Last Measures
Indie
Title: Last Measures
AUTHOR: Indie
EMAIL: creatureofthenight@hotmail.com
CATEGORY: Missing Scene/Epilogue, AU, Angst
PAIRING: Sam/Jack
SPOILERS: Desperate Measures
SEASON / SEQUEL: 5
RATING: PG-13
CONTENT WARNINGS: character death
SUMMARY: What if Jack arrived just too late in Desperate Measures?
STATUS: Complete
ARCHIVE: Heliopolis
DISCLAIMER: Stargate SG-1 and its characters are the property of Showtime/Viacom, MGM/UA, Double Secret Productions, and Gekko Productions. We have written this story for entertainment purposes only and no money whatsoever has exchanged hands. No copyright infringement is intended. The original characters, situations, and story are the property of the authors. Not to be archived without permission of the authors.
AUTHOR'S NOTES: K i have to thank sarah for making me get this down on paper before it drove me mad and for beta reading it (many times) Also gotta thank Laura, my only friend who can spell (even if she doesn't like sci-fi) and dom, my muse, my baby jack ;)
He had to get to her soon, there was no other option, he couldn't lose her, not now, not ever. The sickening ominous feeling in Jacks stomach made him worry that he may already be too late but he couldn't allow himself to dwell on this fact, it would break him. He wasn't too late, he wouldn't be, he couldn't be.
Quickening his step to match his raised heartbeat Jack took in his surroundings, he tried not to mull over his journey to this point. In his opinion it had taken far too long to locate her, and involved far to many 'associates', he had to stop this now. Maybourne caught his attention and started gesturing wildly; once again implying that he needed a weapon but was silenced with a glare from Jack.
A scream reverberated around the empty corridor; emptying Jacks head of any thoughts other than those of his missing other half. Sliding to a halt outside the door Jack didn't pause as he shoulder barged his way into the room. He shouted at the men to stop what they were doing as he took in the scene around him. His Major, the one woman who could ground him with a smile and turn his once cold heart to pure gold was handcuffed to a bed, fighting for all her worth with tears running silently down her face. One of the doctors had a hypodermic syringe already caught in her vein. Sam looked as strong as ever yet the tears showed Jack just what he loved about her. She knew she couldn't escape her situation but she kept on fighting, no matter how scared she was. Her eyes caught his and through those crystal tears she pleaded with him, to do something, anything, please...
The SOB with the needle stuck in her arm shot a malicious grin at Jack and pushed down the plunger, leaking life's opposite, taking away all that made Sam the woman she was. Sam whimpered as the poison entered her blood, slowly blurring her vision, silently removing her from reality. It took one shot from Jack to kill the bastard but it didn't stop him from filling the cadaver with three more rounds before he hit the cold, hard concrete. Without pausing for breath Jack rushed to Sam's side, calling for a medical team, NOW!
The second doctor, who had been cowering in a corner since his colleague was shot, decided to cut his losses and run whilst Jack was distracted. He didn't want to hedge his bets with the vicious biting temper that emanated from that man. As he barrelled through the doorway, his exit ignored by Jack, he flew into Maybourne, who loitered just short of the doorway, unsure what to do.
"He's mad...he just...just shot my..."
Without pausing for breath, or to finish his sentence, the doctor pushed past Maybourne and continued his flight down the corridor. Maybourne seeing the look on the doctor's face decided now would not be a good time to tackle Jack, he had to get out of here, he couldn't stay.
"S'too late, m'sorry..." Sam whispered, tears evident in her words.
"No, we can help you, Janet...she'll save you, she has too.... I can't lose you"
Jack said this as much for his own benefit as for Sam's, the finality with which that doctor had pushed that plunger tore at Jacks soul and he knew, he couldn't save her now, not ever.
"Hold me.... Please?"
Sam's words, spoken softly, barely audible brought tears to Jacks eyes as he ever so gently wrapped his arms around her and pulled her tight to his body, as if his arms, his embrace alone could save her.
"M'sorry...s'my fault"
"No, it's not!"
The anger in Jack's words was aimed not at Sam, but at the cruel deceitful system that had led him to be so close, yet so far, unable to save her from something so simple, so quiet. If only he could have gotten here that bit quicker, if only he hadn't hesitated at some point along the way, if only he'd rang to check on her earlier... Jack knew it would be all too easy to slip into a world of if onlys, missing his Carter, his one and only.
"Sam...Sam look at me, I love you, I always have and I always will, don't ever forget that. I love you more than life itself. I can't live without you..."
The numbness and disjointed reality that followed the injection, snaring her senses and jarring her from her existence, seemed impenetrable to all but his words, his warm arms around her. Sam looked up catching the deep chocolate brown eyes of the one man who she loved, the one man she'd dreamt of every night in this hellhole.
" I love you Jack...have for a long time"
The poisons effect slowing her speech and making any co-coordinated movement a seemingly gargantuan effort. The strong embrace he held her in, comfortable and warm. Safe, away from all those things that had led her to this here, this now, gave her strength to continue, with something so important even the mind numbing, poison that slowly turned off her senses couldn't make her forget.
In the moments that followed, a sudden clarity allowed Sam to speak easily, more so than a few moments ago, more so even than all her time in the military, it gave her a sense of perspective that she had never before experienced.
"Don't forget me Jack, please. I love you...you made me what I am; I can't fight this anymore"
Her strength failing Jack felt Sam grow steadily limper, her breath becoming more laboured with every passing second.
"Don't leave me Sam.... Please"
The desperation in his words voiced everything he'd ever wanted to say to her in the past four years and as her life ebbed away, leaving a shell of a body, Jack told her every thing he'd been prevented from telling her since his love for her began. Speaking softly with the pain and love in his voice reflected in his eyes as he told her he loved her a thousand times over. With each word Jacks heart broke a little more and a little more of his soul was lost to the cruel, heartless world. Yet he didn't stop talking, as if in the vain hope his talking to her could bring her back. As Sam took her final, rasping breaths Jack pressed his lips to hers in knowing that this sense was still there, that she would know the full extent of his love for her.
Somewhere, deep the drug corroded world that Sam was confined in she felt him there, his strong embrace, and the softest sweetest touch to her lips that told her everything, told her how much he cared. He whispered sweet nothings in her ear as time passed and grabbed her with its everlasting embrace.
"I love you Sam"
As though from a thousand miles away, but there, in her heart and soul Jack told her and she relaxed into deaths cold grip after she had fought for so long.
Jack felt rather than saw her go, the sudden peace, like all the pain in the world was gone, she was free. Laying her down on the bed Jack climbed beside her, wanting to hold her for one last time, knowing he couldn't go on without her, he couldn't spend each and every day without her smile and those big blue eyes that sparkled at his bad jokes.
Grasping his previously discarded weapon with shaking hands, Jack contemplated all that had gone before and knew that he couldn't mourn another like he had Charlie, he couldn't go through it. The pity, the sorrowful looks as life went on for others and left him behind, grasping to Sam's memory like a lifeline, keeping him alive though she was gone taking Jacks heart with her.
Levelling the barrel of his 9mm with his temple Jack silently apologised to everyone he'd ever hurt, physically or otherwise as sobs racked his body. His last thoughts lingered on the woman who lay beside him, killed because she'd done the right thing, and now he'd die, because he was a coward, unable to cope when fate had seen fit to take his heart and soul.
The shot rang through the room, echoing off the walls and Jack finally fell into a peaceful everlasting slumber beside the woman who had broken through his cold shell and brought him back from the brink. Now they slept, side by side, for the first and last time knowing now that not even death could separate their souls.
Daniel found them just a few minutes later and the scene broke his heart. Curled up in each other's arms, he knew his best friend had taken his own life after her death. Jack had always looked strong but Daniel knew one wrong move and Jacks world would come crashing down around him as it had now. Like Romeo and Juliet, the forbidden love had been too strong to contain in life, troubling its possessors such that they saw their only freedom in death, unable to cope without their opposite and equal, their one and only.
Daniels only comforting thought through the dark days that followed was the knowledge that his friends were now together, able to love each other as fate had planned with nothing in their way. Able to do in death what life had with held from them.
A tragic loss but a freeing of troubled souls, a freeing of a true love.
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