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The Times That Weren't – Epilogue

St. Luke's Hospital, Upper Westside, Manhattan, July 8th, 1965

Cameron Mitchell shuffled down a corridor of the maternity ward and spotted a rather agitated man passing a hand through longish dark hair with black, round-rimmed glasses perched on his thin nose. He could hear noises from beyond the closed door the man was pacing in front of and smiled slightly. He reached the row of chairs outside the door and lowered himself into one of them, he regarded the nervous man with amusement.

"It'll be fine, son." he said and the man seemed startled to see him sitting almost right in front of him. "I'm Cam, what's your name?" He held out a hand which the man took hesitantly.

"Jackson, Dr. Melburn Jackson." He spun around at a particularly loud cry from behind the door and whipped around again at the chuckle he heard behind him.

"Not a medical doctor if your reaction's anythin' to go by." He crossed his arms across his chest and leaned back in the seat, propping his head against the wall behind him.

"Ah, no, I'm an... archaeologist, I teach at Columbia University." The man seemed distracted, but talking seemed to be calming him down at least. "My wife Clare too, she teaches Ancient History."

"I'm sure your kid will be crazy smart then." Cam chuckled. "Got names picked out?"

"Yes. Uh, Daniel if it's a boy, that was my father's name, and Danielle if it's a girl, coincidentally that's Clare's mother's name." The man had stopped pacing and sat down at last and even chuckled at what he'd said.

"Good names." He nodded and smiled. Just then a muffled wail sounded from behind the door and Dr. Melburn Jackson sprang to his feet. "Oh. There we go. Bet it's a boy." The man leapt towards the door when it finally opened to reveal a nurse who ushered him in, telling him it was indeed a baby boy. "Take care of him!" Cam yelled to the beaming man and woman inside before getting up and walking away.

Holloman AFB Medical Center, New Mexico, December 29th, 1968

No one seemed to question the old man walking into the medical center, he had the air of a veteran about him and seemed to belong there. He heard a commotion behind him and saw a heavily pregnant woman walk in through the front doors, in considerable pain. He rushed over as quickly as his aged feet could carry him and helped balance her with a hand at her elbow and led her towards the front desk where a nurse was already calling for an attendant and a doctor.

"Easy there, ma'am, I got ya. Just breathe, slowly does it." he said as an attendant came over with a wheelchair and Cam eased her down into the seat. A nurse came over asking questions and the woman managed to identify herself as Joanna Carter, but the pain seemed to stop her after that. "She's the wife of Captain Jacob Carter," Cam supplied, "he's on tour in Vietnam right now." The woman fixed him with piercing blue eyes and he was filled with a sense of deja vu for a time. "Jus' breathe, darlin', nice and slow."

"And you are, sir?" asked the nurse.

"Mitchell, friend of the family." he said without hesitation. The nurse looked at Mrs. Carter who nodded quickly. Taking in how tightly the woman was holding on to the old man's hand she just nodded and led the way into the hospital. They met the doctor on the way who made a quick check of the situation and started explaining what could be expected of what was to come. Taking them into a delivery room they initially made to have Cam wait outside, but Joanna shook her head fiercely and gripped the old man's hand even tighter and they relented, admonishing him to just stand by the bed and try to help ease the woman through the labour. It took several hours, and a lot of sweat, tears and yelling, but eventually a tiny, healthy baby girl was swaddled and placed in her mother's tired arms. "Hello, little lady, what's your name?" he asked, letting the girl grasp at his wrinkled finger.

"Samantha. Her name's Samantha." Joanna said through her tears.

"Sam." He couldn't help the grin or his own tears.

"Oh, no! She'll turn into a tomboy if you call her that. She'll be a proper lady." whispered the exhausted new mother. She looked at the older man for several long seconds as the doctor and nurses busied themselves about the room. She glanced around her until there was enough distance between them and the staff and she lowered her voice further. "Thank you for being here, but who are you? Do you know my husband?"

"Like I said, ma'am," he began with a serene smile on his face, "friend of the family." He stroked the wisps of hair on top of the baby girl's head and she gurgled happily.

Rifle Camp Park Observatory, Paterson, New Jersey, August 10th, 1969

Cameron walked into the large dome and stared at the large telescope above the raised platform in the center of the room. Under it were two men talking quietly with each other and the old man smiled a very contented smile, letting out a little sigh of relief. One man was dressed in jeans, a white t-shirt and black leather jacket, topped off with a skull cap decorated with colourful beadwork. The other was a large dark-skinned man with a stern mien belying his colourful outfit of flared trousers, a pink puffed-sleaved shirt with a flower print waistcoat atop it, he also wore a bandanna tied around his head. It was really good to see them. It meant everything he'd done the last 40 years had been worth it. He almost couldn't keep his emotions in check, but the man in the leather jacket turned and saw him in the doorway.

"Hello there, sonny, doin' some solar observations today? It's a good day for it." He started walking towards the two men who shifted a little uncomfortably, but smiled at him nonetheless.

"Yes it is, and we are." the man replied, his companion merely nodded.

"Well, I'm sure you know already, but in case you've forgotten, make sure you're using a Hydrogen Alpha solar filter or-" Cam was cut off by a nodding, grimacing Jack O'Neill.

"Or I'll burn my eyes out, yes I know." He looked to Teal'c who had a small smile playing across his lips. Cam gave a short dismissive wave and leant against some of the equipment around the platform.

"Lookin' for anythin' in particular? Coronal mass ejections maybe?" he asked, grinning, knowing exactly what they were looking for.

"Flares actually." O'Neill said, Cam raised his eyebrows and pointed at Teal'c's trousers. "Solar... flares." Jack clarified after looking at what was indicated.

"They can't be predicted. Jus' hopin' to get lucky?" He couldn't help the small smirk which played across his lips.

"We are testing a theory." Teal'c said and Cam nodded.

"Sounds interestin'. I saw the bus ya got out of as ya came in. Colorado plates, that's quite a road trip. Must be for that big concert I hear's happenin' in upstate New York. Thinkin' of goin' myself to be honest." Cam said, going to Woodstock would actually be a bit of a dream come true for him. Just then a thought struck him. "Ya didn't pass through Kansas on your way, did ya?"

"No, sir, closest we came was St. Louis." O'Neill replied and Cam nearly laughed out loud at being called 'sir' by Jack O'Neill.

"So they were tryin' to punk me. I'll have to teach 'em a lesson." he muttered under his breath. "Well, you boys have fun with your observin'. I'm sure you'll find exactly what you need." He waved and started walking back towards the door. As he got outside he stopped to feel the hot summer sun against his skin, he decided he'd have to add a note to his future self to ask Sam about those rose-tinted glasses, see if she'd kept them. Now to go catch Jimi on stage.

Auburn, Kansas, May 25th, 1970

Cameron walked down the old farm road and turned when he heard a horn blaring behind him, holding up a hand at the car that passed him by and turned into the gravelled square in front of a barn and farmhouse. He carried on walking until he too reached the farm. He saw a broad shouldered man helping a blond haired woman out of the passenger side of the car with a swaddled baby in her arms, when he closed the door behind her they both waved at Cameron enthusiastically. The man hurried over after being shooed away by the woman who turned to walk into the house.

"Uncle Daniel! What are you doing here?" the man cried as he shook the old man's hand joyfully.

"I heard Wendy dropped a little boy in the hospital las' week so I decided to come visit the newest member of the clan. Ya know how long it takes me to get anywhere these days so I started off as soon as I heard, took me three days, but here I am. Thought I'd stay here for a few days if that's alright with you?" He happily handed off the pack he had shouldered, but waved away the offer of support from the beaming father as they walked towards the house. "How are they, Frank?"

"Wendy and Cameron are great and of course you can stay!" The Air Force pilot grinned, matching his pace to his grandfather's old friend from the Merchant Marine. "And what do you mean three days to get here, Daniel Carter? You only live a couple of miles away in town." Cam chuckled. Sometimes he still found amusement in his assumed name.

"Alright maybe I was exaggeratin' a little. Wendy's cousin Emma phoned and said you'd be comin' back today with the baby. Cameron, huh? I like it." Frank Mitchell smiled broadly as they finally reached the door and laid his houseguest's pack down at the foot of the stairs. Cameron noted he'd be able to leave the stuff he'd packed in the nearby closet easily enough, a shoebox with his name on it, marked 'Classified'. He preferred this audio tape plan than the fail-safe he'd left behind all those years ago, a safe deposit box at the local bank in Auburn, under the name Cameron Mitchell with a typed up mission report. He'd retrieved it all the day after Wendy Mitchell safely delivered her first-born son and proceeded to read out his report onto cassette tape. It provided another avenue for verifying the authenticity of it all.

"You hear that, Wendy? Daniel likes the name Cameron." Frank led the old man into the kitchen where the new mother was bouncing a happy baby in her arms.

"We've known for a very long time that Uncle Daniel has absolutely no sense, Frank." She smiled and accepted a kiss on the cheek from the old friend of the family, and handed the baby over to him, who burbled happily. "Are you staying for a bit, Daniel?" She smiled as he nodded. "Great, I'll make some of your favourite corn bread.

"Yer a treasure, Wendy." He grinned and looked down at the baby in his arms, into eyes so much like his own.

USS Odyssey, above P3X-474, May 2007 + 18,631 days relative

She patted his cheek softly with her hand, the wrinkles under her wizened fingers so familiar to her now. She looked up into his blue eyes, still full of the same enthusiasm and mirth as when he was that eighteen year old cadet she'd met all that time ago. He smiled at her and his fingers squeezed at her waist and he leaned in to kiss her again. It brought back the memory of thousands of other kisses they'd shared in the last half century aboard the ship, kisses filled with gentleness, passion, fire and anger sometimes, but always underneath all the rest, was love. She pulled back and leaned into him, resting her head on his shoulder for the last time.

"I wish you would stay here with me." she said softly as he stroked her long grey hair.

"I know, darlin', but the General put me in charge when he passed. I gotta be on the bridge when I give the order. Have to do right by him." His Southern drawl had grown more pronounced the older he got, she had no idea how, perhaps it was just an affectation or he did it to annoy Daniel. Either possibility was likely. She signalled her acceptance of his implied apology by nodding into his shoulder before pulling back and looking once more into his eyes.

"Teal'c has sworn to keep everything we've experienced a secret from ourselves. I convinced him this didn't apply to the science and technology we produced here so my temporal mechanics studies and your power systems research is all included on the reverse of the crystal I've given him. Daniel added his notes from studying the Asgard databases, he felt like giving himself some pointers, your flight simulator plans are in there too if you want to build one." She smiled fondly at him. "All of Vala's and Teal'c's works are in there too, although I expect Vala will be too embarrassed by the some of the stories she's written and Teal'c will want to disseminate his political treatices himself. It's all there. Except the information you dug up about the Asgard consciousnesses embedded in the Deep Core. You're right, we should wait to discover them again on our own."

"We've done right by ourselves I reckon. I may hate this ship with every fiber of my being now, but I loved every moment I spent with you, Sam." He caressed her cheek as he spoke until his hand fell to her shoulder. "Even the fights, actually liked some of them probably a bit more than I should have." She chuckled and kissed him softly again.

"Good bye, my heart. I'll see you soon." She pushed against his chest gently and he acquiesced, backing away towards the door of the Asgard Core room.

"Good bye, beloved. See you on the flip side." He let his hand hover on the door controls a moment as he looked at her over his shoulder before opening it and stepping out.

Praxyon, January 2010

"Now that's what I'm talking about!" Cam cried as the wormhole disengaged behind them, revealing the elevated walkways and central tower of the stellar activity satellite monitoring outpost which had, up until the previous year, been known only to Ba'al, who was now dead. Dead dead dead. As they stepped away from the Stargate, small rectangular panels edging the walkways and platforms lit up, illuminating the space with their weak glow.

"This definitely looks like Ancient technology." said Sam as she walked towards the walkway to the tower, she was heading towards the control console on the other end of a walkway at a ninety degree angle from the one they stood on with the Stargate. She passed her hand across the surface of one of the rings which encased the glowing core of the tower, before walking along towards the control console.

"Indeed, I have never seen such technology used by the Goa'uld. Ba'al did not build this." said Teal'c as he walked towards the ring platform.

"Maybe Anubis could have, he retained a lot of Ancient knowledge after all." posited Daniel as he examined the Stargate for the Point of Origin symbol.

"I don't think so, Daniel, this place looks ancient. As in old, not as in Alteran." countered Vala walking towards the central column. She stopped at a point about halfway between the 'gate and ring walkways and shuddered.

"This tech is Ancient in every sense of the word." Cam said craning his neck upwards as he joined Sam at the control console on its square platform. "Just like the old me described it on the tapes." Sam turned her head to him from where she stood in front of the main console and nodded, smiling. "Hey look here!" He pointed at an ancillary display on one of the angled sides of the control unit. "This says the capacitors are holding a truly gargantuan amount of power." Every head in the place turned towards him at once. Vala peaking out from behind the central tower.

"You know what gargantuan means?" she asked? Daniel scoffed at her which allowed Sam to ask the obvious question.

"Since when can you read Ancient?" She searched his face as he tried to bring any memory to the forefront.

"I... I dunno." He narrowed his eyes and frowned slightly.

"Since we were on Odyssey." Teal'c only breathed it and even so it carried to everyone in the space. Now they all turned to look at him in silence for several long moments until Daniel erupted.

"Okay. Can someone explain to me how things which didn't happen can leave memories in our heads, because right about now I think I'm going to have to hand over another two hundred bucks to Vala." Daniel complained from the Stargate and Vala grinned, rubbing her hands together.

"It shouldn't be possible." said Sam, going into scientist mode. "When Teal'c ran the program on the crystal I gave him before reversing time in the time dilation field, it stopped the field from ever activating, none of those events took place." Deep down she accepted it was happening, but she hated not being able to explain it.

"Yeah they did." Cam said softly. "To Teal'c. Which means on some cosmic level they happened to all of us. Like the time loop created by us when we defeated Ba'al. The alternate timeline took place and we have physical evidence of it."

"Cam, that's not very scientific of you." Sam admonished, but stopped at the 'really Sam? please...' look he gave her.

"And yet I can read Ancient, a language I've never learned, oh," he reached over and pressed a few buttons on the display and they flickered and came back, written with runes. "and Asgard too, apparently."

"Shut up!" cried Daniel striding over to check the display. Sam just looked at Cam incredulously. He grinned at her.

"Wait a minute." said Vala, walking slowly around the tower and standing at the edge of the walkway to the control console. "You said you had physical evidence of the alternate timeline where, amongst other things, I was Ba'al's queen." She shuddered in disgust.

"And you killed him." added Teal'c walking around the other side of the tower.

"And Daniel and Sam, yay me." she added more quietly before looking up again to lock eyes with Daniel who smiled at her sadly. She cleared her throat quickly. "What physical evidence? Not the tapes because they're from this timeline, and not the old Cam 'cause he's from the timeline before Ba'al altered things." Cam turned to Sam with a sheepish grin and she blushed red.

"Um," she faltered slightly not meeting Vala's eyes, "a pair of wedding rings and a marriage certificate." She focused all her attention on the console in front of her despite not being able to read it herself. "Why didn't I learn Asgard on Odyssey?" She tried to deflect the oncoming storm, but was unsuccessful. Vala squealed and bounded over to Sam and clutched at her arm, jumping up and down.

"Story time, Samantha!" she cried in delight and Sam looked ruefully at Cam before turning to her friend.

"Later, Vala. We don't have time now." she said firmly and Vala pouted, Daniel looked at Cam appraisingly for several moments before taking Vala in hand and dragging her away. "Can you switch this to something I can read again, please?" She gave Cam a look, which he grinned at, and pressed some buttons on a console, turning the display back to Goa'uld, which Ba'al had programmed in. "Thank you." She pressed some buttons and stared for a few moments. "You're right about the power levels. That," she pointed at the central column, "is more than just a power core with computing and processing elements. It's a physical power tap and shunt into the planet's core. The Stargate is tied into it as well. There is more than enough power in this place to dial Destiny."

"Not very homey though." said Vala from where she was standing by Teal'c and Daniel. "Now I'm an alien and I don't care about these things, but I've seen General Landry ranting about something like 'Health and Safety can kiss my ass' and I would think this place qualifies." She looked around at the obvious lack of guard rails and her eyes strayed to Daniel again. "I can't imagine a scientist could live in a place like this for very long, no matter how much they like solar flares."

"Woman's got a point, Sam." Cam turned to her, resting his hand on his P90. "Let me switch this to Ancient and do some digging with Daniel. Something tells me Ba'al didn't have much use for any possible living accommodations in this place." Sam nodded and waved Daniel over while she went to stand by Teal'c. The large Jaffa nodded to her with a smile before looking further around the huge space.

"I am reminded of Star Wars." he said with a broad smirk and she chuckled. She had to agree, a fondness for lots of vertical space and a dislike of guardrails was definitely very 'Star Wars'. A sound of discovery came from the two men at the console as Daniel pointed to something and Cam pressed some buttons, then looked over his shoulder at the wall to their left. A loud grinding noise was heard and a walkway shot out from the wall across from Sam and thrust into the central platform near her feet, halfway between the ring walkway and the console walkway. The new walkway shuddered for a second and, at its other end, a panel in the rock wall which hadn't been there a moment before slid aside revealing another door.

"If we are very, very lucky, folks," Cam began, bringing his P90 up and flicking on the flashlight at the top of it. "We just bagged ourselves a new off-world base. Let's go explore!" He grinned and Sam flicked her P90's flashlight on and stepped in beside him as they crossed the walkway together and into the darkness beyond the doorway.

To be continued in 'The Ninth Chevron'