Fanfiction: Rain Ghost

[rachel500]

Fandom: Stargate SG1
Summary: When the replicators attack Earth, Sam is lost.  When she appears in a rainstorm to Jack, can he really trust that it's her or is it another replicator trick?
Rating: PG-13
Author's Note: Sam/Jack.  Hints of Daniel/Vala.  AU after the beginning of S9.  Perceived character death.  Written as a thank you to ziparumpazoo . Prompt was Sam, Jack and a rainstorm.
Disclaimer: No copyright infringement intended. Written for entertainment purposes only.

 

Rain Ghost

It was raining again. The same silent drizzle that streaked down the window panes in relentless streams that had happened every day in the year since rogue human form Replicators had turned up and almost destroyed the Earth.

Jack O'Neill stared past the streaks of water to the world outside of the hotel where the Presidential tour of the US had stopped for the night. Behind him, the President finished his address to the nation; passionate words of survival and grim determination to continue the rebuilding of their world mixed with softer notes of memorial to those lost in the Replicator Rainstorm. Jack didn't bother listening to the words – he'd read the script when Daniel Jackson had insisted on it – although his mind kept track of the fall and rise of Hayes' voice. Instead, he focused on the lack of activity beyond the glass; the empty street, the lack of traffic even though it was central New York. The city had the air of a ghost town. They'd defeated the replicators but nobody went out in the rain anymore.

The day it had happened had started out sunny. At fourteen-hundred hours it had begun raining everywhere across the globe only there had been silvery nanites hidden among the molecules of water that fell out of the sky which had dissolved anything human in their path. The Prometheus had located an alien ship in orbit and had transported Jack from his bunker in the White House with their newly installed Asgard beaming technology; Jack had destroyed the replicators from the Ancient chair.

But the damage to Earth had been done. Millions had died in the hour the nanites fell; millions more in the forty-eight hours because the water supply became infected and the danger became clear. The Asgard had turned up then and helped them neutralise the threat with a worldwide EMP that rendered the nanites useless. The scientists were still working on a way to get the dormant nanites eliminated from the bio-system once and for all, and they were filtered out of domestic water supplies, but not many people could forget that they were present in the rain, in the ocean, in any puddle on the ground.

So many dead. So many gone without a trace.

Like Carter.

His fingers clenched briefly into fists. Jack wrestled the thought of Samantha Carter back before the litany of 'why her' and 'she should have been safe' and 'maybe she's missing, has amnesia, decided to disappear…isn't dead, isn't gone' looped through his mind again.

They'd been lovers when she'd died. The end of the Goa'uld war and the end of relationships they'd both used to fill the need for the other had paved the way for new roles and new chains of command and them. But he could count the times they'd been together on one hand. Sometimes if he closed his eyes, he could feel her phantom touch across his skin; her lips against his.

He opened his eyes, rueful that he'd closed them to better picture Carter in his head; to block out the endless rain outside. He pushed a hand through his short silver hair and turned away from the window.

His eyes fell on Daniel, watching him carefully from across the room. Daniel who had his usual leather clad shadow with him. Jack didn't know why Vala hadn't taken off after the attack but he was glad for his friend that she hadn't. As much as Daniel would never admit it, Jack figured that his friend was grateful for the irreverence and street-wise pragmatism that Vala provided.

Hayes finally wound to a close and signed off. Communications and media had been restored fairly quickly after the attack and it had helped prevent martial law as the country had reacted to the news of aliens and the devastation of loss. They'd had trouble – the usual looting, mob violence and thievery in the days following the Rainstorm, and organised crime was doing good business in the wake of restoration. But mostly people had found some inner grit and integrity; communities banding together to help each other survive. It was almost enough to make Jack proud. It almost made all those years of fighting to keep his world safe worth it.

Hayes wandered over to him. "Thanks for being here, Jack."

Jack shrugged.

Hayes looked out at the empty street and sighed. "Do you think anyone is ever going to feel safe to walk in the rain again?"

"Nope." Jack said bluntly.

Hayes laughed and wagged a finger at him. "That's why I like having you around, Jack. You never sugar coat it for me."

Jack attempted a smile but it still felt like a grimace.

"I just wanted to say goodbye before you take your vacation." Hayes patted his arm.

"I'd rather keep working." Jack remarked.

Hayes nodded and his eyes compassionate with understanding. He'd lost a brother and a nephew in the Rainstorm. "And I need you at full strength. You're tired, Jack. Go, get some rest and come back when you're ready."

Jack felt the frisson of fear that if he stopped fighting, he'd never return to it; too much time on his hands to think, to remember…

Hayes clasped his shoulder. "Go to that cabin of yours and go fishing, Jack. That's an order from your Commander-in-Chief."

Jack's lips twisted wryly. "Yes, Mister President."

o-O-o

The cabin was the same. It had taken Jack a couple of days to clean it up, toss out the rubbish and sweep away just over a year of dust. He hadn't thrown anything of Carter's away, unable to do anything more than simply brush of the dust and replace the items she'd left exactly where she'd left them; a book on astronomy by the bedside table, scented lotion on the dresser, her shampoo in the shower, the clothes in the closet, her motorbike stored in the shed. She had been at the cabin when the Rainstorm had happened, staying an extra day after their own romantic getaway the weekend before.

It had been just the two of them; their first and only trip as lovers. They'd loved each other lazily, contended to touch and hold hands in between. They'd thought they had time for more.

Jack couldn't bring himself to regret any of it though. He remembered each touch, every kiss. He sat on the deck in the sunshine the rod resting lightly in his hand and remembered how she'd loved fishing, happily sitting peacefully beside him, her brilliant mind letting go of all the complexities racing around it to simply enjoy the stillness of the lake.

He closed his eyes and breathed in deeply. Maybe he should have let Teal'c come with him as the Jaffa had requested or Cassie when she had asked if Jack wanted company. One of them, along with Daniel, had always been by his side since the Rainstorm as though they'd been worried that he'd do something stupid. He could understand why; Daniel had been with him in the wake of Charlie's death after all when he'd been perfectly happy to take a suicide mission. But Carter's death was different. Yes, he'd been furious with grief when he'd returned from Antarctica and they hadn't been able to locate her; when the Asgard had shown up and they'd realised she wasn't missing or unable to contact them but gone; when he and Daniel had closed up the cabin with red-rimmed eyes. But he'd known she'd have been furious with him if he hadn't kept on living; hadn't kept going day after day to make sure the world was safe again. So he'd done it.

He was surprised his family had finally acquiesced to his being away on his own. Maybe they'd thought it was time to allow him some space to grieve for her without being constantly watched. And maybe it was time to accept her death and move on; to stop hiding behind a working life that kept him busy and preoccupied and helped him forget every few minutes that she wasn't there anymore.

The first smattering of raindrops caught him by surprise and he stood up automatically to head back indoors. He stopped furious with himself, remembering his reply to Hayes the day before. Why shouldn't he stay out in the rain?

There was no danger. The nanites were dormant; the rain nothing more than rain. His jaw clenched with anger and frustration. That final weekend with Sam, they'd sat out fishing with the rain pouring down around them; her face lit up with laughter as she'd turned it upwards to the sky.

Jack sat down again abruptly, his hand tightening on the fishing rod.

The drops of water became a deluge; sheets of water falling out of the sky, a curtain glistening silver and white in the late afternoon light, blurring the landscape into swashes of different greens that almost blended together. Ripples bloomed across the pond in front of him; perfect circles travelling out until they crashed into each other. The pitter-patter of the water on the wood of the deck filled his ears. Jack lifted his face up to the sky and let himself get drenched, his eyes fluttering closed against the onslaught of water, relished the feel of it hitting his skin, trickling over the stubble on his jaw.

"Jack."

His eyes snapped open as he lunged out of the chair, turning around to check his immediate surroundings with a heart that pounded uncomfortably fast in his chest. He blinked past the drops of water hanging from his eyelashes and stared at the empty seat next to him.

There was nothing there.

He could have sworn he'd heard Carter, her voice saying his name as though she'd been sat right next to him. He dropped the fishing rod and pushed his hands into his eyes. Maybe he was going mad. It had to happen sometime, right? After all, he'd had the Ancient knowledge downloaded into his head – twice! – let's not forget how many times, being tortured by Ba'al who knew how many times because he'd lost count there at the end, and he'd had snakes inside him – twice! – so obviously he should have gone mad long ago.

"Jack."

The tone was the exactly the same as the one in which she'd say 'sir' if she was pissed at him, all the years they hadn't been allowed to be anything to each other but friends and team-mates.

"Open your eyes."

"Nope." Jack stated with certainty. "You're not real, Carter. I've finally gone whacko."

"You were already whacko. I'm real and I'm right in front of you." His hallucination replied with more amusement than he thought was necessary. "Open your eyes."

There was only one way to prove her wrong. He sighed, dropped his hands, and froze.

The rain was still falling, the deluge shifting back a gear to a steady fall of raindrops. They were falling on something human shaped in front of him, bending around it and making it visible.

She moved and he could see her form clearly as the rain ran over it; the lean long lines of her legs, the shapely curve of her hip, the nipped in waist and the flare of a bust-line that the regulation BDUs had never quite managed to hide. His eyes drifted along the elegant line of her neck to her face and he could make out the delicate features as the rain fell on her; her nose and chin, the hint of the shape of her lips.

But she wasn't there; she wasn't human; she was an invisible shape illuminated by the cascade of water.

It was unreal.

She was unreal.

He caught himself reaching out to touch her – it – her, and yanked his hand back as though he'd been burned.

"What the hell…"

"I've been waiting for you to be here and outside in the rain for a long time, Jack." It moved forward and he stepped away without thinking about it. The –thing – paused, lifted a hand beseechingly before dropping it again.

Jack firmed his lips. He'd faced down Goa'ulds and Replicators; he could face this…whatever this was. "You're not Carter."

"I'm projecting my body as a hologram and my voice using the nanites in the water." It didn't move again. "I'm…in the nanites."

"Uh-huh." Jack shook his head. "I don't think so."

"Jack…" There was the pissed off tone again. "The nanites didn't disintegrate our bodies; they beamed us into them somehow and downloaded our minds."

"We destroyed the nanites." Jack replied, ignoring the explanation.

"You mean the EMP you tried? It only rendered the majority inert." She retorted. "Others survived. The nanites are replicator based, Jack. They only needed one to survive; to replicate."

"You're saying they're back in business?" Jack's eyebrows rose. "Why aren't I being beamed up, down, whatever then?"

"Because I was able to counter the command to activate; I've been holding it in a loop." Sam replied. "Do you remember the entity that downloaded me into the computer? I knew as soon as it happened that it was the same thing and that somehow I'd been downloaded into a machine, but it took me time to work out how to operate in the nanite technology. Once I worked it out, I was able to take some control."

Of course she had; that was his Carter.

And he had just thought of her – it – them – as Carter. A shiver ran through him. Jack brushed the water off his face and shook his head.

"No." He turned and walked away.

"Jack." She called after him pleadingly. "Don't go…please, Jack."

Jack looked over his shoulder at the indistinct form. If it was Carter…but it couldn't be. It couldn't be. He carried on walking until he was safely inside the cabin.

o-O-o

Jack stared out of the window at the rain. He raised the beer to his lips and took another swallow. It seemed she – it, he corrected himself briskly needed him in the rain to communicate. As soon as he had towelled himself dry, her form had disappeared from outside the window and the faint plea of her voice had faded away into nothingness.

What the hell was it?

It wasn't Carter.

Was it?

It couldn't be Carter.

Carter was gone. Dead.

Only…

He couldn't stop the hope blooming in his heart; filling up the space in his chest until he couldn't breathe and he had to turn away from the window to get some perspective. He downed half of the bottle before he lowered it and blinked back tears he refused to acknowledge.

Get a grip, he told himself sternly. If it wasn't Carter…and it probably wasn't…then it was likely some kind of replicator trick and the one truth that he had recognised in the technobabble had been that the replicators only needed one nanite to have survived the EMP for them to continue being a threat.

He reached for his phone to call the SGC. He needed them to call Thor and tell him to do another EMP. His thumb hovered over the dial button.

If it was Carter…if it was…

If she was Carter and another EMP took out the nanites completely then he would have killed her.

He sat down, the phone in his hand, frozen with indecision.

Of course, he might be going insane.

He grimaced and looked back towards the window. It was still raining. He got up slowly and walked outside, the phone clutched tightly in one hand, his beer in the other. Within seconds he was drenched again.

Her form shimmered into view in front of him. She stood proudly; her chin up, challenging him. "Jack."

Jack ignored her. He pressed the speed dial on his phone and raised it to his ear. He didn't take his eyes off the form in front of him as he sipped his beer and waited for a response to the ringing tone.

"Jack, is something…"

"Daniel, I need you at the cabin." Jack said cutting in. His eyes never wavered from the shape under the rain.

"I'll be there as soon as I can." Daniel said immediately.

Jack didn't bother to acknowledge the reply. He shut down the call and flipped the phone shut.

"Daniel's coming?" There was delight in the voice that made Jack shiver.

"You think that's a good thing?"

He almost saw the eye roll.

"I've missed him." She said. "I've missed all of you, Jack, especially you. I've been so lonely."

"Don't get excited." Jack cautioned her. "I'm not sold on you being…" he waved the beer bottle at her, "Carter. I just want a second opinion."

She nodded. "You wouldn't be you if you didn't protect yourself against a possible replicator trap."

He nodded slowly. "Well, I'm glad you know that because you'll also know what I'm going to do if you are a replicator trap."

The rain was slowing, falling less frequently and her shape quivered and blurred.

"I'll be back with the next rain." She promised and disappeared as the first rays of weak sunshine broke through the clouds and the rain stopped.

o-O-o

Jack couldn't stop thinking about her. He sprawled out on the battered sofa and glared at the ceiling. No matter how much he tried to tell himself to stop hoping…he wanted to hope; he wanted his Carter back. He wanted more days with her confusing him with technobabble and fighting beside him; he wanted more nights to press his lips against the sweet spot he'd discovered on her neck. He wanted to kiss her and hold her and…

And he wanted her not to be dead. To have somehow cheated death just like they'd done in SG1 so many times before.

But there was enough of the General, the Air Force officer who'd fought too many battles and seen too much death, in him to let go of his paranoia; his fear that it was nothing more than a trap to end the world again.

The sound of the helicopter disturbed him and he levered himself up. He was at the door when Daniel, Vala and Teal'c got out, waving a farewell to the pilot.

Jack rubbed a hand over the back of his neck. He'd expected Teal'c would accompany Daniel but evidently Daniel still had his leather shadow too. It would have been easier if it had just been Daniel and Teal'c to confide in but maybe they needed an outside viewpoint. At least they'd left Cassie at home.

"Cassie's with Mitchell." Daniel said as soon as he got close enough as though he had read Jack's mind. "I didn't think you'd want her here if you were, uh…"

Jack sighed and ushered them inside, refusing to respond to Vala's wide-eyed look of innocence.

Daniel dumped his bags by the doorway to the bedrooms and turned to look at Jack critically. "You look…OK."

"Indeed," Teal'c agreed as he took up a position by the fire, hands behind his back. The pink t-shirt he wore proclaimed his wish for Girl Power.

"I'm going to get some beers." Jack said calmly. "There's stew for dinner. We'll talk after."

He saw his two former team-mates exchange a concerned look before they nodded almost in unison. Vala entertained them at dinner with outrageous stories of some of her days flitting through the galaxy as a thief. Jack let her words fill the silence. He hadn't worked out what to say; how to say it.

He still had no idea when dinner was finished, the dishes washed and stacked, and he'd run out of reasons to procrastinate. He sat down in an armchair and regarded his friends with an awkward grimace.

"I don't even know where to begin with this." Jack admitted.

"I believe at the beginning is the usual advice provided, O'Neill." Teal'c said gently from his position on the floor. He sat cross-legged, his back against the sofa where Daniel sat, leaning forward, his hands clasped loosely together between his knees. Vala was curled up beside him.

Jack nodded. He took a sip of the beer he had nursed over dinner and set it aside. He focused on the fire, the flickering flames burning yellow and orange; occasionally sparking as the logs collapsed to feed them.

"I was fishing," Jack began, "and it began to rain."

The others remained silent.

"You know how many times I've fished outside in the rain in my life?" Jack asked rhetorically. "Hundreds, so I…I just sat there; refused to be driven inside again. I closed my eyes and let the rain fall on me and I…" he sighed heavily and braced himself, "and I heard Carter say my name."

"Jack…" Daniel tried to interrupt but Jack held up a hand.

"Let me finish before you start assuming anything." Jack said firmly. He met Daniel's compassionately sympathetic eyes and got the nod he wanted. "OK, so I'm on my feet immediately, checking and, of course I don't see anything." He dropped his gaze to the floor. "I close my eyes and I think, OK, Jack, you've lost it, gone nuts, whacko…and then I hear her again and she's telling me to open my eyes. So, I open them."

He glanced over at the two men. They were both listening intently.

Vala hunched forward; fascination written across her mobile features. "And she's in front of you?" She guessed.

"Not exactly. There's this Carter-shaped thing standing in front of me." Jack drew two wavy lines of a female figure in front of him. "It's as though she's invisible but being made visible by the rain."

Daniel frowned, his brow creasing quizzically. "But you don't actually see Sam?"

"No." Jack replied. "She tells me that the nanites didn't dissolve people but beamed them into the nanites. She recognised being uploaded, downloaded, whatever. She says she's projecting some holo-thing using the nanites which is why I can see her in the rain because the nanites are still in the water system."

"But didn't the whatyoumacallit kill the nanites?" Vala asked.

"Well, the one thing I did believe is when she told me the replicators only needed one nanite to shield and survive the EMP." Jack explained.

Teal'c's expression darkened. "It was a threat."

"It was an explanation." Jack swiftly responded. "She says she's preventing them doing this beaming thing to anyone else."

"So what does she want?" Vala asked bluntly.

Jack sighed and sat back. He picked up his beer. "I didn't ask." He gestured with the bottle toward Daniel. "I called him."

Daniel's eyebrows rose about the line of his glasses and he cleared his throat. "How did…she take that?"

"She was happy. She's missed you." Jack said tiredly. He ran a hand over his face. "Then it stopped raining and she…disappeared."

Daniel picked up his beer, looked at it and set it aside. "I think this calls for something stronger." He went over to the side table and poured them all a shot of whiskey.

"So," said Jack accepting the crystal tumbler with alacrity, "I have three theories."

"One: this is a replicator trick. A back-up plan for if their first attack didn't work." Daniel said dryly. He swallowed half of his drink and coughed, banging his chest to help it burn its way down.

Jack noticed how Vala's eyes narrowed on Daniel with concern.

"Two," Vala jumped in, "this is your friend, Samantha. She has found a way of interfacing with the technology and she isn't dead but stored in the nanites."

They all took a moment to absorb that.

"There is still the third theory." Jack downed the rest of his drink and went to pour another.

Vala raised one eyebrow in elegant question.

"That O'Neill is indeed whacko." Teal'c replied. "Nuts. One fry short of a happy meal. One…"

"I think we get the picture, T." Jack said, toasting him. "Thanks."

"So, what's the plan?" Vala asked, getting to the point.

Jack looked at Daniel.

Daniel sighed and nudged his glasses. "We wait for it to rain and talk to her."

"See, I knew you were going to say that." Jack quipped.

Daniel threw a cushion at him.

o-O-o

"I don't think that I've ever wanted it to rain this much even before…" Daniel made a gesture in lieu of saying 'Rainstorm.'

Jack huffed and went back to his contemplation of the lake. He could feel Daniel's eyes on him. "Daniel."

"Jack."

He gave in and snapped a glare at his friend. "What?"

"You want it to be her, don't you?"

"What do you think?" Jack bit out, irritated that Daniel was being…Daniel.

"I want it to be her and I want it so badly that I can't imagine how much you must want it." Daniel said softly. "I miss her. Every day."

Jack didn't say anything; he didn't think he had to because he saw how much Daniel missed her in the way he'd turn in the middle of an excited explanation expecting to find Sam nodding in agreement with him or about to chime in to explain it in smaller words and less gobbledegook to Jack. He saw how much Teal'c missed her in the way the Jaffa reached for Sam's favourite foods at lunch time to carry for her only to realise at the last moment she wasn't there. He saw how much Cassie missed her every time she called Jack and told him of her day and waited imperceptibly for when Sam would have said something teasing or wise. And he missed her. He missed Sam, his Carter, so badly he ached with it down to his bones.

"Why did you call me?"

"Why wouldn't I call you?" Jack replied, letting his irritation bleed out into his words.

Daniel simply looked at him with more patience than Jack probably deserved.

Jack sighed. "Do you remember the incident with the computer entity?"

"Who could forget?" Daniel murmured. His blue eyes sharpened. "This is a similar dilemma isn't it? We don't know if Sam's in there really or not."

"My instinct is to treat it like a threat." Jack said. "But if I do that and it is her…" he grimaced.

"Well, even if it is Sam, it doesn't mean she isn't a threat." Daniel joked lightly.

Jack raised a smile.

A drop of water fell from the sky. Jack looked skyward. Grey clouds had moved in and obscured the pale blue. He nodded. It was time. They set the fishing gear aside as Teal'c and Vala came out to join them.

"Are you sure you want to be out here when it's raining?" Daniel asked Vala.

"Wouldn't miss it for all the jewels on Karono, darling. Besides I know how much you've wanted to see me in a wet t-shirt." Vala assured him, slipping her arm through his. "Are you sure you want to be out here?"

"Well, there's only a small chance this is a trap to eliminate us personally so…" Daniel shrugged.

"T?" Jack asked even though he already knew the answer.

The Jaffa inclined his head. "I will remain, O'Neill."

The rain started in earnest then; light scattering of water turned into heavy drops falling in uniform around them.

Jack blinked the water out of his eyes and searched for the shape he'd seen the day before. "Carter?"

"I'm here." She shimmied into view. She stayed back apace, slightly off the deck and over the water. "Daniel. Teal'c. It's so good to see you."

Jack turned to Daniel expectantly and saw his friend scanning the area in front of him with puzzlement. "Daniel, you're up."

Daniel glanced at him with concern. "There's nothing there, Jack."

Jack bristled. "She just said it was good to see you and Teal'c."

"I did not hear anything, O'Neill." Teal'c said.

Daniel shook his head. "Me either."

"Great." Jack muttered. OK, so it was just him which meant they had a winner: he was nuts, whacko…

"But I did, do." Vala's voice shook with wonder. She stepped forward and reached out a hand toward the shape under the fall of the rain. "This is incredible."

"Vala." Daniel tugged her back, worry creasing his face into a frown.

"You can see her." Jack stated, trying to hide his own excitement. He wasn't nuts if Vala could see something too.

"And hear her." Vala agreed breathlessly. Her gleeful eyes alighted on his.

"Why?" Daniel mused out loud. "Why can you and Jack see her and Teal'c and I can't?"

"Naquadah." Sam replied.

"She says naquadah." Jack repeated for the benefit of his former team-mates. Vala had stiffened with the word.

"That makes sense. You're all former hosts." Daniel murmured. "I mean, you only have a miniscule amount after Kanan but it's there."

Jack's lips pressed together tightly at the reminder and he could see by the twist of Vala that she wasn't too happy about it either.

Vala shrugged it off first. "So, the naquadah in our blood is allowing us somehow to connect with how Samantha is using the nanites to communicate with us."

"Carter or the replicator pretending to be Carter." Jack stated firmly, folding his arms and looking back at the shapely rain form.

"So ask me anything, Jack. Ask me anything you know only I know."

Vala's eyes twinkled. "This sounds interesting."

"What?" Daniel asked, his gaze shifting from the rain to Vala crossly.

"She's just asked Jack to ask her anything so she can prove that it's her." Vala explained without a hint of an apology.

Daniel sighed and took off his glasses. "Look, as Teal'c and I can't see or hear her, you're both going to have to keep us in the loop."

"Right." Jack agreed.

Vala poked him with a sharp finger. "So, ask her something!"

"Perhaps I should start." Sam said amused. "You're still bonded with Daniel?"

"Well, it depends on what you mean by bonded with Daniel." Vala said, delighted. "We don't suffer the effects of the bracelets anymore but…"

"Vala." Daniel said sharply.

Vala winked at him audaciously.

Teal'c moved forward a step. "If Samantha Carter has been uploaded to the nanites, a replicator may simply be using the memories stored of her to answer any question."

"He's right."

Jack snapped his head toward the Sam-shape again as she answered Teal'c's charge.

"It wouldn't be the first time a replicator has used my memories to gain your trust, Jack." She said. "Teal'c knows that and he knows I would never want what happened with her to happen again."

Jack dimly heard Vala relaying the words to Daniel and Teal'c. "You know I can't trust you."

"I know." She said. "I also know how much you want to because I know how much I would want to if our positions were reversed."

There was a touch on his arm and Jack turned toward it.

Daniel smiled at him tentatively. "Ask her what she wants."

"She heard you, Daniel." Jack glanced at her. "You did hear him?"

"Yes." She shifted, the rain bending around her. "I think I could reverse the process."

Jack frowned at her. "What?"

"The nanites are incredibly sophisticated, Jack. They're beyond anything we've encountered before. I don't think they're the same replicators that originated with Reese. They were programmed to effectively beam anything human into memory but if they can beam us into them, there has to be a way to beam us out, and I've found the code that could do that."

"So why haven't you activated it?" Vala asked as Jack tried to process what she had said.

Sam could come back to him as more than a visual illusion under water? Jack felt his hope start to bubble up again.

"I can't reach the code."

"Of course you can't." Jack said dully. He let Vala fill Daniel and Teal'c in.

"Why not?" asked Daniel. He hugged his torso, sending his damp shirt askew. "Why can't you get to the code? You can clearly alter some of it, control some it if you can use it to communicate."

"There's a block on some of the code that won't allow anything internal to the programme to alter it. It thinks I'm a replicator."

"You could be a replicator." Jack shot back.

"I'm me, Jack, even if you don't believe it." She sounded tired. "Either way, the code is inaccessible to me. Thor should be able to decipher it and alter the programme so the process is reversed."

"And when it is reversed?" Vala asked quietly.

"Everyone who was beamed into the nanite technology should be beamed out."

He could have her back, Jack realised, his heart pounding; he could have her back.

"Just like that?" Vala murmured. She turned at Daniel's impatient huff and repeated everything that had been said.

"How do we know that activating such a code would not create a human form replicator?" Teal'c asked grimly.

The rain was starting to slow again, thinning out.

"Talk to Thor." Sam encouraged. "I'll be here with the next rain."

Her form blurred again and disappeared.

Jack gazed at the spot where she'd stood for a long moment.

Daniel clasped his shoulder. "Come on inside. Thor's in orbit. We can talk to him."

o-O-o

Thor's ship provided a neutral ground for discussion. Its wide bridge, all clean lines and gleaming metal, had the perfect view and Jack found himself gazing down on the Earth as he let Daniel explain to the little grey alien about the situation.

Thor blinked slowly. "Interesting. I will need a nanite for examination." He moved to a control panel and shifted a glowing rock.

There was a flash of light and a single nanite appeared under an examination instrument.

"Hmmm." Thor said as the analysis zipped up on a nearby monitor. "I believe this programming is unlike the replicators that we have battled before. The code is in Ancient."

Daniel suddenly whirled around. "Ancient?"

Thor waved a thin hand at the screen. "Please see for yourself, Doctor Jackson."

"It's Ancient." Daniel confirmed.

"Which means what exactly?" Jack pressed.

"The Ancients created these nanites." Daniel repeated. "They were a different…" his head snapped up. "Maybe this has something to do with the Atlantis expedition."

The one that had walked through the Stargate almost two years before and which they hadn't heard from since. Their own efforts to go in search of them had been put on an indefinite hold with the Rainstorm despite the Daedalus being completed.

"Hmmm. I believe I have discovered the issue. The originator did put in a protective measure to prevent the nanites from accessing their base code." Thor said briskly.

"OK, so what does that mean?" Jack pressed.

"It means that Sam…" Daniel began.

Jack shot him a look.

"Or the nanites pretending to be Sam," Daniel allowed, "told the truth."

"I have also discovered what the code describing the process by which the nanites transferred the humans they touched into their memory core." Thor said. He shifted another rock. "There are over ten million individual life signs recorded."

Jack's heart stuttered in his chest. "Life signs?"

"Yes, O'Neill." Thor's eyes twinkled at him. "Life signs."

"In that tiny thing?" Vala protested with a wide-eyed stare.

"I have been reliably informed by Daniel Jackson and O'Neill on many occasions that size does not matter." Teal'c informed her, amusement lurking in the depths of his dark eyes.

"They lied." Vala said baldly, grinning.

"But not in this particular instance." Thor countered. "This technology is incredibly advanced."

He sounded impressed and awed which worried Jack.

"Is there a way of retrieving the life signs without reversing the process the way…she wanted?" Jack asked.

"I do not believe so." Thor replied, shifting to focus on him. "I can however alter the code myself to initiate the reversal." He tutted. "There are however complications."

Jack sighed. Of course there were. "What?"

"This can only be done as a single process; all life signs transferred all at once. The nanites would need to be reactivated and in motion to prevent the life signs from being transferred into solid objects." Thor listed out dispassionately. "We would have to stimulate a worldwide rainstorm similar to the one the replicators used to implant the nanites." He paused. "I would then need to perform another EMP to render the nanites inert again."

Daniel looked at Jack. The implications were huge; all the dead brought back to life, another Rainstorm…

Jack grimaced. "I'd better call the President."

o-O-o

He went back to the cabin during the debates. Daniel was better at convincing people to do the right thing than Jack and Jack had…wanted to be at the cabin.

The thunderous fall of rain on the roof had Jack slipping into a waterproof and striding down to the deck.

She shimmered into view and Jack was reminded of the term Vala had used when they had discussed on Thor's ship whether the entity that had told them of the coding was Sam or not: Rain ghost. It suited it – her.

"Jack."

"They're taking a vote on whether to reverse it." Jack ground out, torn between not saying anything to an enemy and updating Carter.

"They?"

"The world knows about the Stargate programme." Jack said succinctly. "Aliens trying to invade by swamping us with nanites kinda took care of that. There's a whole other level of bureaucracy now. We can't just decide 'hey let's save Earth' without it being agreed in triplicate."

The debate wasn't an easy one either; Jack knew that despite his own desire to have Carter alive again. The world had suffered a blow with the first Rainstorm. Resources were stretched as it was without adding more people into the equation. Then there was the worldwide nature of the return; the US had survived relatively intact but some countries were in tatters. Lastly, there was the risk that they were unleashing in reactivating the nanites even if Thor assured them the code had been changed.

She nodded, shifting the rain around her. "How's Cassie?"

"How do you think she is? She lost someone else she loved." Jack said cuttingly, wanting to strike out and hurt her.

"You still think I'm a replicator."

The wry understanding had Jack's cheeks flushing.

"Wouldn't you?" Jack shot back.

"What did Thor say?" She replied instead.

"That he doesn't know if you're a nascent replicator personality who latched onto Carter as the most useful to get what you want, or whether you really are her since in his words, if anyone could work from within the technology he believes it would be you."

"I can't prove I'm not a nascent replicator personality." She admitted, sighing. "But I know who I am, Jack."

"Good for you." He muttered. "But you'll forgive me if I hold off judgement until I have the real you in front of me and not some…' he pointed up and down at her, "rain ghost."

She stirred at that, evidently unhappy. "If…if they decide against the reversal, will you…I would…I want to see you, spend time with you in this form but…I…you wouldn't want that, would you?"

Jack knew the question was moot; if the reversal didn't happen, there was going to be another EMP to render any active nanites inert. The rain ghost in front of him would be gone either way.

"Then I'll say goodbye now."

And she sounded so utterly like Carter; brave and strong and…

"Carter."

"It's alright, Jack." Her hand reached out and he didn't flinch as she touched his cheek, cool and wet, mingling with the water already running over him. "I love you. Be happy."

She evaporated, falling into raindrops in front of him.

He stayed outside for a long moment. His chest too tight with emotion to do anything else but stand still; unable to acknowledge that the wetness on his cheeks was more than just rain. Finally, he managed to turn away from the pond and march inside, strip his wet clothes and dry himself with warm towels. He pulled on fresh jeans, a comfortable old grey t-shirt and a checked shirt.

He stumbled to a halt in front of the fire, grief catching him and holding him frozen in its grip.

He'd lost the rain ghost. He'd let perhaps his only connection to Carter, or some remnant of her, slip through his fingers and…

His phone rang.

Jack knew the call was Daniel. They'd made a decision then, and in that instant, he knew what he would do if it wasn't the decision he wanted: he'd always choose Carter; always.

o-O-o

Jack came awake with a start. He rolled over and stared at the empty expanse of bed next to him. He sat up and rubbed a hand through his hair, over his face. He needed to shave, he noted as his fingers took in the two days' growth along his jawline. He yawned and checked the time.

Early.

Way too early to be awake.

He sighed and reached for his jeans, pulling them on and leaving the buttons half-undone as he dragged on a t-shirt.

The cabin was too quiet; empty. It was beginning to rain outside. He could hear the dull thunk on the windows as the drops began to fall. He eschewed a waterproof and made his way down to the deck where he knew she would be.

Carter stood at the end of the deck, her back to him, her face turned upward to the sky and the rain beginning to fall in earnest.

Jack paused for a moment and took in the view of the flesh and blood woman in front of him. The blonde hair was pale in the grey light of the early morning, almost silver; the dark sweats she wore couldn't hide the shape of her legs or the curve of her hip. She glanced over her shoulder and smiled when she saw him; the smile that lit up her whole face, turning her from a beautiful woman into Jack's Carter.

He moved forward instantly, pulled in as though caught in a gravity well. He wrapped his arms around her waist and buried his face in her neck, breathing in the scent of her buried under the orange fragrance of her lotion. He kissed the vulnerable skin behind at her nape before he shifted and kissed her properly, ignoring the rain that fell around them; his fingers went seeking the warm skin under her clothes, to reassure himself she was real; that she was flesh and bone and blood and back with him.

Sam eased back and ran a hand over his face. "We should take this inside." Her voice was raised slightly to be heard over the tumult of rain against the pond.

"You're the one who left our very comfortable bed and came out in the rain." Jack winced at the note of accusation he hadn't been able to eradicate.

But Carter knew he hated her being outside when it rained even if she didn't understand it even three months after she'd been beamed back. None of the returnees shared the same fears as those who had gone through the year of loss following the first Rainstorm. But then they had no memory of what had happened to them. The last thing Sam said she remembered was fishing on the deck and thinking it was beginning to rain.

She kissed him softly in lieu of an apology. "I came out to look at the thunder and lightening."

"Ah." Jack knew the spectacular lightening was the result of eradicating the nanites from Earth's bio-system; a process Carter had invented and implemented with Thor's help a week before. All he knew was that it had something to do with magnets. His arms tightened around her as his gaze slipped away from hers to the falling lines of rain around the edge of the deck.

Sam cupped his cheek, regaining his attention. "Should I be jealous?" she asked, her eyes laughing up at him.

Sam had had no memory of communicating with Jack as the rain ghost; she had no memory of interacting with the nanite technology at all. Thor had determined they would never know whether it had been Carter or not; she could have been the rain ghost and reversing the beaming process had erased the memories or…or it hadn't been Carter at all but a nascent replicator personality who'd assumed her identity.

He rolled his eyes at her.

Sam tilted her head. "You still think about her."

"Only when it rains." Jack quipped, not bothering to deny it.

"The nanites are gone; she won't be coming back." Sam said, pressing closer to kiss him again.

"She might have been you and she's the reason I have you back now." Jack pointed out briskly. It scared him sometimes how close they'd come to losing Carter for real.

Sam grinned and tugged on his arm. "Let's get inside and out of these wet clothes." She waggled her eyebrows suggestively.

Jack gave a final glance back at the curtain of rain falling into the pond as they turned away. He slipped his hand into Carter's, tangling their fingers together as they walked back toward the cabin. He didn't look back again; it was time to stop thinking about ghosts.

fin.