Beauty In The Broken

Shards

"What did she say to you?"

The elevator had been full by the time the medical teams had piled in with the gurney. In light of Janet's insistence that Sam remain close to the situation, Sam and Daniel had aimed themselves back to the stairwells rather than waiting for the next car. They'd emerged on Level Twenty-one even before the med team had, immediately turning and jogging towards the infirmary.

Within moments of their arrival, the medical team had rounded the last turn and raced down the corridor. Janet had been perched on the edge of the gurney, shouting orders as she'd pressed wads of gauze to the woman's throat and stomach. The nurses had worked as they'd run, adjusting the IV they'd inserted and making sure that the patient's oxygen mask wasn't slipping. The small army of nurses and assistants had rapidly disappeared into the inner recesses of the medical unit, leaving nothing but a trail of dripped blood on the corridor's floor. Sam had been trying not to look at it.

That had been nearly forty minutes ago.

Forty minutes of waiting, of feeling useless. Of standing outside the medical bay trying not to obsessively consider worst cases, likely outcomes, inevitable ends. Forty minutes that had seemed like hours. Days. Eternities.

Sam resisted the urge—yet again—to look at her watch.

Just like she'd been trying not to look at the blood on the floor. She'd been failing in both efforts.

Through the front windows of the infirmary, Sam could see nurses hurrying back and forth, and Janet's voice wafted through in muffled, terse tones. Omnipresent were the beeping monitors and instruments, the low, slow drone of the base's ventilation system, and the frequent bursts of activity as people moved equipment and supplies.

Daniel had suggested that they go get some coffee, but Sam hadn't been able to leave. Despite the fact that Sam wasn't technically part of what was happening, she also really, really was.

It was that weird carbon copy thing again. A little over a year ago, she'd felt as if she were looking at a copy of herself and somehow coming up less-than in comparison. As if her choices, her direction, her path, were somehow wrong.

Now? She wasn't sure what she was feeling.

Worry, certainly. Concern. She was fairly certain that she'd never be able to forget how those eyes—her own eyes—had bored into her, so full of pain and fear. Almost as if she'd been able to feel all of this alternate version's pain within herself, merely because they shared—what—a face? DNA? An existence? How was it even possible to make sense of this? It wasn't.

"Sam?" Daniel's voice prodded gently. "Have I lost you again?"

"No. Sorry." Sam resisted—yet again—the urge to tilt her wrist to check the time. She scrolled back through her thoughts to get to Daniel's question. "What did she say to me? Nothing, really. She asked me to watch a drive."

"What does that mean?"

"I don't have any idea. Some sort of technology, probably. A recording device." Sam's boots squeaked against the concrete floor, the leather of her jacket catching the emergency lighting in the corridor. "We don't really know anything, do we? We don't even know that it's actually her."

"Who—the other Sam?" Leaning back against the wall, Daniel shoved his glasses up on his nose. "Janet seems convinced."

"She's confident." Sam cast him a speculative look as she peered—yet again—through the infirmary doorway. "I'm sure that she's got her reasons why she suspects that this is the same Doctor Carter that came through a year ago. But who knows? You saw a completely different version of another other me in that other other reality a few years back."