpful. Thank you."

"You are most welcome."

"We're interested in the alliance...if it's still an option."

"The offer is ever open to Earth. We know the debt we owe you," Frathith answered, "and our need for your knowledge is still great."

"Debt you owe us?"

"Yes, we had hoped you would avail yourselves of the resources we offered?"

"Many of the items you indicated would be of great use to us. We are interested in perhaps a trade agreement?"

"This is not something I can discuss without the other Council members. I can offer only those supplies already mentioned in good will until a meeting between you and the Council can be arranged."

"That would be fine with us...we are only here to make initial overtures ourselves. We are not authorized to go further than that."

"Well then, when you are prepared please send for us...the Council can be convened at anytime."

The President of the United States had an adventurous streak much to the horror of the Secret Service. He decided it was high time to take a trip through the Gate. The meeting with the Standers seemed like a perfect opportunity for him to get the chance. No one could deny here was a mission with great significance worthy of a high profile government figure. The Standers would have no reason to expect his presence so were unlikely to plan an attack if they were so inclined. The President was insistent and the group which Gated into the contact point was much larger and of a far greater import than with which Daniel had expected to be traveling.

It was made up of the four members of SG-1 along with General Hammond and Dr. Frasier from the SGC; the 6-man Secret Service unit; the President; Senator Kinsey; Senator Darnell; a 3-man news crew; and a Mr. Jonson and a Mr. Catral from the UN. The Standers who answered their call barely blinked at the large number of their contingent. Making introductions yet again, Daniel was fairly confident the Standers had no clue to the significance of the presence of the President of the United States and two highly placed Senators. The Standers waved aside the introduction as unimportant.

"We're just to bring you along to Eonal...hardly worth your time to spout out all those names," the leader of the group told him. "It's for the Council to hear. We're just the escort."

Eonal. Daniel remembered it had figured heavily in the accusations the Standers had sent to Earth, but they had not been given its Gate address for verification. As they stepped onto the once barren world, he knew why. The Aschen may have abandoned the world, but the Standers had reclaimed it. All around the Gate there were various buildings and groups of people moving about. The buildings themselves were similar to the temporary structures they'd erected on various scientific surveys. They were simple and practical as though they were meant to not distract from the barren landscape of dry rock and desert surrounding them.

A dirt path led from the Gate to the buildings. All along it were stone monuments and statues, starting right at the Gate where stone soldiers climbed over the right side of the Gate steps and strung out towards a ridge 30 feet out. They crouched with weapons ready and behind them three soldiers tore packs from their backs as they ran behind the line of their fellow soldiers.

Daniel motioned towards the monument in enquiry.

"These are the Eonal 107," their escort explained. "They survived the Bloodbath at Torantay and came to finish the war here."

"And were successful, obviously," Daniel said impressed that 107 soldiers had been able to defeat the Aschen Confederacy.

The Stander shook his head, "The Asgard arrived before the Aschen could set up their defenses...the battle here was over before it had begun."

"The Asgard? We were unaware the Asgard were involved."

"Oh, they were involved...and a good thing, too, or a good many of us would be dead and the Rebellion would have ended here with the sacrifice of the 107. Come along, please. The Council has already convened."

The Earth group took in all they could of the monuments along the way while trying to keep up with their escort. They all paused long enough to appreciate the most impressive one. A large group of stone men and women rose from a rock base on both sides of the path. On one side they were putting down shovels and pitchforks with one hand and taking up guns and helmets with the other. The base was inscribed simply: Standing together we won the Victory. On the other side the same group lay down their weapons and picked up their farm implements again. It was inscribed: Standing together we build a Future.

Overhead an embossed metal plaque bridged the two. It read: The Standers' Rebellion. 165,000 Stood against the Aschen and drove them from the galaxy. The war claimed the lives of 62,398 Standers. They gave their lives that others might have life. May we Stand worthy of their sacrifice.

"You've turned the whole complex into a memorial for your war?" Daniel asked passing under it.

"The whole complex IS a memorial of our war," the Stander answered proudly. "The monuments along this path tell the story of the Rebellion and the part each battle and party played in it." He nodded back towards four bare rock slabs they'd already passed, "Those show the worlds the Rebellion came too late to save: Eonal, Torantay, Hakter, and Kaiyontra. And this," he said as they passed the first monument they'd seen not carved out of the native gray rock, "Danara." He paused so the group could examine it. Carved out of a shimmering blue stone were two hands, one reaching down and clasping the other. Its plaque read: The Right Hand of Friendship. Danara. They housed our recruits, built our weapons, picked up our fallen from the battlefield, and buried our dead. Without their willingness to Stand behind us, we could not have Stood. "There are many others," their guide said, "but the Council is waiting."

The main building, too, bore a plaque: Look well at the desolation of Eonal. Know what fate we have been spared and know to what fate we must never fall.

Instinctively the entire group gazed at the barren world around them and shuddered. Given enough time, it could have been Earth.

Teal'c nudged Daniel and indicated a hill beyond the compound. At its brow two people stood looking off into the desert. Even from the distance, they were recognizable. Daniel drew in a surprised breath: Sam and Jack. Something in their stillness made him realize they were statues, one more monument to the Standers' Rebellion. He would have loved to run up the ridge and read the inscription, but the others were already filing into the building. Maybe later.

The entrance hall of the building was lined with huge murals showing the Asgard in action. The legend read: Rescuers from another galaxy. The Asgard. They came from a galaxy far, far away to heal the Fallen of Hakter and end the Rebellion at Eonal. Without them, we could not have Stood until the End.

Daniel shook his head and hoped the others in his group were too preoccupied to read the sign closely. A galaxy far, far away...Jack had definitely been here.

"The delegation from Earth is welcomed to the Council of Worlds," a Stander formally told them as they entered the Council Chambers. They were led to one of many long wooden tables filling the room. "Please be seated." There were not enough chairs for their whole party, but the camera crew was quickly ushered to a media room overlooking the chambers, and the Secret Service agents flanked themselves around the table and the council doors. The Standers seemed to find this an acceptable arrangement. Someone crowded in an 11th chair for Teal'c and the group sat down.

"We're honored to be here," Daniel said. "Thank you for meeting with us."

"It is our honor. Will you introduce the members of your group?" This time their introduction was closely attended to and not indifferently waved away.

When he was done, the Stander who had addressed them stood and said, "I am Qritz of Jbtz, the Speaker for today, and these are my colleagues." He began to call each Council Member by name and planet. As their name was called each stood, graciously nodded toward the group, and sat back down. Several of them could have been poster children for the Wounded Veterans Association. Scars, braces, patches, crutches, canes, and prosthetic arms bore witness to the sacrifice they had made to the Rebellion. They'd been told it had been a costly war, and it was easy to believe it here among the Standers.

After the 46 Council Members and the one Representative from Danara had been introduced, Oritz of Jbtz added, "Finally, I believe you are perhaps acquainted with Colonel O'Neill, formerly of your planet." Having failed to notice their exiled ex-compatriot, the group responded with muffled exclamations of surprise. Of course, the last place anyone would have looked for the former Air Force officer was the Council Chambers. Jack O'Neill and politics did not go together. But, there he was. Grayer and thin to the point of gauntness, but very much Jack O'Neill.

Daniel grinned in delight. Teal'c spoke for them both when he said, "Indeed. It is good to see you, my friend."

Jack gave them a casual wave but didn't stand. It was one affront too many for Senator Kinsey whose hatred for Jack had been instinctive and reciprocated from the first moment the two of them had met. He jumped up, sputtering in outrage, "Are you aware, Gentlemen, that this man is a traitor to our world? We will not continue in these proceedings if he must be present."

"Now, Senator," the President began, but the Stander answer overrode his own.

"Then we regret this meeting is over." The Standers began to push back their chairs and rise.

"Whoa, wait a minute. I'm sure we can work this out," Daniel told them.

"There is nothing to work out," the Speaker answered, "We are aware Colonel O'Neill is considered a traitor on your world. However, he is recognized for his value and importance here and these proceedings will not go on without him. If you've read the indictments against the Aschen, you know the Colonel acted only in the best interests of your planet...he is not a traitor."

"I apologize for this," the President told the Council. Turning to Kinsey he said, "Senator, as the man who declared the colonel an Enemy of the State, I have to say, my understandings of his actions have changed as we have learned who and what the Aschen are...seen in this light, I have to agree with the Speaker. Colonel O'Neill is not a traitor. His presence here is not a problem."

Kinsey said spitefully, "He always was a favorite of yours." He plopped himself back in his chair, "Fine. Let's begin."

Through the entire exchange, Jack had sat quietly. Now he began to speak, "Yes, let's. Gentleman and Ladies of the Council, as you are aware it has always been our hope we could bring Earth in to the recovery side of this operation. As you also know, we will in time be the foremost experts on fertility issues, but until then Earth can lead the way and give us a jump on solutions to our problems. We also lack trained engineers to maintain the level of technology now available on many of our worlds. We need training materials, teachers, doctors and engineers to work beside us and train us. Earth can be invaluable to us in these areas. I believe a treaty with Earth could be the single most important and necessary thing in our Stand for the future and ask this Council to make it happen."

It was the longest speech any of the Earthers had ever heard Jack make and those who knew him were duly impressed...particularly because it hadn't included even one joke or inappropriate statement.

Addressing the delegation from Earth, Jack continued, "Mr. President, Senators, General, and the rest of you, the Standers have nothing to offer as far as the fight with the Goa'uld is concerned. Or quite honestly, much of anything else besides a huge amount of grains, the majority of which aren't too bad if you're into oatmeal and granola, and a limited number of raw materials. We're willing to share the precious little we know about the technologies the Aschen left behind. And, if we ever figure out more, we're willing to share that with you, too. That, by the way, would go a whole lot faster if you'd give us the help we're asking for so we can pull Carter out of the medical research labs and engineering classrooms and put her to work where she really belongs."

"Seems you've got precious little to offer, Jack," Kinsey dug in.

A murmur rose up from the Councilors. The Speaker said, "You will address Colonel O'Neill with the respect due him."

"Oh, I am..." Kinsey answered and received a hissed, "Senator!" from the President.

To Daniel's continued amazement, Jack didn't let Kinsey provoke him. "I'm sorry we ask so much and offer so little, but that's where we Stand. We really need your help here. Are you interested in pursuing this matter, Mr. President?" he asked.

The next hours were spent in discussion over the basic principles of the potential treaty. Though Jack had begun the proceedings, the discussion flowed freely from all of the Standers and for the most part he let it go on without him.

"You are not offering an alliance in the sense of military aid?" Teal'c clarified at one point.

"No. We are not. We understand you are at war with the Goa'uld and need strong military allies, but the Standers cannot provide such aid. We are dying...our resources must be directed solely towards survival."

"We'd really like to know how you defeated the Aschen," Colonel Drakel pushed at another.

"We would have to have a much greater knowledge of your people before we felt it wise to disclose such knowledge," he was told.

"Well, isn't that nice. You want us to teach you everything we know about human fertility and share all our technical advances, but you're not willing to share yours..." Kinsey cut in.

"We understand your planet numbers in the billions...collectively we number in the millions. We have entire planets with less than a thousand worldwide. We have no iris on our StarGates, our army is a very limited resource, and we are spread much too thin to defend ourselves should you in any way interfere with the defenses we have in place to keep the Aschen out, or if you should decide to move aggressively against us...it is only prudent we protect what we do have."

Kinsey snorted and tried another jab at O'Neill, "I imagine that's what your 'advisor' from Earth is telling you, but we are-"

"Enough! Mr. President, if we addressed you in such a way surely you would not tolerate it! In the same way, we will not tolerate Senator Kinsey's continued attacks on ou-"

O'Neill held up his hand, "It's all right, Councilman. He's not worth the time or effort." There was a tightness to his voice and face that alarmed his old friends. Daniel, Teal'c, and Janet exchanged troubled glances and around the room their concern was mirrored in the faces of the Councilors.

"I suggest we break for lunch and come back afterwards," Jack said wearily.

"Colonel O'Neill?" an older Stander sitting next to Jack questioned.

"Sorry, George," Jack told him. "These things tend to involve a lot of talk and sitting around when Earth's involved...I am certain the President needs to finish things up today if at all possible. The Council will have to make a long day of it." Neither George nor the other Standers seemed pleased with this announcement, but they nodded their acceptance.

An escort appeared at the Earthers' table. "If you come this way, we'll get you lunch," she said.

"Actually," Daniel said, "I was hoping Teal'c and I might get a chance to talk to Jack."

"Jack?" the Stander asked stiffly.

"Colonel O'Neill?"

"I'm afraid that is impossible at the moment...he is otherwise detained."

Daniel turned to look but couldn't see Jack through the press of those between them. He swallowed down his disappointment and joined the others on their way to lunch.

The food was hot, homemade, and nourishing. Daniel and Teal'c ate theirs quickly and asked their escort if they'd be allowed to see some more of the memorials while the others finished.

"I'll go with you," Janet called and, asking the general's leave, hurried after them. After a quick hike up the hill, they stood catching their breath before the statues of Jack and Sam. The likenesses were surprisingly good; the inscription was even more surprising. It went a long way towards explaining why the Standers used Earth time (Mountain Standard, they'd noted), called the Gate controls a DHD, and let Jack all but run their Council meetings.

It started with a quote:

We looked over the barren land of Eonal, and I swore
it wouldn't happen to another planet...not Earth, not any;
not while I was alive. I ordered Carter to find something,
anything to hit them with. She said, 'Yes, Sir,' like it
was something she could fit in between breakfast and lunch.
Then we went through the Gate to raise an army and drive
the Aschen out of the galaxy.

The quote was ascribed to Colonel O'Neill, Commander of the Stander Army and President of the Council of Worlds.

Daniel whistled when he read it.

Teal'c spoke first, "He didn't join their fight, Daniel Jackson. He started it."

"When he said colonel was the highest rank in their army, he wasn't joking," Janet said, her voice low and stunned.

Daniel shook his head in disbelief. "They said he was a hero, but I didn't realize they meant as in George Washington."

The rest of the inscription finished with these words: Colonel O'Neill and Major Carter from the planet Earth. His leadership, determination, and sacrifice taught us to Stand. As the developer and designer of the CAAD and Defense Web, she gave us the means to do so.

"Heady stuff," Janet commented. Below them they could see people filtering back into the Council Chambers. They hurried to join them.

Hot and sweaty from their quick trip up the hill, they pushed their way through milling Council Members hoping to catch Jack before the session started. Somewhat intimidated by what they'd just discovered, they approached his table almost hesitantly. When he saw them, a wide welcoming smile lessened the pain in his face a minute and relieved their worries. He motioned them over.

"Jack, we were hoping to talk to you at lunch but they said you were busy."

"Always, I'm afraid. But we'll have to work out a way to have a minute to catch up. I'm guessing the President's on a pretty tight schedule, but maybe you can stay the night?"

"Colonel," the old man he'd called George cut in, "tonight might not be the best night for a visit." Jack scowled at him, but he didn't back down. Aha, an aide then.

"Carter will have my hide if I don't at least try," he told him, and George shrugged in reply. Jack turned back to them and said, "See what you can arrange...even if it's just supper. But don't bring Kinsey--even the Danarians can't be expected to put up with him."

They laughed and returned to their seats as the meeting was called to order. The afternoon session dragged on through the rest of the day. The Councilors grew more and more restive as it went on while Jack grew quieter and grayer until George stood up beside him.

"Enough," he said without preamble or introduction, "End it now or come back tomorrow. This has gone on too long. One of you aides, contact Major Carter and let her know we're going to need her," he said and then sat back down.

The Earth contingent looked at each other in surprise. The Standers nodded their heads in agreement. Someone slipped out the back door. Jack looked like he was about to protest, but the Speaker headed him off.

"We do not wish to hurry this matter, but it does seem like we're just going in circles here. Mr. President, I call for the vote." At his words, a low murmur of confused puzzlement rippled across the table occupied by the Earth delegation. The three who had traipsed up to the top of the hill had not had time to inform their companions of what they had learned there.

Jack sighed in response to the call for a vote but said, "Very well. Mr. President, are you prepared to accept the treaty or will you require more time to make a decision?" When he spoke his voice was harsh and so quiet they had to lean forward to hear him.

"I did plan to bring the proposal before the Congress and UN before signing it, but you're not asking anything that should be a matter of contention. The biggest concern will be funding, and you've offered more than a fair exchange in grain for that...I'll sign."

"Thank you," Jack answered him. Then addressing the Council he said, "As President of this Council I am prepared to sign this treaty if that is your recommendation."

The Speaker spoke up, "Because time is short I ask that we forego formality and Stand as one in agreement to the signing of this treaty." The group came to its feet at once. The Speaker looked questioningly to George, "This should go over the Link. Is there time?"

O'Neill growled at him, "We'll take the time to do this right."

The old man frowned, and mouthed "Hurry" to Oritz. The Speaker nodded and motioned to someone in the media room. Turning to the Earthers, he said, "It will only take a moment to establish the Link. Mr. President, if I could ask you to join Colonel O'Neill for the signing."

"The link?" General Hammond asked.

"Yes, this is an important moment for our Worlds. We will open our StarGates and transmit it live."

"You have the means to open all your StarGates simultaneously?" Colonel Ramsey asked.

"Yes."

"We'd be interested in knowing how that works...when you feel you can trust us, of course."

Daniel groaned and wondered if the man would ever say something to the Standers without making it an accusation. But, they took no offense; they understood his mistrust--they'd been just as suckered by the Aschen as Earth.

"The Link is open," someone announced and Jack began to speak:

"This is O'Neill. Beside me is the President of the United States of America who speaks for Earth. We've been able to come together and draw up an alliance between our two peoples...an alliance which I believe will greatly benefit the Hazeldor Research. Councilman Oritz will read that to you and then we'll sign it."

Councilor Oritz stepped in front of the table and began to read the manuscript. It had been handwritten and in several areas entire paragraphs had been scratched out and revised, but it sounded as weighty as any Daniel had ever heard. Not that he was listening very closely. He was more concerned with what was going on behind Oritz's back. While the Speaker read, George pulled Jack's chair away from the table and then with the help of another Stander helped him to stand. It was an obviously painful process. Sweat beaded on his friend's ashen face as he struggled to stay upright. The men worked a pair of crutches under his arms and slowly released their hold on him. He swayed unsteadily between them while George wiped the sweat from his face with a handkerchief.

Daniel hazarded a look at Janet. He could tell it was taking everything she had not to run to Jack and offer whatever help she could. He felt the same way. "What is it?" he whispered to her, but she only shook her head.

The men moved away from Jack's side and when the Speaker finished and retook his seat, Jack was standing on his own. A pen was passed to the President and he signed his name with a flourish while cameras flashed. Balancing carefully on his crutches, Jack scrawled his signature below the President's and reached out a shaking hand to him. The men smiled at one another for the cameras, and it was over.

"The Link is down," someone called. George and his assistant were at Jack's side immediately. The crutches fell out of Jack's shaking hands and he more or less collapsed into George's arms. "It's all right, Sir," he said quietly to the colonel, "We've got you," and then yelled out, "Where's the doctor?"

"If everyone could clear the room," the Speaker asked, and the Council Members came to their feet, blocking Daniel's view. A doctor hurried through the door and moved toward Jack's table, a syringe in his hand. Teal'c began to move through the milling Standers, and Daniel and Janet followed in his wake. They didn't get far. Their escort appeared before them.

"Please," she said, "if you'd come with me?"

"I'm a doctor...I've been his doctor for years, let me help him?" Janet begged, but she was herded with the rest of them out of the room. They stood in a stunned group in the entrance hall of the building along with the majority of the Councilors. The Standers murmured amongst themselves in small, grim groups of their own. One leaned heavily against the door with tears streaming down his face.

Sam arrived, running and looking much too thin, much too fragile. Daniel thought he might not have known her if he hadn't known she was on the way. She took no notice of any of them, neither did she hear him call her name. She paused only a moment at the door to speak to the man leaning on it.

"Samin," she said. "He won't want you out here reliving it with him again. Go home." But, Samin only shook his head. "Then here," she said and reached into a cloth tied over her shoulder. Only when she awkwardly removed a newborn from it did Daniel realize it was a baby sling. She held the infant out toward the Stander, but he pulled back as though it were a bomb.

"You don't want me to hold him, Major," he said, "Not me."

"Samin," she said weakly.

"I'm sorry," he told her.

"You don't have to feel like this, you have nothing to be sorry for...you were acting under orders. You saved his life." Holding the baby out to him once again, she went on, "Take him...please, you know I can't take him in there. Not if he's back on Torantay." With trembling arms, Samin took the baby. Sam opened the door and slipped through it. Someone was screaming behind it. Daniel had heard Jack being tortured before, heard him cry out with the Goa'uld torture device, and he recognized his cry now.

"What is happening?" Janet demanded of the Councilmen around them.

Speaker Oritz moved forward to speak to them, "The colonel occasionally suffers flashbacks to the time of his injury. He is not fully recovered. The meeting went too long. It is difficult for him to be upright for such a long time, and he refuses the pain medication when the Council is in session...he believed the treaty with your world was worth this. I hope he was right," the Councilor ended almost angrily.

After a pause, he continued on in a calmer voice, "Here is your copy of the treaty...there is no need for you to stay."

"We're concerned about Colonel O'Neill," the President said. "We'd like to stay."

The Speaker nodded his head. "The doctors are with him now...he will be fine. But, I understand. You may stay if you wish, though he will probably be too heavily sedated to actually see you again today."

"We understand," the President said. "I'd still like to wait a bit. However, I'm sure several of our group might like to return. Senators, I'd like you to take the treaty and present it to the various committees. And I'm sure the newsmen are eager to get their stories filed and our observers also need to make their reports. Gentlemen, I don't think I need to remind you the story is the treaty...nothing else at this time. Colonel Ramsey and Major Drakel will accompany you through the Gate. The rest of us will be staying awhile." Daniel breathed a sigh of relief to be rid of Kinsey (though finding out just who and what Jack was to the Standers had seemed to effectively silence the man) and admired the President's maneuvering.

The Standers, Daniel presumed, were also free to go about their business, but they stayed. Keeping vigil, he thought. He'd lost track of all the times he'd come to in the infirmary to find Jack dozing or brooding at his bedside. It was fitting they were all there for him now. Not that Jack would appreciate it; he'd hate to have them all seeing him weak and vulnerable and in need of their support.

The doctor came through the door. "It's over," he told the Standers around them. "He's back. I know this is difficult, but he is improving. We were able to avoid sedating him this time...we'll just have to make sure he doesn't pull a stunt like this again."

The Standers somberly nodded in response and began to disperse. Councilor Oritz nodded at the Earthers and said, "If you need anything, just ask anyone. We'll clear out before he knows we were out here...he hates us to hang around." Within a few minutes, virtually all the Standers were gone.

General Hammond approached Samin, "This must be Major Carter's baby."

"Yes," the Stander told him, turning the baby so the general could see him.

"A fine boy," the general said.

"Yes, a fine boy," Samin repeated.

"You were there then, when Colonel O'Neill was wounded?"

The Stander hung his head and his answer was little more than a whisper, "I was."

"I was his commanding officer for years. I still feel responsible for him. Can you tell me what happened?"

Samin shook his head. A tear fell on the baby's forehead and he wrinkled his little face up and wiggled before settling back to sleep. An awkward silence descended on the group and then George opened the door. The old man paused upon seeing them and frowned.

"I said he wouldn't be up for a visit this evening, now didn't I? And no thanks to you and your long-winded ways. Why are you hanging around?" he didn't wait for an answer but turned to Samin. "They're wanting the baby."

Samin held the baby out to him. "You're not wanting to bring him in yourself, then?" George asked him. "Wouldn't hurt you to see him now." Samin shook his head, and George accepted the baby. As he headed back into the Council Chambers, he gave the group from Earth a disgruntled look. "I'll tell the major you are out here..." he said as the door shut behind him.

The next time it opened, it was for a tall, friendly man who smiled warmly at them before saying, "Major Carter asked that I see to you. They're taking the colonel home now...she'd be pleased if you could join them there. If you have to return to Earth, she understands and hopes you will be able to return another day."

"Is it far?" the President asked. "I've a cabinet meeting I really shouldn't miss but had hoped to speak a moment to Colonel...or I guess that's President O'Neill, isn't it?"

"He prefers Colonel, but either title is correct. The O'Neill's are housed on Danara for now...just a trip through the StarGate." The President glanced at the commander of his Secret Service Agents who emphatically shook his head no.

"I'm afraid I'd be pushing my luck too far to talk these fellows into letting me loose on another world...I probably should take my shadows and go home. If you'd just tell the Pres-Colonel I meant what I said in the meeting--he's clear of all charges and welcome home anytime he chooses to return."

"He won't. He's a Stander now, but I'll see he gets the message," the man said and ushered them all to the StarGate. Once again there wasn't time to really see the monuments, but Daniel drank in all he could. Many of them were carved images of various worlds or groups of worlds. Engravings recorded the price each world had paid to be freed from the tyranny of the Aschen.

Atal. Fell without a fight and without bloodshed in the First Wave of the Rebellion. 7,428 Atali recruits were sent to the Training Fields on Danara. 5,092 were lost on the Battlefields.

Earth. The planet that sparked the Rebellion. As far as is known, she fell without bloodshed.

Trytharanith. 3,987 fell to free Trytharanith from the Aschen in the Second Wave of the Rebellion. She gave 17 recruits to the cause, 15 did not return.

Hakter. All the Aschen in the galaxy were driven to the beaches of Hakter where they made their own stand against the Standers' Army. Here the Colonel fell and thousands upon thousands with him. They cut us down like wheat before the sickle, yet we prevailed.

Daniel blinked at that one...they'd been told Jack had been injured on Torantay not Hakter. "Isn't there a monument for Torantay?" he asked their guide.

"No. The wounds of Torantay are too fresh." The man pointed toward an area along the path without any statue or plaque. "When the healing is over it will be set there, but until then..."

"What happened?"

"It was Hakter all over again. But without the Asgard to heal the casualties afterwards. 15,000 went in...107 walked out on the own leaving more dead behind them than the living. That alone was enough to make men weep at the mention of Torantay, but it was only the beginning. When the battle was over...reinforcements arrived but they didn't realize until too late the DHD had been hit and they couldn't bring the wounded back to Danara. Worse, we didn't know...we thought the Asgard--we should have sent help right away, but we didn't know. They were lying there all through the night, waiting on us to come for them." The man fought back tears, and Daniel wished he hadn't asked. The wounds, he thought, might always be too fresh for Torantay.

Janet, though, needing to know what had happened to the colonel pushed on. "Exactly what type of injury did Colonel O'Neill receive there?"

The Stander shook his head. "He wasn't even there for the Battle...he led the reinforcements on to Torantay, but the CAAD had already been set. The Battle was over. The Asgard had patched him back together after Hakter...he should have been fine. But, we...we didn't come. An unexploded bomb...that's what took him out, an unexploded bomb hours after the War was over. It shouldn't have happened. We should have come. He gave up everything to fight the Standers' War, the Major, too, and we left them both lying on Torantay through the Long Night."

"Major Carter was injured on Torantay as well?" Janet broke in.

"Major Carter led the charge after the Colonel fell at Hakter. There was no one else..."

"I see," Janet said faintly. It was too late to be upset about it now. They'd seen Sam only briefly, but obviously she had survived whatever injuries she'd sustained. She'd been too worried about Jack to really look at the baby, but he'd been healthy enough from the looks of it.

Daniel had expected something exotic from the planet with the blue stone monument back on Eonal, but the area around the Gate was far from it.

They'd stepped out into a cross between an army base and a hospital compound. Practical, ugly buildings connected by dirt paths lined with signs pointing off in all directions: Training Grounds, Rehab Building Three, Main Hospital, Research Lab, Requisitions, Prosthetics Lab, Technical Institute, Weapons Development, and on they went. Their guide motioned them down a path following an arrow towards Barracks # 1.

"This is my world," he told them. "The area around our StarGate was a beautiful park which is how we had room to build the Training Facilities for the Army so close to the Gate. When they have moved onto their own worlds, we will tear this all down and reseed the park. Almost, I wish we wouldn't. It will be beautiful with the trees and flowers, but this, this is beautiful, too."

They all looked at him incredulously, and he explained, "Whatever else we do, what we were able to do for the Standers will always be a testimony that once we were a people of which we could be proud, once we looked outside ourselves and did something great."

They reached their destination and he ushered them in. The barracks were as ugly as any on Earth and, in fact, looked remarkably similar. They were ushered to an apartment on the first floor and shown into the small, cramped living room. Through an open door they could see a hospital bed with crumpled blankets at its foot and a wheelchair at its side. Their guide stepped into the room and pulled the door shut behind him. They could hear low murmurs and the occasional word through the thin walls.

The group crowded onto the few pieces of furniture around the living room and leaned against the walls wherever they could find room. A bathroom opened up off to one side and a closet another. There was no kitchen, but a small hot pot and what was possibly a Danarian coffee pot set on a small refrigerator pushed against the wall. A stack of diapers was falling over next to a used coffee cup, a pile of student notebooks, several technical drawings, and a yo-yo on the low table in front of the couch.

Their guide rejoined them. "The major will be out in a minute," he said and left them to their silent appraisal of the O'Neills' quarters. In one corner of the room, a model Air Force jet swung from the roof, a souvenir Jack must have carried away with him. The lone window opened up to face another squat building and nothing else. The only pictures on the wall were close-ups of the baby. Looking at them, Daniel realized they didn't know his name. He couldn't see either Sam or Jack in his red, scrunched up face. He had a head of light brown hair and blue eyes, but then, didn't all newborns have blue eyes?

Out of curiosity he opened the refrigerator and found some bottles of water, a bowl of blue Jell-O and what was apparently left of the stash he and Teal'c had packed for Sam when she'd visited the SGC: three Snickers, two more boxes of Jell-O, and a small can of coffee. He glanced around for the Fruit Loops but didn't spot them. We should have brought more, he thought idly when raised voices from the bedroom caught his attention, and that of everyone else.

"I don't want her in here, Carter! Not like this!" It was the first they'd heard from Jack since the Council Chambers. It appeared he'd regained his strength.

The thin walls let them hear most of the conversation.

"Then it's the hospital...Janet can...take care...in what 10 minutes? ...the doctors at the hospital...won't touch...the OR and we'll spend the night in recovery and they'll be gone before you're released!"

"George can do it!"

"Nope, nope, nope, Colonel," came the old man's voice, "I've done what I can...you had no business wearing those things all day and sitting up like that! What were you thinking?"

"I was thinking of saving a few worlds! That's what!"

"Well, see what you get for thinking," George retorted.

"Oh, just get out...if you're not going to help, go!" Jack snarled in return.

"All right, I will!" The door banged opened and shut. George huffed through the room, and the front door slammed behind him like an angry echo. In its wake, the baby fussed on the other side of the wall.

Jack gave a disgusted growl. A moment later Sam stuck her head around the door.

"Hi, guys. Sorry about that. He'll be back. Janet, is there any way I could ask you to take a look at the colonel?"

"Of course. I don't have any equipment with me..."

"It's ok. George keeps a supply on hand...we have everything you'll need."

The colonel was sitting on edge of the bed facing away from them as they entered the room. A swing bar hung over the bed, a bowl of water and a handful of rags lay on the bed beside him to his left, and the baby squirmed on his belly to his right. She had to squeeze past the wheelchair to reach him, but it wasn't until she crossed to his side of the bed that Janet realized the extent of the damage.

She knew he didn't want her to see him like this. And she didn't want to see him this way either. After all her years of medical training, she still found it hard not to stare. This wasn't just a patient; after four years of working with him he was much more than that. She tore her eyes from his stumps up to his face. He gave her an apologetic grimace. "Doc," he said in greeting.

She cleared her throat, "What seems to be the problem, Colonel?"

"Bone fragment--there," he pointed to a bleeding sore. She carefully cleared away the oozing blood to reveal the white sheen of bone working its way through his skin. "I could have pulled it out myself, but Carter here..." He scowled at Sam but she wouldn't look up to see it.

"I think Sam might have been right, Sir. It looks like it's probably thicker under the skin."

"Always are," he said. "But go for it...yank it out of there. I just got a dose of painkiller, there won't be a better time."

"Is any of this analgesic?" she asked poking around among the unfamiliar tubes and prepared syringes in the kit Sam handed her.

"Oh, for crying out loud, just pull it!" Janet gritted her teeth and carefully worked the fragment out ignoring his occasional hiss of pain. The exit point was larger than she was willing to leave without stitches, though he had several abrasions and cuts on the stump already from the prosthetic. She carefully began stitching him up.

While she worked, Sam sat beside him and nursed the baby. Their previous angry words still hung in the air between the two of them like poison gas. The sight of them sitting like shadows of the officers she'd known back at the SGC made Janet want to cry. They were both too pale, too thin, too obviously worn down. They didn't look like the heroes of 46 worlds.

"I don't suppose either of you want to tell me what happened?" No. "Then tell me about the baby...he looks great. Everything went all right?"

"Just fine," Sam said.

"And?" Janet prompted...maybe she should have been a dentist, getting anything out of these two was like pulling teeth.

Sam brought the baby up to her shoulder and gently burped him. "7 pounds, almost 21 inches, nurses great, and even sleeps a good part of the night..." There was an awkwardness to Sam's handling of the baby that at first she'd attributed to her being a new mother, but the more she watched, the more Janet knew it was something more.

"What's up with the shoulder, Sam?" she asked.

"Broke a few bones...it's mending."

"Is it?" Janet's tone clearly implied she had doubts about the medical care they'd been receiving, but neither of them answered it. "How long have you been fitted for the prosthetics?" she asked Jack.

"A while," he shrugged.

"This should be toughening up better than it is...it looks too raw."

"Well, this is what we've got to work with."

"The other's just as bad?"

"Yeah."

"I'm guessing you lost a good deal of blood?"

"Um."

"It's been what? 11 weeks?" He shrugged in answer. "Your body is still trying to replace the blood loss...you need to get that built up before you're going to see healing like you need to wear the prosthetics easily."

"Yeah, well, seems we're fresh out of compatible blood, but don't worry, Doc...I've been eating my spinach."

She ignored his pathetic excuse for a joke. "This has had to really put a strain on your heart and other organs...I'd like you to come to Earth and let me see what we can do. I'd like both of you to come and let me take a look."

Sam murmured, "I'm fine," and he said, "We're kind of busy here."

"Well, when you go into heart fail-"

"Enough! See why I didn't want her back here?" he growled at Sam. "Come on, finish up. Let's go get something to eat."

Janet carefully washed and wrapped the stump. She looked around for the prosthetics but when he saw her looking Jack said, "Just the chair." She wheeled it close and watched him try to hoist himself in to it. He was weaker than he wanted to admit; both she and Sam had to help move him over. He sat trembling from the effort while Sam calmly worked the soft material of his pants over and around his stumps. He ran a shaky hand through his hair and wheeled himself to the door.

"O'Neill," Teal'c acknowledged painfully.

"Hey, Teal'c," O'Neill met his gaze and then that of the others.

"Jack," Daniel started but couldn't finish.

"It's me, guys, relax," Jack ordered gruffly. "You get used to it after awhile...take your time."

"I'm sorry," Daniel stammered. "I..I..had no idea...I thought you'd just, I don't know--bummed up your knee again or something."

"Oh, I think I did that all right," Jack answered him dryly.

"What happened?"

"War, Daniel...you know, what we were fighting when you were making nice with the enemy."

"Colonel!" Sam reprimanded him.

"Sorry, Daniel. I know we owe you..." Daniel knew with the whole room watching their interchange he wouldn't go into more detail. He'd fought their battle for them on Earth, but Jack couldn't know whether the general was aware of that fact or whether he'd applaud him or court-martial him. He was probably just lucky they hadn't had his name on a plague back on Eonal for all to see.

"No, Jack, you're right. We should have believed you; you shouldn't have been out here fighting without us. Maybe we would have made the difference... maybe..."

Jack shrugged. "There are always 'maybes' but you can't go back and change the way things happened. The Aschen are history, the war's over, Earth still has a future, and today you helped buy us some more time to salvage ours."

"Yours, Colonel?" the general asked. "Does that mean you no longer consider yourself one of us? The President has cleared you--you're free to come home anytime you want."

Jack frowned. "I walked away from Earth to save it. In doing so I made a commitment to these people. I won't go back on it. I'll always consider Earth my home, but I won't be coming back." There was a finality in his words that silenced the room except for the baby hiccoughing in Sam's arms.

"And you, Major Carter?" Hammond asked.

Jack looked at her, his anger fading away like raindrops on a hot sidewalk. She made it too easy for him to take advantage of her, to take her for granted, to just assume she'd always be there. He knew the doctors weren't happy with her recovery even yet. They watched her like a hawk and kept scheduling tests she kept avoiding. Even so, he kept leaning on her. Because he didn't have a leg of his own to stand on. Because he needed her. Because to not was to acknowledge the doctors' fears and his own.

She was a rock he leaned on, and it was rare he felt her give way beneath his weight. But, she'd given way today in the Council Chambers. When he'd fought his way back to Eonal, she'd been there like always. But, not at his side. Across the room, curled in the corner. Panic and pain emanating from her. He'd met her eyes and said, "Kinsey's been here...we'll have to fumigate." She had laughed in spite of herself and they had acted as if nothing had happened. But, it had.

She'd been lecturing everyday all day at the Institute or working in the Research labs and then scrambling to find time and energy for PT in the evenings on top of nursing the baby and caring for the two of them. He'd seen the tears of exhaustion she couldn't hide. She hadn't lied when she said the baby slept a good part of the night...he was the only one though. He wouldn't blame her if she packed it up and went home. But he knew what she would say before she said it.

"I Stand with the colonel," she said without hesitation or apology. Then she grinned at him and said, "We've got a good thing going here." He grinned back. She was the best thing he had going for him. He'd have to find a way to take better care of her.

"I understand," the general said. "You've done yourself proud here. Both of you. But, you can't blame us for trying...you're greatly missed."

"Thank you, Sir. We appreciate that," Sam told him. He stood and gave her a hug.

"Have you heard from my dad, Sir?" she asked hopefully.

He shook his head. "The Tok'ra have made themselves scarce lately. I'm sorry. I'll tell him how to contact you when I do." She bit her lip and nodded her acceptance of his offer. "He'll want to see this grandson of his," the general said, taking the baby from Sam. "What do you call him?"

"CJ," Jack said.

"Chance. Chance Jacob," Sam clarified.

"We would have gone with 'George', but I'd already given it away to someone else," Jack quipped.

"I think we've met him," the general laughed. "I hope you didn't give him my name because he reminded you of me."

"No, Sir," Jack said quickly.

"Come on, Jack, admit it. It was the hair--or lack of it."

Jack changed the subject while the others snickered. "I, for one, am ready for supper..."

The path to the Mess wasn't long, but it took them quite a while to cover the distance. Everyone they met had a respectful nod or salute for Jack. Many paused long enough to let him know they were pleased with the new treaty. Daniel noted that their affection and respect for Jack was mutual. He returned their salutes, thanked them for their support, joked with them, and inquired after problems they were facing.

For a man not known for his patience on Earth, he was extraordinarily patient with the Standers. Daniel, who had been the brunt of Jack's impatience more than his fair share, found it odd to see the contrast between the Jack O'Neill he'd known and the Commander of the Stander Army and President of the Council of Worlds. He'd always known there was more to the man than he usually saw, but he hadn't known how much.

None of the Standers seemed able to pass without putting a gentle hand on the baby's back or fuzzy head. They smiled shyly on him and told Sam how he had grown and what a fine boy he was. Sam took their comments graciously, but she'd never been a public person, and it was readily apparent that she was uncomfortable with the attention. After a time, it became too much, and she thrust the baby into the colonel's lap and took over pushing his chair for him.

He had wondered about their life among the Standers. She'd told Janet she had no regrets, that she was happy in her new life. But that was before the war had left them maimed and trapped in a life where they would always be public property, always have to be larger than life. "We've got a good thing going," she had said and even smiled, but it couldn't be the life they would have chosen given a choice.

They had missed the main supper rush, and the large mess hall was almost empty. They laughed, caught up on hockey scores and base gossip, and discussed ways to implement points of the treaty while they ate.

When they finished, Jack turned to Sam and said, "Another fine meal, Mrs. O'Neill." She threw him a glare in response. Daniel was sure she'd heard it before. He imagined a young Jack had sat at a table and heard his father say the same words...and his mother had probably glared back just like Sam. Quite possibly Chance Jacob would play it out all over again one day with his own wife. Across the table, Jack caught his eye and smirked at him right before throwing his balled up napkin and hitting him squarely in the glasses. Daniel returned fire with his own and wasn't bothered by the fact he missed.

Life went on. Things changed but still stayed the same. None of them could go back to the way things had been before they'd made contact with the Aschen. Earth had lost Jack and Sam; they wouldn't be coming back. The war had changed them, maimed them, worn them down, but they were still Standing.

His favorite place on all the worlds was the Council Chambers on Eonal. He spent most council meetings under his father's table. By and between his father's legs he fought the vile Ashen and Goa'uld with huge space rays. When the war became old and tiresome, he looked at the books his mother had tucked into a bag for him, ate the treats he gathered from the silent hands of Council Members while his father pretended not to notice, and colored on countless pieces of paper his father discreetly handed down to him when he tapped quietly on his dad's thigh. When sleep would start to overtake him, he would sing a quiet, sleepy-time song while tapping on his father's hollow legs until his dad would reach his long arms down and draw him up into his lap. There Chance Jacob would turn his face to his dad's chest and sleep to the sound of his heart beat and the murmurs of the councilors.

And, after he'd woken up and George had quietly ushered him out to the restroom, he'd scurry back under the table and start the fun all over again. No one ever seemed to mind a small boy attending almost all of the meetings of the Council of Worlds and only once could he remember ever being reprimanded more than a few quick taps on the head from his father's long fingers when his games grew too loud.

But that once had been enough. It was a changing point in his young, untroubled life. Like many such memories he never could bring into focus just what he had done to bring down George's wrath upon his head, but the ignominy of being dragged from his place under the table and through the chambers never left him. He could forever after hear the voice of Councilman Hetret pausing only a second from the surprise of it and then droning on; and the silence of his father. The memory of that silence was enough to make him fear George had been acting on his father's orders when he hauled him out of the Council Chambers.

He could remember the hot, angry tears which had run down his face after he'd received his punishment and been roughly thunked onto the bench right under the picture of the Asgard ships coming to save his father after Hakter. Maybe that was what had made such an impact on the little boy he had been. Whatever it was, when George huffed under his breath at the cowering child before him, "Your father is a great man and you won't be shaming him in this way!" his words forever changed Chance's view of not only his father but of himself as well.

The truth of those words filtered down into the little boy's mind and for the first time he understood that his father was unlike other fathers. His father Stood and Standers on all the Worlds came to their feet, his father passed by and men and women acknowledged him with a salute, his father called and even the Asgard came. This new knowledge took him by surprise. The man who sprawled on the bed beside him every night and tickled him until he couldn't breathe, the man who snuck the yucky gralves off his plate when his mother wasn't looking, the man who held him on his lap and spun around and around until they were both too dizzy to hold their heads up wasn't just his daddy. When George was going on about how he was big enough not to leave such a mess, the man who winked at him was more than just his father. He was a great man.

He didn't understand what all that meant, but he instinctively knew that a great man deserved a good son, not a naughty, noisy boy like Chance Jacob. His tears of outrage and anger over George's ill-treatment turned to those of sorrow before a thoroughly subdued little boy had been quietly returned to the Council Chambers. Somberly, he climbed into his father's lap and with his dad's fingers playing in his hair and the voices of Councilors discussing the plague on Craiike in his ears, he'd done his best to sleep away the shame of the day.

But, it was still there when he awoke to find his dad shaking hands with the last of the Council Members heading off towards home. The meeting was over, and it was time for them to leave as well. He quietly helped George gather up his papers and books and toys and didn't even fuss about it. Too discouraged to run about as he usually did and play among the statues that lined the path along their way, he climbed into his father's lap for the ride home.

As they passed the monuments, he looked at each one. He knew them all, knew each planet, each part they'd played in the War. Stander after Stander had carried him along that path during Council breaks while his father met with tight-lipped men behind closed doors. They'd showed him each image, read to him each inscription, and in quiet voices thick with unshed tears they'd spoken to him of the part they'd played in the war. They talked about the things they'd left behind to join the fight or the things they'd sacrificed to the cause while forced to wait at home. They spoke of the wounds they'd received and the loved ones they'd lost. None of them had meant for him to understand or even cared if he listened...he was only a little boy, almost still a baby when he'd first started coming.

And he didn't understand it all...didn't know why they'd needed his daddy to teach them how to Stand or why they'd taken his daddy's real flesh and blood legs to do so. But, with his new-found knowledge, he did understand enough to know they had needed a great man to fight their war. And that great man had been his father.

Before that day, going through the Gate had never failed to delight him. He'd always loved the kawoosh of the Gate and passing into its blue ripples from the hot brownness of Eonal to the cool green of home. He liked to position his body into some strange stance as they moved into the Gate and watch it emerge exactly the same way on the other side. But, today the wonder of the Gate meant nothing to him.

He also usually liked watching the salutes of those they met, listening to their respectful voices as his father paused along the way to speak to them, and noticing the way they drew close to hear his words. But, not today. Today he could see in their faces and hear in their voices that his father was a great man. And he was afraid of what that meant.

He always looked forward to meeting his mom. They never knew when they'd meet her. Sometimes she was waiting at the Gate for them, other times she'd meet them along the way somewhere or another, and sometimes they'd have to go all the way to her classroom or lab and wait quietly as she finished her work. His little brother Chase might be in her arms or toddling at her feet or off somewhere with one Stander or another. Chance Jacob didn't care; one way or another meeting her was his favorite time of the whole day.

He loved that first moment of seeing her, of hearing the catch in his father's breath when he saw her and feeling it matched by his own. He loved the look of joy she got in her eyes when she caught sight of them, and he loved the way it transformed itself into a welcoming smile. He loved the feel of her sweeping him up into her arms and her familiar hands running up and down his back as though to assure herself he was really there. He loved the soft kiss she'd give the top of his head and then his forehead when he raised his smiling face to hers.

And he loved how she always understood how his day had gone. "A good day then" or "A rough one" she'd say and she was always right. In the way of a little boy, he thought she read it through her hands on the back of his head as she smoothed his hair. It would be years before he understood differently. Understood, in fact, that though it was the child she held, it was to the man she spoke. It was his father's day she asked after, and by then he understood the signs she'd read had not been the thoughts of her son, but the tenseness of her husband's muscles, the grimness of his smile, whether sweat plastered his hair to his head, or whether, when his son clambered out of his lap into her arms, his hand moved to roughly rub his thigh.

The chastened little boy in his father's lap that day knew none of that. He just wanted to be in his mother's arms far away from the place of his disgrace. And it seemed they'd never get there. They'd already come through the Gate and were almost all the way to the Institute and still they hadn't seen her. He blinked to keep his sadness from leaking out of him in hot tears, but it didn't help. He roughly swiped his arm over his eyes to wipe them away, but his father had already seen them.

"What's the matter, CJ?" the great man asked him. Chance Jacob was almost fearful looking up into his face, but it hadn't changed. It was still the face of his father. His little boy mind couldn't grasp the familiarity of his father's face and the new knowledge he'd gained of him that day. Laugh lines and worry lines still intertwined in and around one another as they etched their way across it. Like always, his eyes looked at him and through him and, Chance was sure, saw everything about him while holding hidden within their depths thoughts he could never guess. Chance knew if he reached up his hand the gray stubble on his dad's chin would tickle him just like always. But things weren't like always.

"What's troubling you, Son?" his father asked again and Chance couldn't tell him.

Instead he said, "What makes you a great man, Daddy?" His father blinked at him in surprise and then looked up the path. Chance felt the familiar intake of air and saw his father's eyes widen and a smile break out across his face and knew his mother was coming. But seeing her was no longer the most important thing in his mind. He needed an answer. "I want to know, Sir, what makes you a great man?" he demanded.

"I guess that," his father said with a nod of his head, and Chance Jacob followed it in time to see the smile light his mother's face. He puckered his face at the answer and tried to work it out.

Then she was beside them, settling Chase into his father's lap, and pulling him up into a tight hug. The baby who they were going to get 'soon' wiggled underneath him. Usually he would have gently nudged it hello with his knee, but today he didn't even notice it as his mother's hands ran their welcome up and down his back and wiped away the fear and shame he'd held all afternoon.

If her smile and what lay beneath it made his father great, then he was going to be all right. Because that smile was as much his as his dad's. If it made Jack O'Neill a great man, it would do the same for his son.

He raised his face to receive her kiss and wondered when he'd become a great man, when he'd have to give up his flesh and blood legs for hollow ones like his dad's, when he'd have to quit playing under the table and sit in one of the big chairs instead, when his voice would speak in the Council Chambers and other men would be quiet and listen to what he had to say, when he'd Stand and others would Stand with him. But, he wasn't afraid of it anymore.

He would be almost grown before he realized his father had simply given him an answer to avoid having to really look at a question that made him uncomfortable. His father hadn't wanted to admit to his son that he didn't see himself as a great man. He'd thrown him a bone to shut him up and hadn't considered that Chance would take it to heart. By then, the damage, if it was damage, was already done. He'd been set on the path to become a man who would be his father's son.

His new understanding had not changed anything. He'd swallowed down his irritation at his father's tendency to avoid the relevant, joined the battle over Eonal, and earned his place on a new monument to be erected on its desolate soil.