August 31, 2009
Manchester, NY

Kammie listened to the sound of the tires rolling along the pavement. Thomas was so excited, taking her to 'see' his creation. And it sounded like an impressive thing. Though he'd saved most of the description for when they'd be with the equipment.

He called it the Gate Generator.

The wheels crunched over the broken asphalt, Kammie guessed by the hangar Thomas used. The car slowed down to confirm that guess and Chak uncurled in Kammie's lap.

"We're here. I'll get your door." Thomas scrambled out, pausing only to grab his cane, before walking around to open her door. He leaned down to kiss her. "Thank you for coming. I've wanted to share it with you." The kiss lasted perhaps a little longer than he'd intended and Chak gave a soft, but impatient, ferret hmph.

"Thomas... you know I'm honored. You don't need to thank me." Kammie eased her way out of the car, holding the still irritated ferret.

"I, well," He huffs, sounding a little like Chak. "Let's go inside."

Hanger at the Manchester Airport

Inside the hangar, Thomas takes Chak and sets him someplace. "Here, I'll lead you to it." He guides her to the center of the hangar after flipping some switches that Kammie guesses are for the lights. A faint hum starts on their motion. "Let me take the cover off. Then I'll guide your hands...." There is the sound of something, maybe canvas, being slid over and off something. Then Thomas' hands take hold of the backs of Kammie's and he moves them so they can lightly stroke the surface of the creation.

Kammie realizes that the gate is quite large. She certainly isn't going to feel the whole of it. Thomas had described it as something that the typical couch potato would think the SG-1 Team should step out of. Of course, he'd then had to explain what an SG-1 Team was.

Thomas started into an in depth explanation, which Kammie listened to, but he soon stopped and chuckled. "Don't know what I'm talking about, do you."

"No, but I still like to listen. Perhaps I will learn someday."

"If it works, when it works, no one is ever going to be lost in the Tellurian again. Even the damned Void Engineers can't boast this kind of technology. It will make travel safer. Closer to letting everyone see the world beyond their faces. Imagine if everyone had SEEN the Umbra and accepted it as fact? We'd have stopped the Technocracy dead in its tracks!"

Kammie smiled. Thomas lead her over to the scruffy couch. This was where they'd first made love, where she'd decided to risk being as human as she could be, where she accepted that someone... no, not someone... this one, this Thomas wanted her and cared for her. He settled her down on it, leaving her for a moment just to return and place Chak on her lap. He sat next to her. He must have a beautiful view of the gate, as the couch faced it directly.

"I know I haven't been around much." He leaned in to kiss her cheek. "I want to be with you to hunt your answers, to find the drums, to protect you from Ford. I want to be with you to love you. And..." He rested his forehead on her shoulder. "... I had to finish this. I -have- to finish this."

Kammie rested her hand on his head. "You've been good to me. I never thought... I know it's been hard with all the changes, being blind, Ford... Thomas, never feel guilty for being who you are, please."

Thomas nodded against her shoulder and kissed her again. "I love you. You're so beautiful, Kammie and I do love you." He looked toward the gate. "Just let me cover it up and we'll go home. Maybe I can show you a glimpse of how much I love you." He stood and moved away from the couch.

Kammie sat on the couch stroking Chak who'd curled up in her lap again as if realizing there wasn't much for him to do that night. Kammie could hear Thomas start to lift the canvas to place it over the gate. Then there was a faint "What the...?" and Thomas screamed, "Ford! Not that!!"

Kammie sat up straight as Chak leaped onto her shoulder and turned to look toward the gate. He was making a high squeeling noise. "Thomas?" No answer. "Thomas!"

There was the the smell of ozone and the sound of crackling electricity. The whining of a turbine increased to a screaming pitch. There was the sound of some kind of struggle either between people or for one person to prevent something from happening, Kammie couldn't tell.

Kammie struggled for the bit of blue leather she wore on a chain around her neck. She tried to calm herself enough. She needed this. /See! SEE!/

Umbra 'over' Manchester

The Umbra swam around her. It was hard for her to see at first. She seemed to be surrounded by more of the dancing spirits than she'd ever seen. Then she saw it.... saw him.... One of the spirits held a body in its arms, a body limp and lifeless... and recognizable as Thomas' or so she believed.

"NO!"

/I showed you yours, you little upstart. Now I'll take what's mine./

The voice echoed around the empty hangar over Kammie's ragged breathing. She whispered, "Thomas?"

At the end of the statement that had come in, yes, Ford's voice, Chak stiffened and began to shudder, legs paddling wildly. Kammie put a hand out trying to calm him or hold him somehow, but struggled to find which side of him was which as he flailed away in her lap where he'd falled from her shoulder. It seemed that the seizure lasted forever to Kammie as she watched the fluttering form that was Chak's in the Umbra, but it was less than a minute later that the body relaxed suddenly, limper than sleep. The only motion was the frantic panting as the little ferret tried to lower his body temperature.

Kammie waited... waited as the floating shadows of spirits began to slowly move away from her. She didn't think about seeing in the Umbra. She didn't think about magick. She though only of Thomas and the strange sense of a part of herself being gone... simply not existing. Oh... and a little thought for Chak.

How long she sat there on the couch, Kammie didn't know. Eventually Chak got to his feel and wanted to wander. She put him down on the floor and let him move around as he pleased. He stumbled this way, then that, running into furniture and equipment as if unable to control his muscles.

He stumbled his way over to the gate and a pool of blood at its base.

"No, Chak! Don't..." She moved off the couch to reach for him and pulled him closer to her. Then it hit her. She was seeing. Not in the Umbra. Seeing like a human... now... when it did her no good in saving Thomas.

The tears began to fall.

"Oh.... Thomas..... "

Somewhere in Manchester

"So she's changed her form. And so well I couldn't detect it until now. Quite impressive. Better than I could ever have expected." The speaker winced as one of his assistant's massaged the arm that he'd so recently healed of a cut that had left blood on the floor of a hangar. "I'll get her soon enough, now that I know where she is. And that she's blind. And that cretin is gone."

Somewhere in the Tellurian

The spirit floated slowly toward the lake and the small boat floating at it's edge. It placed the body into the boat and the boat, seemingly of its own will, floated out into the middle of the lake. The spirit stood on shore watching until it could see the small vessel no more and turned.

Had its eyesight been stronger, it might have seen a hand lift itself and curve over the side of the boat....

[Descriptions of the gate take from Thomas' earlier stories.]