Samantha's Swim
A Stargate SG-1 story starring Amanda Tapping as Samantha Carter
Written by Nemesoak
Written by Nemesoak
It was shaping up to be a boring mission as Major Samantha Carter was searching for signs of civilization near the stargate on a new world. So far the search seemed to be in vain. None of the other SG-1 members who were searching different areas were having any luck.
As she went further into the forest, Carter heard distant sounds of an ocean. Kind of odd for a dense forest to be so close to the ocean, but she had seen many far stranger things in her time on SG-1. At least things were nice and quiet - something seldom experienced by the team.
Just when it seemed nothing would happen, Carter heard a twig snap. In seconds, three large men in primitive shirts and pants appeared. Reaching for her gun, Carter was shocked to find it missing along with her other weapons. How strange. She didn't recall dropping them or setting them down anywhere. But this wasn't the time for speculation, it was the time for action. Carter then prepared to defend herself. The men moved in. While Carter was a very good fighter, within the limits of her size and build, it was impossible to defeat three men larger than she was. The men quickly subdued Carter and restrained her by the old tactic of pulling down her fatigues jacket.
While she was trying to struggle, a man dressed in a somewhat better outfit showed up. He was accompanied by another man who was dressed in the same primitive manner as Carter's captors. Looking at Carter, the better dressed man yelled "What do we have here?"
The man standing next to Carter answered "We found her while we were foraging, Captain. I think she will bring us a good price at port. She looks like she would do good as either a domestic or field slave."
"You did well." replied the captain. "That looks like a nice jacket she has. Take it." With that, the men removed her jacket and stowed it in one of their packs, leaving Carter in her black T-shirt. But Carter had a surprise in store. While still restrained by two of the men, she quickly kicked the captain's attendant in the groin, sending him to the ground in pain.
As the man was trying to recover, Carter's captors grabbed her tighter and held a dagger to her throat. Her hope of escape was dashed for now. Getting up, the man Carter kicked said "No woman can kick like that! It's magic, I tell you!"
"Nonsense!" roared the captain. "You," he said pointing to one of the men, "get her boots. The rest of you, slit her throat if she tries anything." The man complied and removed Carter's boots, leaving her barefoot.
Examining the boots, the captain explained "There's no magic. These have metal in the soles and toes. Might come in handy some day. Now, let's return to the ship."
Carter was marched with the men a short distance to a dinghy on the beach. After she was inside, the boat was launched and the crew rowed it to their destination - a primitive looking sailing vessel. Once at the ship, Carter was taken aboard and led below decks to a cargo hold. Then, her hands were bound behind a post. After that was done, her captors left.
When she was sure that the crew was occupied, Carter examined her situation. It seems that her luck was starting to change. The rope she was tied with wasn't really good. Finding a rough spot on the back of the post, Carter started rubbing the rope on it. A short while later, the rope broke and her hands were free. After removing the ropes from her wrists, Carter carefully sneaked out of her prison.
A short time later, Carter found a door that led to the captain's cabin in the stern of the vessel. Once inside the cabin, she noticed a window. Glancing out the window, she saw that the ship was already some distance from shore. Figuring that her only chance of rescue would be on the same landmass as the stargate, her course of action was clear. Opening the window, Carter carefully climbed out. Fortunately, the stern of the ship had a number of features that could work as handholds and steps, so Carter could quietly descend into the water.
To her relief the water was quite warm - a vast improvement over her last unplanned swim, on that strange planet where Daniel disappeared for a while. Another positive difference was that she wasn't as encumbered by gear this time. Taking a deep breath, Carter dove down and swam underwater. The sensation wasn't bad. Soon she surfaced, took a breath, and dove again. Swimming underwater would keep the people on the ship from noticing her escaping.
When she had judged that she had swam far enough away, Carter rested on the surface to catch her breath. She could see the ship in the distance, but all the people on the ship could see of her was an indistinct dot. Then, there was a loud noise. The ship had exploded, evidently the result of spontaneous combustion of the ship's magazine. At least she no longer had to worry about pursuers.
With the threat of pursuit gone, Carter soon continued her swim on the surface. But it was a long way to the beach and the going was a bit laborious. Her fatigue pants were never intended for use as swimwear and their weight and resistance were slowing her down considerably. At about the halfway mark, Carter was starting to tire and she decided that something had to be done.
Then, she remembered something she read that might be helpful in this situation. Carter undid her pants and pulled them off, leaving her in her opaque military-issue briefs. Taking the pants, she tied a tight knot in each leg. She wasn't too worried about making the knots too tight. If she couldn't undo them when she got to shore, she could always find a sharp shell or stone and cut off that part of the pants legs. Once she was finished tying the knots, Carter proceeded to fill the pants with air, creating a crude floatation device.
Armed with something buoyant to hold, Carter resumed her swim at a leisurely pace. Aiding her effort was the fact that her current attire of T-shirt and undergarments offered little resistance to her swimming. If it wasn't for the serious life-or-death nature of the situation, Carter thought, this swim would be downright pleasant. The water was nice and warm. There was also the sensation of her T-shirt moving against her body as she swam. It was almost fun.
While it was easy for Samantha Carter to imagine she was swimming in an ocean on Earth, she wasn't. There were differences. And now, one of those differences was fast approaching. Carter felt something bump her. "Just a fish, I hope." she thought and moved to one side. Then she got bumped again. As she was wondering what was happening, something tentacle-like wrapped around one of her legs and pulled her under.
As she was descending, Carter could see a tentacle wrapped around her leg. The tentacle led to some large indistinct form in the darkness below. The pressure of the water started building up and hurting her ears. But that was the least of her problems. She had to escape before whatever it was had her for lunch or drowned her.
Thinking quickly, Carter ripped open her T-shirt and grasped her dogtag. If a thin piece of paper could cut a human finger, the thin aluminum of her dogtag should be able to give a nasty, painful nick to the tentacle that imprisoned her. In a slashing motion, Carter ran the edge of the dogtag along the tentacle. A tiny spurt of colored liquid confirmed she was successful. The creature jerked the tentacle back, releasing Carter who quickly swam to the surface.
Gasping for breath at the surface, Carter returned the dogtag to its normal place around her neck. If she didn't make it, she wanted her remains to be easily identified. Then she looked for her improvised floatation device. It was nowhere to be seen. Evidently, the air leaked out and it sank while she was struggling with the creature. She decided it wasn't worth worrying about and resumed her swim, at a faster pace in hopes of avoiding any more creature attacks.
As she was within a few hundred yards of the shore after her long swim after escaping the creature, Carter started to get tired. Each stroke was more laborious than the one before. Eventually, a hundred yards out, she slowy started to sink. Her attempts to surface were futile. Exhausted, she gave up. Seconds later, as her sight was dimming, she landed on the bottom.
The next thing Carter noticed was blackness. However, this blackness had a dim red glow to one side. Examining the glow, she saw that it came from glowing red numbers which read "2:56". Snapping awake, Carter reached around and found a switch. The light came on and she saw that she was in her bed in her quarters, dressed in standard sleepwear. It must have been a dream. But Carter needed to be sure. She got out of bed and checked her closets and dresser drawers. Nothing missing. From past experience, she knew that it usually took a few days for the quartermaster to process the paperwork to replace lost or damaged clothing. Since everything was there and she didn't wake up in the infirmary, it was indeed a dream, though a very vivid one. A bit unsettled, but with that mystery answered, Carter went back to bed and slept without incident the rest of the night.
The next morning, as she was working on some alien gizmo she found a few weeks ago, Carter saw her friend Dr. Janet Fraser approach.
"Sam," the medic asked "did you have any strange, vivid dreams last night?"
Fearing that a detailed account of her aquatic dream including the sensations would brand her a nut, but not wanting to lie, Carter replied "Yeah. In it, I was abducted by some primitives, but then I escaped. Why do you ask?"
"Well, it seems everyone on SG-1, except Teal'c had weird dreams last night. Daniel dreamt that he was working at a software company designing a fantasy role-playing game. Jack dreamt he was a handyman who fixed things at an apartment building."
"Any idea why that happened?" asked Carter.
"I did a test on Jack and Daniel. Seems that 'toast' you drank at the party the village on the planet you went to yesterday had a little surpise in it. The local booze seems to have a very mild psychoactive substance in it which affects the dream state. Teal'c's symbiont was able to neutralize it, so it didn't affect him."
"Does this mean we will have strange dreams tonight?"
"No. The substance has passed from your system by now. I was only able to find only tiny traces by the time I tested Daniel and Jack. So everything should be back to normal."
"That's good."
As Dr. Fraser was leaving, Carter was thinking about her dream. Could she really swim a long distance if she had to? Or would she fail like she did in her dream. Carter decided that brushing up on her swimming skills might not be a bad idea, since she might need them one day.
However, there was a minor problem. She was in Colorado, near Colorado Springs. Places for a woman to get in private swim practice would be few and far between. Fortunately, she had some vacation leave coming and she would choose a vacation spot by the water. Carter decided she would even try to get in some clothed swimming practice. Partly to train for emergencies, partly to see if the sensations she experienced in her dream were real.
Her strange swim was a dream, but Samantha Carter learned a few things from that experience. Who knows what wet adventure she might have in the future?
As she went further into the forest, Carter heard distant sounds of an ocean. Kind of odd for a dense forest to be so close to the ocean, but she had seen many far stranger things in her time on SG-1. At least things were nice and quiet - something seldom experienced by the team.
Just when it seemed nothing would happen, Carter heard a twig snap. In seconds, three large men in primitive shirts and pants appeared. Reaching for her gun, Carter was shocked to find it missing along with her other weapons. How strange. She didn't recall dropping them or setting them down anywhere. But this wasn't the time for speculation, it was the time for action. Carter then prepared to defend herself. The men moved in. While Carter was a very good fighter, within the limits of her size and build, it was impossible to defeat three men larger than she was. The men quickly subdued Carter and restrained her by the old tactic of pulling down her fatigues jacket.
While she was trying to struggle, a man dressed in a somewhat better outfit showed up. He was accompanied by another man who was dressed in the same primitive manner as Carter's captors. Looking at Carter, the better dressed man yelled "What do we have here?"
The man standing next to Carter answered "We found her while we were foraging, Captain. I think she will bring us a good price at port. She looks like she would do good as either a domestic or field slave."
"You did well." replied the captain. "That looks like a nice jacket she has. Take it." With that, the men removed her jacket and stowed it in one of their packs, leaving Carter in her black T-shirt. But Carter had a surprise in store. While still restrained by two of the men, she quickly kicked the captain's attendant in the groin, sending him to the ground in pain.
As the man was trying to recover, Carter's captors grabbed her tighter and held a dagger to her throat. Her hope of escape was dashed for now. Getting up, the man Carter kicked said "No woman can kick like that! It's magic, I tell you!"
"Nonsense!" roared the captain. "You," he said pointing to one of the men, "get her boots. The rest of you, slit her throat if she tries anything." The man complied and removed Carter's boots, leaving her barefoot.
Examining the boots, the captain explained "There's no magic. These have metal in the soles and toes. Might come in handy some day. Now, let's return to the ship."
Carter was marched with the men a short distance to a dinghy on the beach. After she was inside, the boat was launched and the crew rowed it to their destination - a primitive looking sailing vessel. Once at the ship, Carter was taken aboard and led below decks to a cargo hold. Then, her hands were bound behind a post. After that was done, her captors left.
When she was sure that the crew was occupied, Carter examined her situation. It seems that her luck was starting to change. The rope she was tied with wasn't really good. Finding a rough spot on the back of the post, Carter started rubbing the rope on it. A short while later, the rope broke and her hands were free. After removing the ropes from her wrists, Carter carefully sneaked out of her prison.
A short time later, Carter found a door that led to the captain's cabin in the stern of the vessel. Once inside the cabin, she noticed a window. Glancing out the window, she saw that the ship was already some distance from shore. Figuring that her only chance of rescue would be on the same landmass as the stargate, her course of action was clear. Opening the window, Carter carefully climbed out. Fortunately, the stern of the ship had a number of features that could work as handholds and steps, so Carter could quietly descend into the water.
To her relief the water was quite warm - a vast improvement over her last unplanned swim, on that strange planet where Daniel disappeared for a while. Another positive difference was that she wasn't as encumbered by gear this time. Taking a deep breath, Carter dove down and swam underwater. The sensation wasn't bad. Soon she surfaced, took a breath, and dove again. Swimming underwater would keep the people on the ship from noticing her escaping.
When she had judged that she had swam far enough away, Carter rested on the surface to catch her breath. She could see the ship in the distance, but all the people on the ship could see of her was an indistinct dot. Then, there was a loud noise. The ship had exploded, evidently the result of spontaneous combustion of the ship's magazine. At least she no longer had to worry about pursuers.
With the threat of pursuit gone, Carter soon continued her swim on the surface. But it was a long way to the beach and the going was a bit laborious. Her fatigue pants were never intended for use as swimwear and their weight and resistance were slowing her down considerably. At about the halfway mark, Carter was starting to tire and she decided that something had to be done.
Then, she remembered something she read that might be helpful in this situation. Carter undid her pants and pulled them off, leaving her in her opaque military-issue briefs. Taking the pants, she tied a tight knot in each leg. She wasn't too worried about making the knots too tight. If she couldn't undo them when she got to shore, she could always find a sharp shell or stone and cut off that part of the pants legs. Once she was finished tying the knots, Carter proceeded to fill the pants with air, creating a crude floatation device.
Armed with something buoyant to hold, Carter resumed her swim at a leisurely pace. Aiding her effort was the fact that her current attire of T-shirt and undergarments offered little resistance to her swimming. If it wasn't for the serious life-or-death nature of the situation, Carter thought, this swim would be downright pleasant. The water was nice and warm. There was also the sensation of her T-shirt moving against her body as she swam. It was almost fun.
While it was easy for Samantha Carter to imagine she was swimming in an ocean on Earth, she wasn't. There were differences. And now, one of those differences was fast approaching. Carter felt something bump her. "Just a fish, I hope." she thought and moved to one side. Then she got bumped again. As she was wondering what was happening, something tentacle-like wrapped around one of her legs and pulled her under.
As she was descending, Carter could see a tentacle wrapped around her leg. The tentacle led to some large indistinct form in the darkness below. The pressure of the water started building up and hurting her ears. But that was the least of her problems. She had to escape before whatever it was had her for lunch or drowned her.
Thinking quickly, Carter ripped open her T-shirt and grasped her dogtag. If a thin piece of paper could cut a human finger, the thin aluminum of her dogtag should be able to give a nasty, painful nick to the tentacle that imprisoned her. In a slashing motion, Carter ran the edge of the dogtag along the tentacle. A tiny spurt of colored liquid confirmed she was successful. The creature jerked the tentacle back, releasing Carter who quickly swam to the surface.
Gasping for breath at the surface, Carter returned the dogtag to its normal place around her neck. If she didn't make it, she wanted her remains to be easily identified. Then she looked for her improvised floatation device. It was nowhere to be seen. Evidently, the air leaked out and it sank while she was struggling with the creature. She decided it wasn't worth worrying about and resumed her swim, at a faster pace in hopes of avoiding any more creature attacks.
As she was within a few hundred yards of the shore after her long swim after escaping the creature, Carter started to get tired. Each stroke was more laborious than the one before. Eventually, a hundred yards out, she slowy started to sink. Her attempts to surface were futile. Exhausted, she gave up. Seconds later, as her sight was dimming, she landed on the bottom.
The next thing Carter noticed was blackness. However, this blackness had a dim red glow to one side. Examining the glow, she saw that it came from glowing red numbers which read "2:56". Snapping awake, Carter reached around and found a switch. The light came on and she saw that she was in her bed in her quarters, dressed in standard sleepwear. It must have been a dream. But Carter needed to be sure. She got out of bed and checked her closets and dresser drawers. Nothing missing. From past experience, she knew that it usually took a few days for the quartermaster to process the paperwork to replace lost or damaged clothing. Since everything was there and she didn't wake up in the infirmary, it was indeed a dream, though a very vivid one. A bit unsettled, but with that mystery answered, Carter went back to bed and slept without incident the rest of the night.
The next morning, as she was working on some alien gizmo she found a few weeks ago, Carter saw her friend Dr. Janet Fraser approach.
"Sam," the medic asked "did you have any strange, vivid dreams last night?"
Fearing that a detailed account of her aquatic dream including the sensations would brand her a nut, but not wanting to lie, Carter replied "Yeah. In it, I was abducted by some primitives, but then I escaped. Why do you ask?"
"Well, it seems everyone on SG-1, except Teal'c had weird dreams last night. Daniel dreamt that he was working at a software company designing a fantasy role-playing game. Jack dreamt he was a handyman who fixed things at an apartment building."
"Any idea why that happened?" asked Carter.
"I did a test on Jack and Daniel. Seems that 'toast' you drank at the party the village on the planet you went to yesterday had a little surpise in it. The local booze seems to have a very mild psychoactive substance in it which affects the dream state. Teal'c's symbiont was able to neutralize it, so it didn't affect him."
"Does this mean we will have strange dreams tonight?"
"No. The substance has passed from your system by now. I was only able to find only tiny traces by the time I tested Daniel and Jack. So everything should be back to normal."
"That's good."
As Dr. Fraser was leaving, Carter was thinking about her dream. Could she really swim a long distance if she had to? Or would she fail like she did in her dream. Carter decided that brushing up on her swimming skills might not be a bad idea, since she might need them one day.
However, there was a minor problem. She was in Colorado, near Colorado Springs. Places for a woman to get in private swim practice would be few and far between. Fortunately, she had some vacation leave coming and she would choose a vacation spot by the water. Carter decided she would even try to get in some clothed swimming practice. Partly to train for emergencies, partly to see if the sensations she experienced in her dream were real.
Her strange swim was a dream, but Samantha Carter learned a few things from that experience. Who knows what wet adventure she might have in the future?