Beyond the Iris: A Stargate Story

Epilogue

Daniel

Months had passed since I time jumped through the gate. The world seemed undersaturated somehow, like it was muted or at my darkest times devoid of all color. The eggshells that Sam walked on around me had ground down, and for everyone's sake I mustered false smiles in moments needed. I did my job to the best of my abilities, but for the most part I went home and felt a cold numbness in that empty space. I had found Eleanor's gravesite in Kansas City and sent flowers, but I knew I would never visit, could never. What would I even say to a body who never knew me like I had her. A body I had never touched, but my god had she touched me.

I had the scrap of a note left framed on my desk. Out of habit I poured two mugs of coffee every morning, often I'd leave hers next to the frame and just talk about my day to it, like a madman. It felt wrong drinking from the plain white ceramic mug, not when she had curated a collection of terribly cheesy gift shop mugs from every little weekend getaway. But when I opened the cabinets it was just the two white ceramic mugs. It felt as if I had hallucinated it all in some sick fever dream. No one around me had any idea who she was, so I mourned alone. Some were kind enough to ask about her, but how do you commiserate in memories that never happened with people that it never happened to. I couldn't tell Janet about their biweekly book swaps, Teal'c about the celebration cake she had made for the two of them to share when he found out his son was engaged, and I definitely couldn't tell Jack I had wished we had taken his offer on going to his lake house that weekend. Sometimes, in the car I could hear her singing along to the radio and I would have to pull over and shake it off. Whispered promises of our future together haunted my bed, so I often slept on the couch or in the office, but even here it was a taunting hell. The closet across the hall, her office, it sat there deserted with no trace of her walking these halls. No morning chats, no post-it daily messages, and no hard candy jar on her desk that gave me an excuse to just see her for a moment in my day. Her lease was supposed to end in a few months, so we were going to move in together at my apartment, our apartment.

I remember one evening when we were walking through the park a gaggle of children ran past us, their parents huffing and puffing to catch up. She said one day she looked forward to being a mother, and looked up at me to see my response. I never told her that the idea of fatherhood terrified me. Instead in that moment, seeing the question in her eyes I knew I wanted the same, wanted her to share in parenthood with. Something about seeing her dancing in our kitchen making dinners with a glass of wine in hand, curled up on the couch nestled into my side while we both read, the way her eyes could cut me to the bone when she was cross and yet make me want her more, I knew I needed her forever.

I had bought us airplane tickets for a trip to London after Christmas as a surprise. An entire tour planned, a week's worth of dedicating every moment to her, to us. Our leave was cleared, she had no idea. I was going to stuff the itinerary in the perfectly imperfect stockings she was knitting for our second Christmas together. But, none of that happened, because here in this timeline I never met her. Her birthday passed, and I was off-world helping the free Jaffa settlements. Christmas was now months away. Every time I heard the Stargate flush I flinched, seeing the bloodied tear tracks on her face, knowing impending death would happen if I didn't leave, and not knowing that because I left it already had. I was her murderer instead of the man I promised her I'd be and I could never forgive myself. I had planned it all, except I could never have planned for this.

A knock on the doorframe pulled me out of my thoughts and I looked up to see Jack tight lipped with concern wrinkling around his eyes.

"I'm just wrapping up the details on P7G-Y65." I cleared my throat and he didn't seem swayed.

"Uh, yeah, you're going to want to come with me to the gate room."

"Now?"

"Yes, now." His expression pinched with conflict. "Jonas Quinn called through the gate about ten minutes ago, there's a woman who says she wants proof that one Doctor Daniel Jackson quote, 'made it through in time.'"