(no subject)
More String Theory: An AU Series
Dr. Samantha Carter joins the SGC and discovers a life she never expected.
Action/Adventure, Drama, Angst, Romance, S/J
Teen: language and violence
Ficlet 38-Nothing Like You and I
Sam is curled up on one end of Jack’s couch, some completely ridiculous movie about spies and cold fusion on the television. Jack lounges at the other end, his feet up on the coffee table and a now-empty bowl of popcorn on the couch next to him. They’ve been taking turns mocking both the improbably dreadful aim of the bad guys and the pretty light shows that pass for science for the past two hours, but with the credits rolling they have fallen back into comfortable silence.
Seeing her there, so comfortably curled up with her shoes carelessly kicked off and her hand tucked up under her cheek, makes Jack feel seductively content. There are still a lot of things left to say though. Taking a deep breath, he resigns himself to broaching a subject he’s been avoiding all week, not particularly wanting to do anything that might upset the fragile balance they’ve managed to build. Or maybe that’s just the excuse he’s been clinging to.
Leaning forward, he moves the empty bowl to the coffee table. “I’m going to Abydos for a couple days,” he says.
“Yeah?” Sam says, sleepily pushing up on one elbow to look at him. “When?”
“Tomorrow.”
She raises an eyebrow and he knows she’s wondering why this is the first she’s heard of it.
Jack looks down, his eyes latching on the popcorn bowl. “There’s going to be a ceremony for Skaara,” he says as casually as he can manage.
Apparently not casually enough though, because she shifts positions, sitting up to look at him. “A funeral?”
She says the word so softly, but Jack still wants to flinch.
“Yes,” he confirms. “They had to make a statue, a sort of stand-in to help his soul find the afterlife since...there was no body to recover. They just finished it.” Jack reaches for the remote, turning off the TV, trying to pretend he doesn’t feel the weight of Sam’s regard against his skin.
“He meant a lot to you,” she says tentatively as if aware she’s treading dangerously close to something she never would have dared during their first time around.
More than anything Jack wants to push up off of this couch and not have this conversation. Lying to Sara, concealing things from her, had been the default mode in their marriage. He could blame his job for that, but he has no ground to stand on with Sam. No excuse to lie to her. He convinced himself he was just protecting her by not sharing certain parts of his life with her when they first got together, but now it feels like maybe he’d just slipped back into default mode, the only way he had ever known how to have a relationship.
I just don’t know any other way to do this, Sam had confessed to him not so long ago.
Jack picks at the blanket lying on the back of the couch. “Yes, he did,” he says, each word a struggle. “When I first met Skaara, he reminded me a lot of Charlie.”
Charlie’s name seems to hang forebodingly in the air for a moment, until Sam slides across the couch, settling next to him, close, but not touching.
“You would have liked Skaara,” Jack finds himself saying. “He’s the one who convinced me to give up smoking.”
Sam wrinkles her nose in mock disapproval. “You used to smoke?”
Jack smiles. “Yeah. Sara hated it. She used to make me stand outside, no matter how deep the snow got.”
Sam glances over his shoulder to the small ledge behind the couch. “Is that her?”
Jack forces himself to reach up and take down the framed photograph, passing it to Sam. “Sara and Charlie,” he says.
Sam’s fingers trace across the faces. “They’re beautiful,” she says.
He doesn’t trust himself to answer.
“I never thanked you,” she says, still holding the photo almost reverently, “for the photo album. It meant…more than you can know.”
He nods mutely.
She hands the photograph back to him, shifting toward him. “I’m just sorry I couldn’t take better care of it.”
“I kept the originals,” he says, his fingers tightening around the frame.
“What?”
“I made copies,” he clarifies. “You never know what can happen off-world.” They share an ironic glance. In retrospect that seems like foreshadowing he should have picked up on.
“But not the one of...,” Sam says, trailing off as if she can’t quite bring herself to say his son’s name.
“Charlie,” Jack finishes for her, remembering the frayed edge to that worn photograph, an image he’d carried with him for years. “No, but I have more of those.”
He looks down at the picture of Charlie sitting next to Sara on the front stoop of their old house. This photo has sat on that ledge for almost six years now, but he can’t be sure he’s ever had the strength to even look at it.
“It’s my fault he died.” The words are out of his mouth before he can censor himself.
Sam’s hand settles on his arm.
“He found my gun.”
She sucks in a breath, her fingers tightening painfully, but he welcomes it, the honesty of her horror. She doesn’t say how sorry she is, or try to convince him that it hadn’t been his fault. It makes it easier to continue.
“When I went to Abydos that first time...it was supposed to be a one way trip. Then I met Daniel and Skaara and I...” He’s still staring down at the photograph, not wanting to see Sam’s reaction, but her hand lifts to his face, warm and insistent.
“You came back,” she finishes for him.
“Yeah, I did.”
Her hand drops to his chest, the other curling around his arm as she settles down against his side. “Tell me about the first time you met Skaara,” she says and Jack feels something inside him ease.
“The first time he saw us, he ran screaming for the hills,” he says, the memory still bright in his mind.
“An auspicious beginning,” Sam remarks.
“It only got more complicated from there.”
“Sounds familiar.”
It really does. Jack shifts, putting an arm around Sam and pulling her closer.
“Can I go with you?” she asks.
It actually takes him a moment to realize what she’s asking. “To Abydos?”
He feels her head nod against his chest. “I’d like to be there.”
He’s sure there are perfectly logical reasons for why she shouldn’t, but all he can think about is the feel of her against him and the idea that maybe this is exactly the sort of thing they were supposed to share.
“Okay.”
* * *
Jack stands at the base of the gate ramp in full dress blues, each crease and pleat perfectly crisp. The formal uniform makes things like this easier to bear somehow. Plus, he’s fairly certain Skaara would have gotten a kick out of them.
Sam appears a few minutes later, though it takes him a moment to realize it actually is her. She’s wearing a floor length dress dyed a dusky rose that wraps around at the waist, another layer of lighter linen wrapping around her shoulders and over her head. When she steps towards him, he can just make out the flash of sturdy hiking boots under the hem of her skirt.
“Is this alright?” Sam asks when she reaches his side. She fidgets, running her hands down the front of the robes self-consciously. “I had no idea what to wear, so Daniel lent me these.”
“I think they’re a good idea,” he says, trying to put her at ease as he puts her small bag on the MALP with the rest of their supplies.
“I think they must have been his wife’s,” she says.
Jack looks at her clothes again and he can easily conjure a vision of shy, but courageous Sha'uri walking proudly by Daniel’s side. It’s hard to believe, sometimes, that more than five years have passed since he last saw her. “Yeah, I think so,” he says.
Her hand casually brushes against his, her eyes trailing over his uniform. “You know, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you in dress blues before.”
“Yeah?” he says, smiling slightly.
“I like them,” she says, one hand reaching out to skim over his ribbons.
Her shoulder bumps gently into his when she turn to see Daniel enter the gate room and Jack is surprised to find himself intensely grateful she’s coming with them. Somehow, she just makes this all seem more bearable and he thinks maybe that’s the point.
Daniel takes a moment to look Sam over, an unmistakable sheen of wistfulness there before he smiles at her and says, “Perfect. You’ll fit right in.”
“All ready to go, Daniel?” Jack asks.
“Yeah,” Daniel confirms, his tight smile more of a grimace. Jack knows this isn’t the way he planned to return to Abydos.
None of them had.
Jack signals the tech to start dialing and the Stargate groans into motion. Next to him, he can feel Sam shrink back slightly at the sound. It’s then he remembers that this will be only her second time through the gate. He can feel tension gradually building in her as each chevron engages. She’s frightened to step through the wormhole again, to face what might be out there, but even so, she’s still here, ready to walk through with him.
When the wormhole engages, the enormous horizontal thrust erupting in front of them, Jack reaches for Sam’s hand. She looks surprised, but grateful, her fingers wrapping around his in a death grip.
They follow Daniel and the MALP up the ramp. Stopping right before the event horizon, Jack looks over at Sam, happy to see at least a little of her wonder still mixed in with her apprehension.
“Thanks for coming with me, Sam.”
She pulls her gaze from the surface of the wormhole, smiling at him in the rippling light. “Anytime,” she says, squeezing his hand.
They step through together.
next
Dr. Samantha Carter joins the SGC and discovers a life she never expected.
Action/Adventure, Drama, Angst, Romance, S/J
Teen: language and violence
Ficlet 38-Nothing Like You and I
Sam is curled up on one end of Jack’s couch, some completely ridiculous movie about spies and cold fusion on the television. Jack lounges at the other end, his feet up on the coffee table and a now-empty bowl of popcorn on the couch next to him. They’ve been taking turns mocking both the improbably dreadful aim of the bad guys and the pretty light shows that pass for science for the past two hours, but with the credits rolling they have fallen back into comfortable silence.
Seeing her there, so comfortably curled up with her shoes carelessly kicked off and her hand tucked up under her cheek, makes Jack feel seductively content. There are still a lot of things left to say though. Taking a deep breath, he resigns himself to broaching a subject he’s been avoiding all week, not particularly wanting to do anything that might upset the fragile balance they’ve managed to build. Or maybe that’s just the excuse he’s been clinging to.
Leaning forward, he moves the empty bowl to the coffee table. “I’m going to Abydos for a couple days,” he says.
“Yeah?” Sam says, sleepily pushing up on one elbow to look at him. “When?”
“Tomorrow.”
She raises an eyebrow and he knows she’s wondering why this is the first she’s heard of it.
Jack looks down, his eyes latching on the popcorn bowl. “There’s going to be a ceremony for Skaara,” he says as casually as he can manage.
Apparently not casually enough though, because she shifts positions, sitting up to look at him. “A funeral?”
She says the word so softly, but Jack still wants to flinch.
“Yes,” he confirms. “They had to make a statue, a sort of stand-in to help his soul find the afterlife since...there was no body to recover. They just finished it.” Jack reaches for the remote, turning off the TV, trying to pretend he doesn’t feel the weight of Sam’s regard against his skin.
“He meant a lot to you,” she says tentatively as if aware she’s treading dangerously close to something she never would have dared during their first time around.
More than anything Jack wants to push up off of this couch and not have this conversation. Lying to Sara, concealing things from her, had been the default mode in their marriage. He could blame his job for that, but he has no ground to stand on with Sam. No excuse to lie to her. He convinced himself he was just protecting her by not sharing certain parts of his life with her when they first got together, but now it feels like maybe he’d just slipped back into default mode, the only way he had ever known how to have a relationship.
I just don’t know any other way to do this, Sam had confessed to him not so long ago.
Jack picks at the blanket lying on the back of the couch. “Yes, he did,” he says, each word a struggle. “When I first met Skaara, he reminded me a lot of Charlie.”
Charlie’s name seems to hang forebodingly in the air for a moment, until Sam slides across the couch, settling next to him, close, but not touching.
“You would have liked Skaara,” Jack finds himself saying. “He’s the one who convinced me to give up smoking.”
Sam wrinkles her nose in mock disapproval. “You used to smoke?”
Jack smiles. “Yeah. Sara hated it. She used to make me stand outside, no matter how deep the snow got.”
Sam glances over his shoulder to the small ledge behind the couch. “Is that her?”
Jack forces himself to reach up and take down the framed photograph, passing it to Sam. “Sara and Charlie,” he says.
Sam’s fingers trace across the faces. “They’re beautiful,” she says.
He doesn’t trust himself to answer.
“I never thanked you,” she says, still holding the photo almost reverently, “for the photo album. It meant…more than you can know.”
He nods mutely.
She hands the photograph back to him, shifting toward him. “I’m just sorry I couldn’t take better care of it.”
“I kept the originals,” he says, his fingers tightening around the frame.
“What?”
“I made copies,” he clarifies. “You never know what can happen off-world.” They share an ironic glance. In retrospect that seems like foreshadowing he should have picked up on.
“But not the one of...,” Sam says, trailing off as if she can’t quite bring herself to say his son’s name.
“Charlie,” Jack finishes for her, remembering the frayed edge to that worn photograph, an image he’d carried with him for years. “No, but I have more of those.”
He looks down at the picture of Charlie sitting next to Sara on the front stoop of their old house. This photo has sat on that ledge for almost six years now, but he can’t be sure he’s ever had the strength to even look at it.
“It’s my fault he died.” The words are out of his mouth before he can censor himself.
Sam’s hand settles on his arm.
“He found my gun.”
She sucks in a breath, her fingers tightening painfully, but he welcomes it, the honesty of her horror. She doesn’t say how sorry she is, or try to convince him that it hadn’t been his fault. It makes it easier to continue.
“When I went to Abydos that first time...it was supposed to be a one way trip. Then I met Daniel and Skaara and I...” He’s still staring down at the photograph, not wanting to see Sam’s reaction, but her hand lifts to his face, warm and insistent.
“You came back,” she finishes for him.
“Yeah, I did.”
Her hand drops to his chest, the other curling around his arm as she settles down against his side. “Tell me about the first time you met Skaara,” she says and Jack feels something inside him ease.
“The first time he saw us, he ran screaming for the hills,” he says, the memory still bright in his mind.
“An auspicious beginning,” Sam remarks.
“It only got more complicated from there.”
“Sounds familiar.”
It really does. Jack shifts, putting an arm around Sam and pulling her closer.
“Can I go with you?” she asks.
It actually takes him a moment to realize what she’s asking. “To Abydos?”
He feels her head nod against his chest. “I’d like to be there.”
He’s sure there are perfectly logical reasons for why she shouldn’t, but all he can think about is the feel of her against him and the idea that maybe this is exactly the sort of thing they were supposed to share.
“Okay.”
* * *
Jack stands at the base of the gate ramp in full dress blues, each crease and pleat perfectly crisp. The formal uniform makes things like this easier to bear somehow. Plus, he’s fairly certain Skaara would have gotten a kick out of them.
Sam appears a few minutes later, though it takes him a moment to realize it actually is her. She’s wearing a floor length dress dyed a dusky rose that wraps around at the waist, another layer of lighter linen wrapping around her shoulders and over her head. When she steps towards him, he can just make out the flash of sturdy hiking boots under the hem of her skirt.
“Is this alright?” Sam asks when she reaches his side. She fidgets, running her hands down the front of the robes self-consciously. “I had no idea what to wear, so Daniel lent me these.”
“I think they’re a good idea,” he says, trying to put her at ease as he puts her small bag on the MALP with the rest of their supplies.
“I think they must have been his wife’s,” she says.
Jack looks at her clothes again and he can easily conjure a vision of shy, but courageous Sha'uri walking proudly by Daniel’s side. It’s hard to believe, sometimes, that more than five years have passed since he last saw her. “Yeah, I think so,” he says.
Her hand casually brushes against his, her eyes trailing over his uniform. “You know, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you in dress blues before.”
“Yeah?” he says, smiling slightly.
“I like them,” she says, one hand reaching out to skim over his ribbons.
Her shoulder bumps gently into his when she turn to see Daniel enter the gate room and Jack is surprised to find himself intensely grateful she’s coming with them. Somehow, she just makes this all seem more bearable and he thinks maybe that’s the point.
Daniel takes a moment to look Sam over, an unmistakable sheen of wistfulness there before he smiles at her and says, “Perfect. You’ll fit right in.”
“All ready to go, Daniel?” Jack asks.
“Yeah,” Daniel confirms, his tight smile more of a grimace. Jack knows this isn’t the way he planned to return to Abydos.
None of them had.
Jack signals the tech to start dialing and the Stargate groans into motion. Next to him, he can feel Sam shrink back slightly at the sound. It’s then he remembers that this will be only her second time through the gate. He can feel tension gradually building in her as each chevron engages. She’s frightened to step through the wormhole again, to face what might be out there, but even so, she’s still here, ready to walk through with him.
When the wormhole engages, the enormous horizontal thrust erupting in front of them, Jack reaches for Sam’s hand. She looks surprised, but grateful, her fingers wrapping around his in a death grip.
They follow Daniel and the MALP up the ramp. Stopping right before the event horizon, Jack looks over at Sam, happy to see at least a little of her wonder still mixed in with her apprehension.
“Thanks for coming with me, Sam.”
She pulls her gaze from the surface of the wormhole, smiling at him in the rippling light. “Anytime,” she says, squeezing his hand.
They step through together.
next