In All Certainty

In All Certainty

In All Certainty

In all certainty, neither of them had expected to ever see each other again. They each went their own way, living their own lives and moving on; but they had never guessed that they would be brought back together again.

Samantha Carter had been searching blindly for someone after she had realized that Jack O’Neill would never commit to her. After she lost him, and before she found Pete Shanahan, she had seen another. In the end, it was fated never to work out, but she had slowly begun to love him. She had to tell herself to walk away.

But, perhaps, it was harder for Paul Emerson to move on. He had loved Sam, and still did; that was getting harder to ignore as time went by. Honestly, he had never expected to become captain of the Odyssey. Even with the benefits that job brought, it was hard to see her, and work with her, again.

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When he first boarded the Odyssey, he busied himself on the bridge, watching the work of his crew and helping out himself. It was sometimes tricky to get the systems working properly, but in a way it was enjoyable to watch his ship slowly coming to life. She was a beautiful ship; everyone shared the same opinion about her.

Ninety percent of the systems were operational when General Landry called. Apparently, SG-1 was missing on P6G-452, and the gate on that planet couldn’t be dialed into. Landry wanted the Odyssey to go get them.

Paul couldn’t think of a worse situation than what he’d just been placed in. Still, he obeyed his orders and told Marks, his pilot, to set course for P6G-452. After speeding through hyperspace for almost a day, they found the planet easily.

They had no problem detecting SG-1, and beamed them up without a hitch. As they materialized on the bridge, Paul rose, both out of respect for the renowned team and for Sam. “SG-1,” he acknowledged. Sam was the only one who knew him, so he continued. “I’m Colonel Paul Emerson. Welcome aboard the Odyssey.”

Ironically, Sam responded, wearing the recognizable smile that he knew so well. “Thank you, sir,” she said. Those were the very first words she said to him after they’d broken up, and he remembered them forever.

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Months went by; Paul and Sam’s paths continued to cross. The Odyssey helped SG-1 with any number of missions. Again and again they found themselves in trouble, and again and again they managed to escape. Soon Paul was somewhat used to it, but that was before the Ori attacked.

That attack—at an Ori Supergate that no one knew existed—was the hardest part of his short command. Sam had thought that, with the help of the Asgard, she’d be able to activate the Supergate and keep Ori ships from coming through; with a special control crystal, she had beamed over to the outside of the massive gate.

But the plan, just like many other plans before, had failed. The Ori had dialed in before they could dial out, and four ships had come through.

That had been one of the few times in his life that Paul had almost panicked. Sam had been dangerously close to the gate as it had activated; because of that, she couldn’t radio in nor could they beam her out. He didn’t know if she was alive or not.

It didn’t help that they now had to fight off four ships, which they failed miserably at doing. The Odyssey had almost been destroyed, whereas most of the other ships there hadn’t survived. It was a grim sight.

By the end of the battle, however, it was certain: Sam had survived, and even with their loss they now knew what they were up against. They were all desperate for a new plan, and because of that the Odyssey was helping SG-1 more than ever. They took them on a trip to Atlantis in the Pegasus galaxy, and rescued them several times from both the Lucian Alliance and the Ori forces. But for a while, it seemed that things were leveling out. Paul, even with his renowned common sense, was starting to hope that the Ori might be defeated.

But the Lucian Alliance was becoming more and more of a threat; its leader, Netan, wanted SG-1 captured or killed at all costs. The only problem was that no one knew that, until the day came that they learned painfully just what the Alliance could do.

On that day, the Odyssey had been dispatched to investigate a rumor of a second Ori Supergate. Sam came along, in case the Supergate was real and they needed to destroy it; other than her presence, things were normal.

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