Just Imagine...

Strange Visions

Sam was hardly awake, she would blame it on that. It was too early for a mission to the middle of nowhere. Too cold as well. And did she mention too early?
She paused in her search of the warehouse to let out a huge yawn, letting her gun drop to her side for a moment. It was then that she heard the laughter and she froze.
The sound was distinctly not Jack, Ianto, Owen, or Tosh, and even though she wasn't there Sam ruled Gwen out too. This sounded like a child. Two children, actually, giggling somewhere nearby.
"Tosh?" Sam asked into her comms, "can these things shapeshift? I dunno if you can tell that or not, but, uhh..."
"What, Mom?" Jack's voice asked anxiously, "what is it?"
Sam jerked her head to the right as she saw movement. Her heart stopped for a second.
Whatever she was looking at looked exactly like her Jay had when they were both seven, and the second one that leaped out after the first looked like Sam's younger self.
Or maybe it really was them. Maybe... they were ghosts.
Little Sam pounced on little Jay with a fierce mock-roar (that sounded more like a squeak) and started tickling him. Little Jay squealed with laugher.
"Stop it, Sam!" He giggled, trying to push her off, "you're not playing right!"
"I can play however I want!" Little Sam declared, tickling him more, "I'm the boss of this castle!"
Sam just stared, mouth hanging slightly open and brows furrowed in confusion. She remembered this.
"Then I get to play your way too!" Little Jay exclaimed, and tickled little Sam back. She let out a scream and fell backwards, and both of them ended up in a giggling heap. "Hey," little Jay murmured, nudging little Sam with his elbow, "are you gonna have a real castle someday?"
"Of course!" Little Sam replied, throwing her arms up in the air, "when I'm big I'm gonna have Harmony Palace all to myself! I'll banish Daddy's parents to a dungeon so they'll never hurt me again! And everybody I love is gonna live there!"
"Me?"
"Duh!"
Little Sam stood up and took little Jay's hand, and Sam watched as they walked away, disappearing around another corner.
"SAM!"
Sam jumped and let out a startled yelp as Owen's voice cut through her comms.
"WHAT?" She demanded loudly, immediately regretting her tone.
"You cut out for a second," Ianto murmured, "we couldn't hear you. Are you okay? What did you see?"
Sam took a deep breath.
"N-nothing," she stammered, "it was nothing."
"Are you sure?" Tosh pressed, "you sound like you've just seen a ghost!"
Sam glanced back at where she'd seen the vision of her past self and Jay. There was nothing there now, just a small stem of blooming forget-me-nots poking out through a crack in the ground that she was certain hadn't been there before.
"No," Sam laughed quietly, "I just... saw a flower moving in the wind, it startled me."
"Getting scared by flowers?" Owen teased, "I might have to check your brain, mate, make sure everything's working right."
"Ha ha ha, very funny, Owen." Sam murmured in response, walking past the splash of blue on the concrete floor.
"Are you sure you're okay?" Jack asked worriedly.
"Yes, I'm fine, sweetheart," Sam murmured with a smile, "I'm fine."
Then she rounded the corner and saw it.
The bomb.
The timer winding down to 4... 3... 2...
Sam turned on her heel and ran back the way she'd come, even though she already knew it was too late.
Her foot crushed the flowers as she ran, but they would have been destroyed anyway when five explosions ripped the warehouse apart.