Ripple Effect - Confluence of Circumstance - Chapter 10
Disclaimer: I do not own Stargate: SG-1, I am only playing in the world
A/N: Here is another side story / companion piece to my series of SG-1 tales. This one will be different to the others in that I plan to keep adding to it little by little. It may spur me to add on to the other Ripple Effects later on.
Previously: Ch 1 | Ch 2 | Ch 3 | Ch 4 | Ch 5 | Ch 6 | Ch 7 | Ch 8 | Ch 9
Ripple Effect - Confluence of Circumstance - Chapter 10
Samantha Carter's house, Colorado Springs, March 2006 (alternate reality)
Sam stretched out her arms above her head on the bed, pushing back languorously against the headboard. Cam smiled at her long contented sigh and each small hesitant groan when a muscle popped in her back, the pitch of each sound she made told him it didn't hurt so much. He'd done his best to see to that. She went limp with another long sigh and turned her head to face him where he sat at the edge of the bed, wiping his hands clean on a towel.
"That isn't the first time you've done that." she murmured huskily. He smiled softly and shook his head.
"When I was in Japan," he explained, "I took a few lessons from the woman who ran the local seafood restaurant. She used to work in a massage parlour in her youth." Sam propped her cheek up on her forearms as Cam set the towel aside with her bottles of oils and lotions and leaned back against her headboard, he tugged on the corner of the towel she was still lying on and she obligingly shifted so he could pull it out from under her and set it aside with the other one. "She insisted that it was an absolutely necessary skill to have if I wanted to impress any woman, but that it was beyond the abilities of my clumsy American fingers." He flourished his hands and Sam giggled.
"I'll disagree with her assertion. I can almost believe I didn't get beaten up recently." When she closed her eyes Cam could only smile.
"Well, I went easy on account of that. Your feeling better is mostly up here." He tapped her temple softly with the tip of his finger and she scrunched up her face adorably without opening her eyes, sighing again.
"Whatever the cause, I'm feeling a lot better." she supplied sleepily. Cam chuckled and got up off the bed. His movement startled Sam a little and she followed him with a slightly irritated look until he came around to her side of the bed. She turned over slightly, propping herself up on an elbow and draping her hand on a bare thigh as she looked up at him curiously. He could definitely see the exhaustion on her face as he knelt down by the bed to get to her eye level. She smiled softly and reached over to caress his cheek. "Are you planning to tuck me in?"
"Hmm, the thought had crossed my mind." He gave her a gentle smile as she couldn't stifle a yawn. She was too tired to even protest and merely nodded as she moved to sit up at the side of the bed. Cam stood and helped her up as well and she walked slowly towards her bathroom to get ready for sleep. When she came back and walked around the bed, Cam had already turned over her sheets and was just waiting for her, she stood in front of him and pulled his head against her stomach, ruffling his hair and kissing the top of his head. He looked up at her as his hands slipped around her waist and gently caressed her back.
"Tuck yourself in with me, okay?" she whispered to his breathy chuckle. She pushed him back and climbed in next to him, rolling around so her back was tucked in against his chest. He smiled against her blonde locks and brought her comforter up over them both, then let his arm slip down to pull her in tight against him.
Stargate Command, March 2006 (alternate reality)
"That's exactly what you said about the ruins on P5R-612, Daniel." she said without looking up from her laptop. Even so, she could feel the linguist's glare on her as he sat on the other side of her workbench. "And we found nothing about Merlin's weapon there." She pressed a few keys on her keyboard as she bit her lip and looked over to the Tok'ra communicator further down her bench. She saw several lights flare up and flash in a complex sequence then die away. She grinned happily.
"Yes, well, I'm dealing with some... vague sources here, Sam." Daniel groused. She looked up and gave him a reassuring smile. He huffed and looked away slightly. "It's not going to be Camelot, but I think I'll find something about it there." She was smiling at him when he looked back to her. "How about that thing?" he asked, nodding towards the communicator. "Is it ready?"
"Just about. I've got the protocol for simulating the stone impulses pretty much down. Of course, it will only work for you, since we can't actually create a connection without a stone, we have no telemetry on that." She sighed sheepishly. "That's one of the reasons I've been kind of hedging on telling Cam about it. You know he'd want to take your place if he could." Daniel smiled slightly and shrugged. "I'm just figuring out the actual communications mechanism for the listening monitor, and properly interfacing the stone simulator with the communicator itself." Daniel nodded and she looked down at her watch. "Isn't it about time for mission prep?" she asked, only to immediately look to her door when Cam bustled in and clapped his hands together softly.
"Come on, you two, we've got a mission!" he said enthusiastically, hooking his thumb over his shoulder before walking right back out without waiting for them to reply.
"Has he always been like that?" Daniel asked as he stared out the open doorway with a small frown. Sam's breath hitched slightly at the question, at what was left unsaid.
"Yes, ever since we met at the Academy. He's exactly the same." she breathed as she stood up and set her laptop to shut down. "Better not keep him waiting, you know how he gets." Daniel smiled at her and nodded as he stood up to follow her out the door.
An hour later they were walking down the corridor to the 'gate room where they'd be collecting their weapons from a pair of waiting airmen from the Quartermaster's office.
"I'm just a 'glass-half-full' kind of guy." Cam told them as if he was saying something they weren't all very aware of. "We found a cure to the Prior's plague, and we got it out to the planets that needed it."
"And it has been some time since the last reported outbreak." Teal'c intoned as he walked alongside them with his hands clasped behind his back.
"That's right," Cam declared with a little point of his finger at the Jaffa, "so I'm chalking that one up in the 'win' column."
"The Asgard actually seem to be enjoying themselves keeping the Ori mothership on the run at the end of the Perseus spiral arm." Sam said with a smile. Cam gave her a little glare.
"I was just getting to that." he muttered and she grinned, bumping shoulders with him. He tottered theatrically and smiled at her.
"Look, all I'm saying is let's not get carried away." Daniel said as they walked into the embarkation room and checked over the weapons handed to them while the open wormhole shimmered in the Stargate behind them. "Yes, we're doing well against them right now, but you can be damn sure they're already thinking up some other means of spreading fear and destruction through this galaxy."
"Yeah, that's why we call them the bad guys." Cam said sarcastically as he clipped his P90 to his tac vest. Daniel gave him a little glare.
"And by the looks of things, the next one's going to be something big." Daniel elaborated on his point. "The Priors are already starting to step up their rhetoric with all this talk of doomsday, 'When all shall witness the final battle between the light and darkness.'"
"That's what they said about Tyson-Holyfield. There's always a rematch." Cam muttered as Sam slapped the bill of his patrol cap playfully. He grinned at her before turning to all of them and walking backwards towards the ramp, leading the way for his team. "Alright, let's move out. Those ancient ruins aren't going to explore themselves."
"Hold up, SG-1." came General Landry's voice over the 'gate room speakers. They stopped halfway up the ramp and turned towards the control room, various degrees of curiosity evident on each of their faces. Landry was leaning down towards Walter and told him to shut down the Stargate, which fizzled away behind them. Sam frowned slightly as she looked from the ring back towards the General. "Your mission has been scrubbed."
Cameron Mitchell's house, Colorado Springs, March 2006 (alternate reality)
"I hate you." she said while still blatantly resting her head on his shoulder as the credits rolled on their movie, Daniel got up from his seat to grab more beers for everyone except Teal'c, who just preferred fruit juice, and Heimdall, who wasn't allowed any after what happened the last time he'd had alcohol. "I can't believe you made us watch that after the day we've had."
"The day we've had is exactly the reason why it had to be 'Starship Troopers', Sam." he replied with a small smile as he snuck in a quick kiss of the top of her head.
"I found it most enjoyable, Colonel Mitchell." Teal'c offered with a smile. "I particularly enjoyed the scene where the Lieutenant's brain was sucked out of his head." Sam gagged theatrically while Daniel laughed.
"I am most intrigued how none of you show the least hesitancy in accepting the things you watch as real, even if only for the duration of the entertainment." Heimdall put forward from his control chair. "I believe you call the phenomenon 'willing suspension of disbelief'. I find it eminently fascinating." he added as he looked to each of them and blinked slowly.
"How else are we gonna believe in little grey space aliens, Heimdall old pal. Ain't no sense in it otherwise." Cam said as Sam gaped and gave him a slap on the arm.
"I see, that was most amusing." Heimdall said happily. "Implying the only reason you accept my own existence, being a 'little grey space alien' as you put it, is through the willing suspension of disbelief, even though I am plainly sitting right before your eyes."
"Yeah, but there's actually a grain of truth at the core of my joke." he added and Sam chuckled to herself. The Asgard blinked again.
"What he means, Heimdall," Daniel put forward as he took a fruit juice to Teal'c and handed Sam and Cameron beers before sitting back down with his own brew, "is that human senses are notoriously fallible, at all points along the process. It could be bad eyesight, like me."
"Or the brain chemistry of the observer could be out of balance, causing delusions or hallucinations." Sam added.
"Or, even if all of that is working fine, our brains themselves can make stuff up just to fill in the gaps in our perception." Cam explained. Heimdall blinked. "Get five humans to describe the same event and you'll get five different accounts."
"How can humans function at all with such a limitation, unable to trust their own senses?" asked Heimdall.
"Willing suspension of disbelief." Daniel replied and they all laughed.
"We should watch 'Rashomon' at our next gathering." Teal'c intoned. Cam snapped his fingers.
"Good one, T-man!" he cried and Sam nodded. "Man, it's been ages since I've seen a Kurosawa flick. Gotta dig out my copy of 'Yojimbo'."
"Better than 'Last Man Standing'." offered Sam as she looked up at him, he smiled at her, impressed, and wondering when she'd watched those films.
"Fascinating. We Asgard suffer no such failings of our sensory perceptions. Perhaps this is a factor in how our personalities differ so highly from yours." Heimdall murmured. "I think I will investigate this. I must take my leave of you, thank you once again for the invitation."
"Anytime, buddy." Cam said with a smile and a wave. Sam also waved to the Asgard before he beamed himself and his chair back up to his science vessel in orbit.
"What an excuse to get out of doing dishes." Daniel muttered. "Investigating the role that failure of sensory perception plays in the differences in Human and Asgard personality and culture."
"And I thought Loki was supposed to be the trickster." Cam said with a quick swig of his beer. Daniel smiled and nodded as Teal'c took a sip of his orange juice to cover a subtle smirk. Sam giggled a little which turned into a yawn. "Yeah, maybe we should call it early tonight, we didn't get much sleep last night what with the bug problem." Daniel nodded again. "I can take care of the clean up, no worries."
"Teal'c, do you think you can drive Daniel back to his place? I'm sure you can call for a car to pick you up and take you back to base." Sam gave the Jaffa a hopeful smile and he nodded.
"Gladly, Colonel Carter." Teal'c stood and Daniel reluctantly handed him the keys to his Jeepster.
"Do you even have a license, big guy?" asked Cameron, Teal'c merely turned around and raised an eyebrow before he and Daniel bid them farewell. "We'll get together and start looking for an apartment for you, T-Man. Real soon now!" Cam called only for the Jaffa to growl at him in warning. Sam laughed and Cam looked at her with a smile. "You going too?" He smiled when she shook her head.
"I'd like to stay a little longer, if that's alright." she replied and snuggled into his side. He nodded as his fingers found their way into her blonde locks.
"I'd like you to come and go as please, if that's alright." he said softly as he dug out a key from his pocket and held it up to her. She looked at it with wide eyes.
"Are you sure?" she asked barely above a whisper.
"Positive." he replied and she smiled broadly as she took the key and looked at it. "I already think of wherever you are as my home." he whispered. She closed her fingers into a fist around the key and sat up straight on the seat next to him. He looked over to her as she pivoted on a knee and straddled him to sit in his lap.
"I do too, Cameron. Wherever you are is where I want to be." she breathed as she held the key up before slipping it into the pocket of her jeans. She watched his eyes for a moment as his hands settled on her waist, then she shifted forward slightly with her hands on his shoulders and leaned down to kiss him lightly on the lips. "I love you, Cameron." she whispered as she looked down into his eyes. He couldn't help the smile lifting up the corners of his mouth or the heat which rose from his chest, up his neck and over his cheeks. She smiled at his reaction. "I love you, Cameron." she repeated and smiled again when his reaction was the same. She really was the consummate scientist.
"I love you too, Sam." He lifted a hand to caress her cheek as she bit her lips and blinked rapidly with eyes that had gone turbulent and watery. "I've always loved you." She put her hands on his cheeks and kissed him fiercely, hungrily. He pulled her in tighter to him and one of her arms curled around the back of his neck, running into his hair.
She flicked at his lips with a darting tongue and deepened the kiss when he parted his lips in invitation. Each kiss lasted longer, tasted sweeter and became more ardent, leaving him breathless and only more desperate for her touch. He needed her to know how sure he was. His hands held her cheeks and he pulled away slightly, nearly losing his resolve as she furrowed her brow and made mewling sounds of protest at the separation.
"I need you to understand something, Sam. When I say I love you, I mean you." His fingers ran across her cheek and into her hair. She watched him for a moment. "Do you believe me?" Her lower lip trembled slightly and she bit down on it as she nodded slowly. "I love you, Samantha Carter. You are my Sam." he said in a hoarse whisper and she forcefully sought his lips again with hers. Clutching at the back of his neck with all the strength she could muster in her fingers. This time her kisses were desperate and raw, leaving his lips aching and bruised. He could feel her heart thundering away in her chest as she gasped for air and locked his gaze with her shimmering blue eyes, filled with her need for him.
Samantha Carter's house, March 2006 (alternate reality)
She frowned slightly as her awareness crystallised and focused on her back. She felt subtle pressure, feather-light touches. She tried to groan the sleepiness from her mind only for the skin around the points being touched to begin tingling as her brain started assigning higher priorities to external stimuli. She felt the sunlight on her back, the warmth breaking through her curtains and shining down on her bed, but it was where he was touching her, caressing her skin, that felt like it was on fire. She pressed herself into the pillow and let out a moan at the invasion of day. She did like waking up to him though. She pushed up slowly and his fingers moved up her spine to the nape of her neck and across a shoulder when she turned over and settled back down on the bed. His fingers didn't stop moving, just drifted back down her collar bone to settle in the hollow above her sternum, then slowly ran down her breastbone as the tips of outstretched fingers just brushed against her breasts before moving down her abdomen to circle around her navel.
"Are you the new alarm clock I ordered?" she asked huskily. He smiled at her and she frowned when she saw he was nearly fully dressed.
"If I am then you need to get your money back. We've got an hour to get to the SGC." he replied and laughed when she bolted off the bed and ran for her bathroom, cursing him all the way even as she began brushing her teeth and running the water for a shower all at the same time. After quickly ducking her head under the water she found a towel in front of her which she stepped into without thinking about it, walked out of the bathroom to find some clothes waiting on the bed which she put on as quickly as she could, then stepped out into the hall to find a covered mug of coffee hovering right where her hand could reach for it and a slice of toast with raspberry jam right where her mouth could bite down on it.
"Okay, I won't kill you until tomorrow." she murmured as she accepted a good morning kiss and then licked some jam from the corner of his mouth. "You driving?" she asked before taking another bite.
"Well, we can get there on time or we can get there five minutes early and need a new set of tires and brakes." he replied and she took the keys. "Alright, but I'm coming to you when I need to pay for those parts." They arrived five minutes early, and Cam was wincing after he got out to kneel down by his right front wheel and bathed in the warmth created by the tortured brake pad as he felt the inside tread of the tire. She grinned at him over the hood of his car as he stood up and walked with her towards the mountain entrance.
"With five minutes I can get myself some jello from the mess." she explained as he chuckled and flashed his ID at the sergeant on duty. They got changed from their civvies into BDUs and he walked with her to the mess to grab a bowl of jello which she ate on the way to the briefing room, hoovering it all up and handing the bowl to a confused Master Sergeant Siler as he walked past. They walked in just as General Landry came in from his office to conduct his Homeworld Security briefing for his senior military officers. It went the way these meetings usually did, that is to say, slowly, until the end when Landry pointed at her and Cameron.
"I need both of you to go to Washington to be our liaisons with NID and brief them on the Lucian Alliance kassa operations we've uncovered so far. They need to be on the look out should any of this stuff begin to show up on Earth." the General said with a lift of his eyebrows as they both looked at him sullenly.
"How would we filter any cases of addictive pathology caused by kassa from everything else we already have here on Earth, sir?" asked Colonel Dixon. Landry shook his head and shrugged.
"I don't know, Colonel, but I guess seeing as the plant is alien in origin it falls to us to try to deal with it." he replied and dismissed them all. Cam stayed seated and tapped the end of his pencil on a letter pad until only he, Sam and General Landry were left in the room. Sam looked at him worriedly, wondering at the frown he was trying his best to hide.
"I'm getting a vibe, Colonel." began Landry with an amused shrug of his shoulders. Cam looked up at him.
"Are we being punished, sir?" he asked and Sam bit her lip as she moved her hand under the table to rest it over the top of his thigh. He glanced at her and gave her a quick shake of his head.
"Have you done anything you should be punished for, son?" Landry asked as he looked between Cameron and Sam. She blinked at how jovial he seemed. Cam's brow furrowed. "I'm not aware of any regulations left in the military code of conduct that deal with interpersonal relationships. I understand they were done away with some time ago." He stood and they both shot up. "No, Colonels, I'm not punishing you. You both simply have the most first-hand knowledge of anyone available since Colonel Reynolds is still off-world on deep cover recon." He walked towards his office, but stopped at his door and turned towards them. "Oh, and I'm glad for you both, just... not on the base."
"Yes, sir." they both said automatically. She turned to look at Cameron with a slight hint of reproach.
"What?" he asked.
"Are we being punished?" she intoned with a cant of her head. He shrugged and held out his hands. She shook her head. "Cameron, you're looking at this assignment the wrong way." she explained as she gathered up her pad and looked over the notes she'd taken during the meeting, grinning when she got to the one Cameron had reached over and written himself, 'swot', emblazoned over a blank space in his bold hand. She looked up at him with a smile to find him furrowing his brow her way in confusion. She rolled her eyes. "Two days in Washington, and only a few hours each day will be filled with meetings." He perked up as comprehension slowly washed over his eyes. "Right." she said with a grin. "Let's go tell Teal'c and Daniel then go home to pack. We'll have to leave this afternoon."
"I knew there was a reason I loved you so much. You're so smart!" he cried and scooped up his pad, conspicuously empty as it was.
"And such a swot, right?" she asked with a lift of her eyebrow as she swept out the door he was holding open for her. She liked that about him.
"You know you are! Me, I keep it all up here." he said as he tapped the side of his head with the end of his pencil. She smirked at him and knocked the side of his head. "Hey! That could have been some valuable bit of intel that just got knocked out my ear."
"Good thing I took notes." she replied and slapped the top of his head with her pad as she spun around on her heels in front of him.
On to Chapter 11