Hey, guess what? IT'S NOT DW FIC.
Title: to travel hopefully
Fandom: Stargate SG-1
Rating: G
Spoilers: Only very general spoilers for seasons 9 and 10 and for characters’ backstory.
Prompt from the galpalficathon: “Because we've earned a vacation.”
A/N: Title comes from R. L. Stevenson (“To travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive”). Particular thanks to jenlev for betaing for me, and to members of my flist for discussing Cameron Mitchell’s musical tastes with me (a vital plot point to the story, I will have you know) and other minor character details. Any mistakes and inconsistencies that remain are all mine.
Summary: “You’re going to Thelma and Louise it with an alien chick across the American Southwest for a weekend?”
To travel hopefully
“Wait,” Mitchell said when Sam started telling him her and Vala’s plans. “You’re going to Thelma and Louise it with an alien chick across the American Southwest for a weekend?”
Sam stared at him. “I wouldn’t quite put it like that,” she said, “but you’re close.”
“Why?” he asked.
“Because we’ve earned a vacation,” she rolled her eyes.
“Vala. You. On a road trip,” he said. “Are you sure about this? You’ve never been the type to take a road trip, I thought.”
“Vala has seen Colorado Springs, DC, and Kansas,” Sam told him. “And she’s been underneath Glastonbury, but I don’t think that counts. And I have been under this mountain or off-world constantly for waaaay too long. I think it’s going to be fun,” she added with a grin.
Cam still seemed befuddled. “Okay,” he said. “Have fun with that,” he added, and Sam patted his shoulder before walking away.
*
“Don’t let her anywhere near Vegas,” was Daniel’s only comment.
*
“I have brought you gifts,” Teal’c announced as Sam and Vala loaded up Sam’s car with Vala’s luggage on their way out the door. Far, far too much luggage in Sam’s opinion, whose two small bags were now crammed in the farthest reaches of the trunk, but she’d kinda been expecting that. Both women looked up, Vala pushing her hair out of her face.
“Oh, Teal’c, you shouldn’t have!” she exclaimed, running around the car to grab the two plastic bags Teal’c was holding. “What’d you give us?”
“Snacks, appropriate for such a journey.” Teal’c seemed ridiculously proud, and Sam could feel the smile freezing on her face. She knew about Teal’c’s research methods. She also knew about his sense of humor. “I am sure that you will enjoy them.”
“Thanks, Teal’c,” Sam said as she joined Vala, trying to get a look in the bags. Vala was exclaiming things in delight as she poked around. Sam only hoped there wasn’t too much beef jerky in there.
“We would have invited you to come along with us,” Vala interrupted herself, looking up at the Jaffa. “But this is a girls-only sort of thing. Next time!” she added brightly. “Perhaps just you and I can go and it can be an aliens-only thing.”
“Uh-huh,” Sam said, opening the passenger door. “Right. We’d better get going, Vala.”
“Right.” Vala threw the grocery bags into the car and then turned and gave Teal’c as tight a hug as she could, wrapping her arms around as much of him as she could reach. Teal’c’s eyebrow flew up in as startled an expression as Sam had seen on his face in years, and she bit back a laugh. Vala jumped into the car.
Sam grinned up at her teammate and gave him a hug as well. “Daniel Jackson asked that I give you a message,” Teal’c said in her ear while they were still embraced. “Do not let Vala Mal Doran drive.”
“I heard that!” Vala said from the passenger seat, which wasn’t surprising; Teal’c’s voice was meant more for bellowing orders than whispering.
“Don’t worry,” Sam said, “I’ve got it covered.” She gave Teal’c a quick peck on the cheek-there went the eyebrow again; and really, that was a large part of why she’d done it-and she walked around to hop into the driver’s seat.
“Right,” Vala said as Sam started the car. “We’ve got Coke, chocolate, and potato chips. This is going to be marvelous, isn’t it?”
*
“So this is the purpose of a road trip?” Vala asked as they passed Fountain, heading for Pueblo and points south. “A joyride across the countryside of your planet?”
“Well, sort of,” Sam floundered a little before regrouping. “You wanted to go on this trip without even knowing what exactly it was?”
“Teal’c showed me some literature on the matter,” Vala said. “Easy Rider, Thelma and Louise, Supernatural. I recommend we don’t do anything any of those people did,” she added. “Well, except maybe Easy Rider, though I understand New Orleans is not on this side of the country. Wait, you have a motorbi-”
“Right,” Sam cut her off with the ease of long practice. Or maybe she had spent too many years with O’Neill as her CO. “Those are some fairly modern takes on the idea, yes.” She tried to formulate an off-the-cuff mini-lecture on literary and symbolic themes surrounding the American West, the open road, the frontier, and found herself half-wishing some other team member had come along with them. This would’ve been perfect for Daniel in one of his more anthropological moods, or Mitchell in one of his more expansive ones, or an exciting chance for Teal’c to talk about some other literature he’d discovered about American culture.
“Your people are so parochial,” Vala shook her head, cutting off Sam’s brief foray into the Monroe Doctrine-how the hell she’d gotten there; how the hell she had even remembered that particular piece of historical trivia, she had no idea-and continued, “One planet-one continent! I’ve been to some planets that are so narrow in their outlook, but not many.”
“The gate was buried on Earth for centuries,” Sam reminded her. “Millennia. By the time Europeans started settling North America, we were creating our own myths, not relying on the Goa’uld for them.”
Vala shrugged. “So what else is part of the-road trip experience?”
Sam glanced at her, then started grinning. Taking one hand off the steering wheel, she started fiddling with a slim jewel case located in the cubbyhole below the stereo. She managed to put the CD into the player. Vala blinked in surprise when Elvis Presley stated singing.
“Er,” said Vala. “This isn’t a religious experience, is it? Because you know I’m terrible at those.”
Sam broke into laughter. “No religious experiences,” she assured the other woman. “Strictly music appropriate for the open road.”
Elvis Presley segued into Buddy Holly, and Vala’s eyebrows were doing an admirable impression of Teal’c’s. “I made a bunch of mix CDs,” Sam explained. “Basically organized by decade for the past fifty years or so. Relax,” she went on, “you’ll get the hang of it.”
Vala hadn’t been exposed to a lot of American music-or any other music from the planet, for that matter. Mitchell muttering lyrics from Johnny Cash or Bon Jovi in his sleep off-world and Sam listening occasionally to classical music while she worked-the only thing she could listen to that wouldn’t distract her-really didn’t count.
By the time “Shi-Boom” by the Crew Cuts started up, Vala was bouncing so much in her seat the car was shaking. “The beat!” she enthused. “I have no idea what they’re singing about, but it’s so-bouncy!” Sam grinned out at the railroad running parallel to the interstate, the foothills near to the other side of the highway, the sun shining down over them, and called it good.
*
“It shouldn’t be fenced in,” Vala murmured, looking up at the neo-classical obelisk and frowning.
Sam looked up from the inscription near the base of the monument, taking in the fence around them. “Why?” she asked. “What’s wrong with it?”
“It’s a monument,” Vala said, “a memorial. It should be out in the open. Unafraid.”
Sam blinked in surprise; she would never have expected Vala to be the source of that sort of sentiment. Then again, Vala’s cultural background was a mishmash that not even Daniel could probably truly sort out. Whatever was left over from her homeworld; her time as a host and her exploits afterwards-sometimes Sam had no idea what was going on in her friend’s head.
And perhaps making their first stop on their road trip a memorial left to the dead of the Ludlow Massacre of the mine camps in southeastern Colorado had not been a wise move on Sam’s part. But she’d wanted to check it out ever since Teal’c mentioned it in passing once. At least going this way, instead of on US 50, they weren’t likely to stop at Camp Amache. “Come on,” she said finally, taking one last look around at the painted ironwork surrounding the monument-it did make Sam wonder who it was supposed to keep out, or in-“let’s get back on the road.”
*
“Eeeeeeee!” Vala yelled as they coasted down the steep hill next to the even steeper mountains in northern New Mexico, gaining ever more speed despite the fact that Sam had taken her foot off the gas pedal a couple minutes ago. “You must teach me how to drive this thing!”
“Another time,” Sam said, braking to go around a sharper curve. They had the windows rolled down; Vala’s hair was knotted at the back of her head, and Sam’s hair was pulled into as firm a ponytail as she had been able to muster one-handed a couple hours ago when they mutually agreed that keeping the windows closed on such a glorious day was a ridiculous thing to do. She’d told Vala that for a proper road trip they should have been driving a 1960s convertible with the top rolled down, but Sam’s hybrid got a lot better mileage and was better for the environment, so they just had to make do with the windows instead. “Maybe.”
Vala was laughing for no reason other than because she wanted to, and they’d made it to “Under the Boardwalk” by the Drifters, and it had been a long time since either of them had felt so carefree. Sam turned the music up and settled back in the driver’s seat, feeling truly relaxed for the first time in years.
*
“Tawa,” Vala said knowledgably in the Santa Fe Museum of Indian Arts and Culture on Museum Hill, “I met him once or twice; a right little upstart-”
Sam grabbed her arm and tugged her away from the clay statuette about which she had been reading, smiling and nodding at the security guard who was wandering through the gallery and at the other visitors. “Classified,” Sam hissed, stopping in the gift shop. “Remember?”
“Oh,” Vala said, and nodded. “Right.” She brightened again, pulling Sam deeper into the gift shop where no customers or sales people were hanging around. “But really, you wouldn’t believe what he thought he could get away with…”
*
They stopped at the Plaza in the afternoon, to wander around and shop. Vala kept wandering off into unexpected nooks and crannies, and Sam spent some time sitting in the Cathedral Park, people-watching. In front of the Palace of the Governors, she picked up some silver earrings for herself and a pretty scarf for Cassie. Vala picked out a charm with turquoise after long thought and comparison of her options.
“Turquoise is supposed to be good luck,” Sam said while Vala paid and smiled her thanks at the old woman who had sold it to her. “Especially when you give it to somebody else. Have anyone in mind?”
“Perhaps,” Vala said, and slipped the piece into her pocket.
*
The next day, back in the car. ““I’m just saying,” Vala insisted, “you really should rethink your policies on the subject. Even your money doesn’t grow on trees, not technically, and-”
“Vala,” Sam said, “there is no way that General Landry, the United States President, the IOA, or any of the US’s allies would ever go for us turning into space pirates.”
“You can’t know that for sure! I’ve read some of your planet’s history,” Vala retorted, waving a finger at Sam, and Sam decided she’d spent way too much time with Daniel that one time they were stuck together because of those bracelets. “Piracy has a long and…semi-honorable history among your people. Treasure would help the SGC’s resources greatly. Not to mention-”
“Not gonna happen,” Sam interrupted, not looking away from the road.
Vala slumped backwards in her seat. “You’re no fun,” she grumbled.
“Nope,” Sam said. “Responsible, staid, boring old us. Is that what you said at the Labor Day party last week when Mitchell showed you how to limbo?”
“Oh sure, throw that back at me,” Vala said. “Just because occasionally you actually do invent the most interesting ways to entertain yourselves. Hmph.”
Sam smirked out the windshield.
*
It was hotter, the terrain more and more desert like, and they’d rolled the windows back up and turned the AC on. Disco and Abba and glam rock-it’d been a strange nostalgia trip for Sam, putting some of these CDs together, and Vala said she could not decide whether she was enjoying the current music or not. She was definitely being vocal about other things, though.
“I’m bored,” she declared for the fiftieth time at least in the past few hours. “This place is boring. I think we should turn back and go back to Santa Fe. At least it was prettier to look at.”
“Give it a chance,” Sam said. “We’ve barely got started.”
Vala was slumped so far down in the passenger seat she was practically huddled in the foot well-or she would have been, if she hadn’t decided to prop her feet up on the dashboard. Her sunglasses covered her eyes, but the downturn of her mouth spoke volumes.
“What do you say we find an empty county road,” Sam suggested, taking pity on the other woman. “I can teach you a little about driving cars instead of spaceships.”
Vala instantly sat up. “That would be lovely,” she said, casually, but Sam didn’t miss the note of excitement vibrating underneath, “thank you.”
*
“Okay, you’ve got it, just stay between the lines.” The road was well-paved, recently repainted, and practically empty. Sam had decided she could risk giving Vala a lesson, if only so Vala would quit whining about how bored she was.
“That’s it? This is easy,” Vala said, both hands tightly gripping the steering wheel. She’d flipped her sunglasses up to the top of her head; now she risked taking one hand off the wheel to put them back down over her eyes. “Flying a ha’tak vessel is far more complicated. I should have learned this back when I first came to Earth.”
“So you could have pulled your very own bank robbery?” Sam asked dryly.
“Not a bad idea,” Vala pondered, “but it probably wouldn’t be worth the heartache.”
“Heartache?” Sam looked at her in surprise.
“Well, yes. You’d give me a disappointed look, Colonel Mitchell would probably start yelling at me, Muscles would raise his eyebrow, in that particular way that means something along the lines of ‘I am sorely disappointed in you, Vala Mal Doran, and thought that you had moved beyond such childish temptations,’ and I shudder to think what Daniel would say. Or rather, what his eyebrows would say.” Vala sighed dramatically. “Living a straight and narrow life is hard.”
Sam wanted very badly to laugh but thought that would probably hurt Vala’s feelings. “It’s a good thing you have us around,” she said instead, “watching your six.”
“I’ve seen some of those after-school specials,” Vala said, “your lot’s peer pressure is entirely the wrong kind.”
Sam did laugh at that. “Watch the road,” she said. “I’m going to make you turn right soon.”
“Oh goody!”
*
They debated whether they should head for the Grand Canyon or Phoenix. Vala was all in favor of Phoenix; she wanted to go shopping some more, “And besides,” she said, “it’s not like you haven’t blown bigger holes yourself in various planets. Or just blown up the whole planet.”
“You’re kinda missing the point,” Sam told her.
They had to stop for the night, no matter which direction they headed. They had discussed, before leaving the Springs, whether they should stay in hotels the whole time or be a bit more adventurous and bring camping gear. And then Vala had reminded them both that they did plenty of adventuring off-world and they were both grown women with needs, like hot running water for showers and comfortable beds.
Sam had agreed.
*
About the time they hit Nirvana on the CDs, Vala yelling along to “Smells Like Teen Spirit” on repeat, Sam began wondering if making the mixes had been such a good idea after all.
*
“I didn’t get along with my dad for a really long time,” Sam found herself telling Vala, without any recollection of how they had gotten onto the subject; it was one of those conversations that simply meandered from one topic to the next. She had also forbidden playing any CDs for the rest of the day. “He was Air Force like me, and he kept trying to control my life, and he wouldn’t listen-” She broke off. “It was different, after Selmak.”
“I didn’t meet Selmak,” Vala said. “Then again, I didn’t really meet many Tok’ra before they kicked me off their secret planet to fend for myself. Um. I’m sure Selmak was very lovely,” she added with a sidelong glance at Sam.
Sam glanced at her in return with a smile. “Sometimes,” she said. “Sometimes, he was just a pain in the ass. Or maybe that was dad.”
“You could be proud of your father,” Vala said, her voice distant and careful. “That’s something, at least.”
Sam’s brow creased into a tiny frown. “You can’t choose your family,” she said at last. “They can’t really choose you. I can tell your dad loves you, though.”
“Yes,” said Vala. “But even in family, that isn’t really enough, is it?”
*
“Mothers now,” Vala said. They were parked on the edge of a rest area, taking a break. Vala had poked a cactus and discovered why you shouldn’t do that; now she sat cross-legged on top of the car trunk, sucking occasionally at her finger. The sun blazed down through a perfectly blue sky, the horizon stretching clear and distant all around them as far as they could see. There were mountains far away, to the west. “Now that’s a different story. I never actually met my mother, and my stepmother was awful. Really, considering my upbringing, it’s amazing I turned out as fabulous as I did.”
Sam leant against the hybrid next to Vala, her sunglasses not quite protecting her from the intensity of the sun. Still she found herself shivering. “My mom died in a car crash when I was 13,” she said.
“Oh,” Vala said.
*
“Screaming,” Sam repeated, and her hands were so tight around the steering wheel that she thought she might rip it off. “That’s exactly what it was. Screaming, silently, and nobody was listening.”
“After a while you stop screaming,” Vala said, again with that distant and careful tone in her voice. Sam wondered how many people Vala had talked with about being a former host; if she’d ever actually really talked to anybody about it, even Daniel. Then again, Sam was never sure whether Daniel would have wanted that talk, would have wanted to think about, fantasize, how somebody else’s situation could have compared with his wife’s. She’d been surprised, back after Jolinar, that he hadn’t pried more. “It’s not because your voice grows hoarse; obviously not, since it’s all in your head and nobody can hear you anyway. It’s more a sort of-numbness. There’s no point after a while; all you’re doing is giving yourself a headache. Even-even the snake isn’t listening.”
Sam’s hands spasmed, and she let go of the steering wheel.
Vala caught it before they drifted too much into the other lane. “Do you want me to drive for a while?” she said, and her voice was so damned calm and flat that Sam almost wanted to scream for her.
“No,” Sam said finally. She flexed her hands, stretched her fingers, worked out the kinks she’d created. She put one hand back on the wheel, her left hand, careful not to touch Vala. She wasn’t sure if it was for Vala’s sake or her own. Vala let go. Sam put her other hand back on the wheel. Steady.
“I’m okay,” Sam said, too late for it to attach to anything innocuous, innocent.
“I know,” Vala said and turned her head. Sam glanced at her quickly, and Vala’s eyes were clear. She smiled and brushed a hand over Sam’s shoulder, just barely. “So’m I.”
*
After such a day of driving, both women agreed alcohol was strongly in order when they checked into their motel for the night. They walked down the street to the nearest restaurant for dinner, ordering various fruity martinis with their steak and salads, and they found out that the bar next door had lots of pool tables.
Martinis were not right for the bar’s ambience, but the thought of beer made Sam gag slightly, so she got an amaretto sour while Vala tried Jack Daniels and Coke (both women refrained from any obvious jokes, mostly because they'd all already been made). They played game after game; the team had taught Vala the rules a few months ago, and Vala was well on her way to turning into a shark, if anybody would let her.
“No, but seriously,” Vala protested amidst peals of Sam’s laughter. “You should have seen his face. Both their faces!”
“You called his beard a ferret,” Sam pointed out, trying to contain her giggles long enough that she could make her shot.
“It was!” Vala said. “As soon as I saw a picture of one, I knew. Why had he wanted that on his face? Mitchell agreed with me, he just didn’t want to admit it.”
Sam had to set her pool cue down on the table before she whacked herself in the face with it. “I can’t believe you said it,” she repeated. “To his face. Why wasn’t I there?”
“I don’t know,” Vala shrugged, “you were working on a project or chatting with McKay or something.”
“McKay?” Sam finally stopped laughing enough to pick up her cue again and study the table. She was having difficulty remembering if she was even stripes or solids, not that she was going to ask Vala. It was a damned good thing they’d walked over here. “McKay and I barely ever talk.”
“You send lots of sniping little messages back and forth to each other,” Vala said nonchalantly, perching herself on a stool by the table that held their drinks. She watched Sam wander around the table, trying to find the best shot. “Mitchell calls it scientist-flirting.”
Sam stopped to stare up at Vala. “He doesn’t.”
Vala nodded once. “He does,” she confirmed. “So, is it?”
“Is it what?”
Vala rolled her eyes. “Flirting,” she said.
Sam snorted. “With Rodney McKay? You’re kidding, right?”
“You told us about that alternate universe where you were married,” Vala shook a finger. “If it can happen in another timeline, why can’t it happen in this one?”
“Because pigs will fly first,” Sam remarked and bent down to take aim.
“Actually-”
“On Earth,” Sam finished and took her shot. Blue, corner pocket, straight and true. She stood up again and grinned sunnily at Vala.
“Oh, well done,” Vala smiled back, “thank you for making my shot for me.”
“Damn.” Sam studied the table again. “I knew I was stripes.”
Vala laughed. “You should get drunk more often,” she said, sliding off her stool. “You’re fun.”
Sam wandered over to the table to sip at her drink. “Are you saying I’m not fun when sober? I’m wounded.”
“You’re not as fun,” Vala allowed, catching the eye of one of the players at another table-four college-aged kids, Sam judged. All four young men looked back at Vala. She winked and turned back to survey her own table. “You’re far more cautious when you’re sober.”
“Unlike you,” it was Sam’s turn to roll her eyes.
“Caution is overrated,” Vala said. “All of you, tiptoeing around when you could just do so much.” She shook her head and leant over the table at just the right angle to maximize cleavage, and at just the right position so that the other table of players could get the best view. Sam shook her head. “If I had had half your resources two years ago when I was trying to steal the Prometheus-well. I wouldn’t have had to steal her, would I?” She stood up again, smiling as sunnily as Sam when the yellow ball went into the pocket. “Then again, I would have missed out on an exciting opportunity, so I’m rather glad I took the chance.”
“Daniel also considers it an exciting opportunity,” Sam said dryly. “He looks back on that day with great fondness.”
Vala frowned at her. “Don’t mock,” she said, shaking her pool cue at the other woman. “It was the start of a beautiful relationship and he knows it.” She turned her frown back to the table as she considered her options. “He just doesn’t like to admit it most of the time.”
Sam was horrified to find herself giggling. “That’s it,” she said, “I’m cutting myself off.”
“See? You’re being no fun again,” Vala admonished her, still looking over her options. They’d both taken longer and longer to complete their shots, the more alcohol they drank. She finally completely missed getting the purple ball with a bank shot, which Sam could have told her would never have worked; she had her angles all wrong. “I say you need more alcohol.”
“You are a bad influence,” Sam said, “Daniel was right about you all along.”
Vala stiffened. “He doesn’t still say things like that, does he?”
Sam paused in her walk back to the table, glancing at Vala. She had discussed Vala and Daniel with Mitchell on occasion-even Teal’c, who had his own insights into the matter-but none of them ever brought up their relationship in front of the actual people involved. It was one of those things that you just left alone. “No,” she said at last, “not really.” Vala nodded and went back to the table for her drink. Sam tried not to frown; when she creased her brow like that, it hurt, and boy she needed to stop drinking tonight.
“Why not Rodney McKay?” Vala asked suddenly, and Sam almost hit the Budweiser light hanging over the table with her cue she was so startled by the question.
“Because he’s kind of an ass?” Sam replied. “Not quite as much of an ass as he used to be, but still pretty firmly in that territory?”
“What about Mitchell then?” Vala said.
Sam stared at her. “…because he’s my teammate? Vala, you’re not trying to hook me up with somebody again, are you? Remember what happened last time?”
“There was no need for you to throw your water in his face.” Vala had gotten all the details on that particular date the following day from an irate Sam. “I picked him for his looks, not for his brain and I told you that going in.”
“Well, just-don’t,” Sam said and turned back to the table. “Please. Ever.”
“Now you sound like Daniel.”
Sam nodded sadly. “We’ve worked together over ten years,” she said. “It was bound to happen. There was a point when the colonel-General O’Neill-Teal’c, Daniel and I were finishing each other’s sentences. General Hammond made us all go on leave for a week. Separately.”
“It’s nice, isn’t it?” Vala sounded a bit wistful, and Sam carefully did not look up at her again. “Having a-bond like that. I’ve never really gotten close to anyone like that. Of course, you couldn’t when you were a god,” she considered. “And afterwards I could never trust anyone. Besides, it meant more treasure for me.” Sam heard the smile briefly light up her tone before fading again into something more contemplative. “This is the closest I’ve ever come to anything like that.”
Sam wondered if they’d hit the maudlin phase of the evening, if they would walk out of this bar with their arms draped around each other to support each other and declare their undying friendship. It’d been years since she’d done anything like that with anybody, and a lot of those friendships had, in fact, faded, if not completely died.
But not all of them, and the ones that really counted had never involved such a scene at an anonymous bar. She made her shot-missed of course, but thank goodness she’d also missed the eight ball, perilously close to a corner pocket-and wandered over to drape her arm around Vala’s shoulders.
“I think Teal’c likes it when you call him Muscles,” she confided and saw out of the corner of her eye the smile that curved Vala’s lips and banish the thoughtful frown.
“Me too,” she said. “He definitely has to come with us next time.”
Naturally Vala ended up winning the game, though Sam insisted she got to claim partial win since she’d helped Vala, after all.
*
Despite getting a much later start the next day than they’d planned-Sam had banished a far-too-chipper Vala from the room that morning until she’d brought Sam acetaminophen, or coffee, or both-they still made it to the Grand Canyon that day.
“Okay,” Vala said as they watched the light play over the rock across from them and the valley below as the sun began its colorful descent. “It was worth it.”
Sam smiled.
*
There was a voicemail on Sam’s cell when they checked into a hotel that night; Landry, requesting that they return to the mountain as soon as possible and apologizing for cutting their vacation short. Sam snapped the phone shut, sighing, and glanced across the room at Vala.
“They want us back,” she said.
“Of course they do,” Vala did not sound surprised, and she didn’t look up as she dug around her duffel for her pajamas. “Honestly, do you think they can run that place for that long without us? Walter probably did something to the gate computer.”
“I’m sure he didn’t,” Sam said, dropping her own small suitcase onto the bed so she could dig out her toiletries and hit the shower.
“Siler, then,” Vala suggested. “Or perhaps Daniel’s gone and made some new ‘friends’ again.”
Sam started snickering, despite herself, and set down her toothbrush. “That’s just mean,” she said.
Vala beamed. “But true,” she waved her own toothbrush and sprinted across the small room. “Dibs on the shower!” she yelled as she slammed the bathroom door shut.
“You suck!” Sam yelled back and tried to remember the last time she’d told anybody that.
*
They drove through the next day, Sam occasionally letting Vala drive for very short distances so she could get a small break and rest her eyes. By the time they made it back to the mountain, they were both exhausted, sore, and ready to be done with and far away from any moving vehicle. Sam wasn’t even sure she wanted to go through the ‘gate anytime soon.
“Welcome back,” Mitchell said, clapping Vala on the shoulder and giving Sam a quick one-armed hug. “I hope you enjoyed yourselves; things aren’t looking so good here.”
“We did,” Sam smiled briefly as they walked down the corridor toward Vala’s quarters and Sam’s quarters on-base. “I hope things aren’t so bad we can’t get some sleep first, though.”
Cameron nodded. “I think we can allow you a few hours before being brilliant,” he said with that certain “aw, shucks” smile that Sam had found appealing the first time she’d met him, years and years ago. “Have a good sleep.” He nodded to both of them and veered off for the elevators.
“Hey!” Daniel called, down the side corridor, heading toward Sam and Vala. He and Teal’c were walking together. “You guys made it back.”
“Daniel!” Vala dropped her bags and ran up to the two men.
“Whoof,” Daniel said, as Vala impacted with him. She hugged him tightly. He looked at Sam over Vala’s shoulder, shrugged, and hugged her back-carefully.
“Muscles!” Vala then swung around and hugged Teal’c-as much of him as she could, anyway.
“It is good to see you too, Vala Mal Doran,” Teal’c said, hugging her back with none of Daniel’s restraint.
“How was the trip?” Daniel asked Sam as she joined the trio.
“Great,” Sam told him, giving him a quick hug of her own. “Really great.”
“Sam taught me how to drive,” Vala said.
Daniel hit his head with the palm of his hand. Repeatedly.
“Oh, hush,” Vala said irrepressibly, taking his arm and pulling him down the corridor toward her bags. “Obviously I didn’t get us into any wrecks or thrown in jail. Now help me pick up my things and get them to my quarters, would you? And I have something for you,” she added.
“You do?” Daniel sounded apprehensive. “What?”
“Nothing horrible.” Even from behind, Sam could hear the rolled eyes. She laughed.
“Really, Daniel,” Sam called to them, “you’ll like it.”
Daniel glanced back at her as Vala started piling bags on his arms. Sam grinned and waved.
“You did indeed enjoy yourselves, Colonel Carter?” Teal’c asked.
“We really did,” Sam put her hand on his arm. “You will definitely have to come with us, next time.”
“Yes!” Vala called back as she opened the door to her quarters, Daniel standing behind her, long-suffering and loaded down with luggage. “And play pool! And listen to Buddy Holly! It will be fun!”
“Yeah,” Sam said. “It will be.”
Fandom: Stargate SG-1
Rating: G
Spoilers: Only very general spoilers for seasons 9 and 10 and for characters’ backstory.
Prompt from the galpalficathon: “Because we've earned a vacation.”
A/N: Title comes from R. L. Stevenson (“To travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive”). Particular thanks to jenlev for betaing for me, and to members of my flist for discussing Cameron Mitchell’s musical tastes with me (a vital plot point to the story, I will have you know) and other minor character details. Any mistakes and inconsistencies that remain are all mine.
Summary: “You’re going to Thelma and Louise it with an alien chick across the American Southwest for a weekend?”
To travel hopefully
“Wait,” Mitchell said when Sam started telling him her and Vala’s plans. “You’re going to Thelma and Louise it with an alien chick across the American Southwest for a weekend?”
Sam stared at him. “I wouldn’t quite put it like that,” she said, “but you’re close.”
“Why?” he asked.
“Because we’ve earned a vacation,” she rolled her eyes.
“Vala. You. On a road trip,” he said. “Are you sure about this? You’ve never been the type to take a road trip, I thought.”
“Vala has seen Colorado Springs, DC, and Kansas,” Sam told him. “And she’s been underneath Glastonbury, but I don’t think that counts. And I have been under this mountain or off-world constantly for waaaay too long. I think it’s going to be fun,” she added with a grin.
Cam still seemed befuddled. “Okay,” he said. “Have fun with that,” he added, and Sam patted his shoulder before walking away.
*
“Don’t let her anywhere near Vegas,” was Daniel’s only comment.
*
“I have brought you gifts,” Teal’c announced as Sam and Vala loaded up Sam’s car with Vala’s luggage on their way out the door. Far, far too much luggage in Sam’s opinion, whose two small bags were now crammed in the farthest reaches of the trunk, but she’d kinda been expecting that. Both women looked up, Vala pushing her hair out of her face.
“Oh, Teal’c, you shouldn’t have!” she exclaimed, running around the car to grab the two plastic bags Teal’c was holding. “What’d you give us?”
“Snacks, appropriate for such a journey.” Teal’c seemed ridiculously proud, and Sam could feel the smile freezing on her face. She knew about Teal’c’s research methods. She also knew about his sense of humor. “I am sure that you will enjoy them.”
“Thanks, Teal’c,” Sam said as she joined Vala, trying to get a look in the bags. Vala was exclaiming things in delight as she poked around. Sam only hoped there wasn’t too much beef jerky in there.
“We would have invited you to come along with us,” Vala interrupted herself, looking up at the Jaffa. “But this is a girls-only sort of thing. Next time!” she added brightly. “Perhaps just you and I can go and it can be an aliens-only thing.”
“Uh-huh,” Sam said, opening the passenger door. “Right. We’d better get going, Vala.”
“Right.” Vala threw the grocery bags into the car and then turned and gave Teal’c as tight a hug as she could, wrapping her arms around as much of him as she could reach. Teal’c’s eyebrow flew up in as startled an expression as Sam had seen on his face in years, and she bit back a laugh. Vala jumped into the car.
Sam grinned up at her teammate and gave him a hug as well. “Daniel Jackson asked that I give you a message,” Teal’c said in her ear while they were still embraced. “Do not let Vala Mal Doran drive.”
“I heard that!” Vala said from the passenger seat, which wasn’t surprising; Teal’c’s voice was meant more for bellowing orders than whispering.
“Don’t worry,” Sam said, “I’ve got it covered.” She gave Teal’c a quick peck on the cheek-there went the eyebrow again; and really, that was a large part of why she’d done it-and she walked around to hop into the driver’s seat.
“Right,” Vala said as Sam started the car. “We’ve got Coke, chocolate, and potato chips. This is going to be marvelous, isn’t it?”
*
“So this is the purpose of a road trip?” Vala asked as they passed Fountain, heading for Pueblo and points south. “A joyride across the countryside of your planet?”
“Well, sort of,” Sam floundered a little before regrouping. “You wanted to go on this trip without even knowing what exactly it was?”
“Teal’c showed me some literature on the matter,” Vala said. “Easy Rider, Thelma and Louise, Supernatural. I recommend we don’t do anything any of those people did,” she added. “Well, except maybe Easy Rider, though I understand New Orleans is not on this side of the country. Wait, you have a motorbi-”
“Right,” Sam cut her off with the ease of long practice. Or maybe she had spent too many years with O’Neill as her CO. “Those are some fairly modern takes on the idea, yes.” She tried to formulate an off-the-cuff mini-lecture on literary and symbolic themes surrounding the American West, the open road, the frontier, and found herself half-wishing some other team member had come along with them. This would’ve been perfect for Daniel in one of his more anthropological moods, or Mitchell in one of his more expansive ones, or an exciting chance for Teal’c to talk about some other literature he’d discovered about American culture.
“Your people are so parochial,” Vala shook her head, cutting off Sam’s brief foray into the Monroe Doctrine-how the hell she’d gotten there; how the hell she had even remembered that particular piece of historical trivia, she had no idea-and continued, “One planet-one continent! I’ve been to some planets that are so narrow in their outlook, but not many.”
“The gate was buried on Earth for centuries,” Sam reminded her. “Millennia. By the time Europeans started settling North America, we were creating our own myths, not relying on the Goa’uld for them.”
Vala shrugged. “So what else is part of the-road trip experience?”
Sam glanced at her, then started grinning. Taking one hand off the steering wheel, she started fiddling with a slim jewel case located in the cubbyhole below the stereo. She managed to put the CD into the player. Vala blinked in surprise when Elvis Presley stated singing.
“Er,” said Vala. “This isn’t a religious experience, is it? Because you know I’m terrible at those.”
Sam broke into laughter. “No religious experiences,” she assured the other woman. “Strictly music appropriate for the open road.”
Elvis Presley segued into Buddy Holly, and Vala’s eyebrows were doing an admirable impression of Teal’c’s. “I made a bunch of mix CDs,” Sam explained. “Basically organized by decade for the past fifty years or so. Relax,” she went on, “you’ll get the hang of it.”
Vala hadn’t been exposed to a lot of American music-or any other music from the planet, for that matter. Mitchell muttering lyrics from Johnny Cash or Bon Jovi in his sleep off-world and Sam listening occasionally to classical music while she worked-the only thing she could listen to that wouldn’t distract her-really didn’t count.
By the time “Shi-Boom” by the Crew Cuts started up, Vala was bouncing so much in her seat the car was shaking. “The beat!” she enthused. “I have no idea what they’re singing about, but it’s so-bouncy!” Sam grinned out at the railroad running parallel to the interstate, the foothills near to the other side of the highway, the sun shining down over them, and called it good.
*
“It shouldn’t be fenced in,” Vala murmured, looking up at the neo-classical obelisk and frowning.
Sam looked up from the inscription near the base of the monument, taking in the fence around them. “Why?” she asked. “What’s wrong with it?”
“It’s a monument,” Vala said, “a memorial. It should be out in the open. Unafraid.”
Sam blinked in surprise; she would never have expected Vala to be the source of that sort of sentiment. Then again, Vala’s cultural background was a mishmash that not even Daniel could probably truly sort out. Whatever was left over from her homeworld; her time as a host and her exploits afterwards-sometimes Sam had no idea what was going on in her friend’s head.
And perhaps making their first stop on their road trip a memorial left to the dead of the Ludlow Massacre of the mine camps in southeastern Colorado had not been a wise move on Sam’s part. But she’d wanted to check it out ever since Teal’c mentioned it in passing once. At least going this way, instead of on US 50, they weren’t likely to stop at Camp Amache. “Come on,” she said finally, taking one last look around at the painted ironwork surrounding the monument-it did make Sam wonder who it was supposed to keep out, or in-“let’s get back on the road.”
*
“Eeeeeeee!” Vala yelled as they coasted down the steep hill next to the even steeper mountains in northern New Mexico, gaining ever more speed despite the fact that Sam had taken her foot off the gas pedal a couple minutes ago. “You must teach me how to drive this thing!”
“Another time,” Sam said, braking to go around a sharper curve. They had the windows rolled down; Vala’s hair was knotted at the back of her head, and Sam’s hair was pulled into as firm a ponytail as she had been able to muster one-handed a couple hours ago when they mutually agreed that keeping the windows closed on such a glorious day was a ridiculous thing to do. She’d told Vala that for a proper road trip they should have been driving a 1960s convertible with the top rolled down, but Sam’s hybrid got a lot better mileage and was better for the environment, so they just had to make do with the windows instead. “Maybe.”
Vala was laughing for no reason other than because she wanted to, and they’d made it to “Under the Boardwalk” by the Drifters, and it had been a long time since either of them had felt so carefree. Sam turned the music up and settled back in the driver’s seat, feeling truly relaxed for the first time in years.
*
“Tawa,” Vala said knowledgably in the Santa Fe Museum of Indian Arts and Culture on Museum Hill, “I met him once or twice; a right little upstart-”
Sam grabbed her arm and tugged her away from the clay statuette about which she had been reading, smiling and nodding at the security guard who was wandering through the gallery and at the other visitors. “Classified,” Sam hissed, stopping in the gift shop. “Remember?”
“Oh,” Vala said, and nodded. “Right.” She brightened again, pulling Sam deeper into the gift shop where no customers or sales people were hanging around. “But really, you wouldn’t believe what he thought he could get away with…”
*
They stopped at the Plaza in the afternoon, to wander around and shop. Vala kept wandering off into unexpected nooks and crannies, and Sam spent some time sitting in the Cathedral Park, people-watching. In front of the Palace of the Governors, she picked up some silver earrings for herself and a pretty scarf for Cassie. Vala picked out a charm with turquoise after long thought and comparison of her options.
“Turquoise is supposed to be good luck,” Sam said while Vala paid and smiled her thanks at the old woman who had sold it to her. “Especially when you give it to somebody else. Have anyone in mind?”
“Perhaps,” Vala said, and slipped the piece into her pocket.
*
The next day, back in the car. ““I’m just saying,” Vala insisted, “you really should rethink your policies on the subject. Even your money doesn’t grow on trees, not technically, and-”
“Vala,” Sam said, “there is no way that General Landry, the United States President, the IOA, or any of the US’s allies would ever go for us turning into space pirates.”
“You can’t know that for sure! I’ve read some of your planet’s history,” Vala retorted, waving a finger at Sam, and Sam decided she’d spent way too much time with Daniel that one time they were stuck together because of those bracelets. “Piracy has a long and…semi-honorable history among your people. Treasure would help the SGC’s resources greatly. Not to mention-”
“Not gonna happen,” Sam interrupted, not looking away from the road.
Vala slumped backwards in her seat. “You’re no fun,” she grumbled.
“Nope,” Sam said. “Responsible, staid, boring old us. Is that what you said at the Labor Day party last week when Mitchell showed you how to limbo?”
“Oh sure, throw that back at me,” Vala said. “Just because occasionally you actually do invent the most interesting ways to entertain yourselves. Hmph.”
Sam smirked out the windshield.
*
It was hotter, the terrain more and more desert like, and they’d rolled the windows back up and turned the AC on. Disco and Abba and glam rock-it’d been a strange nostalgia trip for Sam, putting some of these CDs together, and Vala said she could not decide whether she was enjoying the current music or not. She was definitely being vocal about other things, though.
“I’m bored,” she declared for the fiftieth time at least in the past few hours. “This place is boring. I think we should turn back and go back to Santa Fe. At least it was prettier to look at.”
“Give it a chance,” Sam said. “We’ve barely got started.”
Vala was slumped so far down in the passenger seat she was practically huddled in the foot well-or she would have been, if she hadn’t decided to prop her feet up on the dashboard. Her sunglasses covered her eyes, but the downturn of her mouth spoke volumes.
“What do you say we find an empty county road,” Sam suggested, taking pity on the other woman. “I can teach you a little about driving cars instead of spaceships.”
Vala instantly sat up. “That would be lovely,” she said, casually, but Sam didn’t miss the note of excitement vibrating underneath, “thank you.”
*
“Okay, you’ve got it, just stay between the lines.” The road was well-paved, recently repainted, and practically empty. Sam had decided she could risk giving Vala a lesson, if only so Vala would quit whining about how bored she was.
“That’s it? This is easy,” Vala said, both hands tightly gripping the steering wheel. She’d flipped her sunglasses up to the top of her head; now she risked taking one hand off the wheel to put them back down over her eyes. “Flying a ha’tak vessel is far more complicated. I should have learned this back when I first came to Earth.”
“So you could have pulled your very own bank robbery?” Sam asked dryly.
“Not a bad idea,” Vala pondered, “but it probably wouldn’t be worth the heartache.”
“Heartache?” Sam looked at her in surprise.
“Well, yes. You’d give me a disappointed look, Colonel Mitchell would probably start yelling at me, Muscles would raise his eyebrow, in that particular way that means something along the lines of ‘I am sorely disappointed in you, Vala Mal Doran, and thought that you had moved beyond such childish temptations,’ and I shudder to think what Daniel would say. Or rather, what his eyebrows would say.” Vala sighed dramatically. “Living a straight and narrow life is hard.”
Sam wanted very badly to laugh but thought that would probably hurt Vala’s feelings. “It’s a good thing you have us around,” she said instead, “watching your six.”
“I’ve seen some of those after-school specials,” Vala said, “your lot’s peer pressure is entirely the wrong kind.”
Sam did laugh at that. “Watch the road,” she said. “I’m going to make you turn right soon.”
“Oh goody!”
*
They debated whether they should head for the Grand Canyon or Phoenix. Vala was all in favor of Phoenix; she wanted to go shopping some more, “And besides,” she said, “it’s not like you haven’t blown bigger holes yourself in various planets. Or just blown up the whole planet.”
“You’re kinda missing the point,” Sam told her.
They had to stop for the night, no matter which direction they headed. They had discussed, before leaving the Springs, whether they should stay in hotels the whole time or be a bit more adventurous and bring camping gear. And then Vala had reminded them both that they did plenty of adventuring off-world and they were both grown women with needs, like hot running water for showers and comfortable beds.
Sam had agreed.
*
About the time they hit Nirvana on the CDs, Vala yelling along to “Smells Like Teen Spirit” on repeat, Sam began wondering if making the mixes had been such a good idea after all.
*
“I didn’t get along with my dad for a really long time,” Sam found herself telling Vala, without any recollection of how they had gotten onto the subject; it was one of those conversations that simply meandered from one topic to the next. She had also forbidden playing any CDs for the rest of the day. “He was Air Force like me, and he kept trying to control my life, and he wouldn’t listen-” She broke off. “It was different, after Selmak.”
“I didn’t meet Selmak,” Vala said. “Then again, I didn’t really meet many Tok’ra before they kicked me off their secret planet to fend for myself. Um. I’m sure Selmak was very lovely,” she added with a sidelong glance at Sam.
Sam glanced at her in return with a smile. “Sometimes,” she said. “Sometimes, he was just a pain in the ass. Or maybe that was dad.”
“You could be proud of your father,” Vala said, her voice distant and careful. “That’s something, at least.”
Sam’s brow creased into a tiny frown. “You can’t choose your family,” she said at last. “They can’t really choose you. I can tell your dad loves you, though.”
“Yes,” said Vala. “But even in family, that isn’t really enough, is it?”
*
“Mothers now,” Vala said. They were parked on the edge of a rest area, taking a break. Vala had poked a cactus and discovered why you shouldn’t do that; now she sat cross-legged on top of the car trunk, sucking occasionally at her finger. The sun blazed down through a perfectly blue sky, the horizon stretching clear and distant all around them as far as they could see. There were mountains far away, to the west. “Now that’s a different story. I never actually met my mother, and my stepmother was awful. Really, considering my upbringing, it’s amazing I turned out as fabulous as I did.”
Sam leant against the hybrid next to Vala, her sunglasses not quite protecting her from the intensity of the sun. Still she found herself shivering. “My mom died in a car crash when I was 13,” she said.
“Oh,” Vala said.
*
“Screaming,” Sam repeated, and her hands were so tight around the steering wheel that she thought she might rip it off. “That’s exactly what it was. Screaming, silently, and nobody was listening.”
“After a while you stop screaming,” Vala said, again with that distant and careful tone in her voice. Sam wondered how many people Vala had talked with about being a former host; if she’d ever actually really talked to anybody about it, even Daniel. Then again, Sam was never sure whether Daniel would have wanted that talk, would have wanted to think about, fantasize, how somebody else’s situation could have compared with his wife’s. She’d been surprised, back after Jolinar, that he hadn’t pried more. “It’s not because your voice grows hoarse; obviously not, since it’s all in your head and nobody can hear you anyway. It’s more a sort of-numbness. There’s no point after a while; all you’re doing is giving yourself a headache. Even-even the snake isn’t listening.”
Sam’s hands spasmed, and she let go of the steering wheel.
Vala caught it before they drifted too much into the other lane. “Do you want me to drive for a while?” she said, and her voice was so damned calm and flat that Sam almost wanted to scream for her.
“No,” Sam said finally. She flexed her hands, stretched her fingers, worked out the kinks she’d created. She put one hand back on the wheel, her left hand, careful not to touch Vala. She wasn’t sure if it was for Vala’s sake or her own. Vala let go. Sam put her other hand back on the wheel. Steady.
“I’m okay,” Sam said, too late for it to attach to anything innocuous, innocent.
“I know,” Vala said and turned her head. Sam glanced at her quickly, and Vala’s eyes were clear. She smiled and brushed a hand over Sam’s shoulder, just barely. “So’m I.”
*
After such a day of driving, both women agreed alcohol was strongly in order when they checked into their motel for the night. They walked down the street to the nearest restaurant for dinner, ordering various fruity martinis with their steak and salads, and they found out that the bar next door had lots of pool tables.
Martinis were not right for the bar’s ambience, but the thought of beer made Sam gag slightly, so she got an amaretto sour while Vala tried Jack Daniels and Coke (both women refrained from any obvious jokes, mostly because they'd all already been made). They played game after game; the team had taught Vala the rules a few months ago, and Vala was well on her way to turning into a shark, if anybody would let her.
“No, but seriously,” Vala protested amidst peals of Sam’s laughter. “You should have seen his face. Both their faces!”
“You called his beard a ferret,” Sam pointed out, trying to contain her giggles long enough that she could make her shot.
“It was!” Vala said. “As soon as I saw a picture of one, I knew. Why had he wanted that on his face? Mitchell agreed with me, he just didn’t want to admit it.”
Sam had to set her pool cue down on the table before she whacked herself in the face with it. “I can’t believe you said it,” she repeated. “To his face. Why wasn’t I there?”
“I don’t know,” Vala shrugged, “you were working on a project or chatting with McKay or something.”
“McKay?” Sam finally stopped laughing enough to pick up her cue again and study the table. She was having difficulty remembering if she was even stripes or solids, not that she was going to ask Vala. It was a damned good thing they’d walked over here. “McKay and I barely ever talk.”
“You send lots of sniping little messages back and forth to each other,” Vala said nonchalantly, perching herself on a stool by the table that held their drinks. She watched Sam wander around the table, trying to find the best shot. “Mitchell calls it scientist-flirting.”
Sam stopped to stare up at Vala. “He doesn’t.”
Vala nodded once. “He does,” she confirmed. “So, is it?”
“Is it what?”
Vala rolled her eyes. “Flirting,” she said.
Sam snorted. “With Rodney McKay? You’re kidding, right?”
“You told us about that alternate universe where you were married,” Vala shook a finger. “If it can happen in another timeline, why can’t it happen in this one?”
“Because pigs will fly first,” Sam remarked and bent down to take aim.
“Actually-”
“On Earth,” Sam finished and took her shot. Blue, corner pocket, straight and true. She stood up again and grinned sunnily at Vala.
“Oh, well done,” Vala smiled back, “thank you for making my shot for me.”
“Damn.” Sam studied the table again. “I knew I was stripes.”
Vala laughed. “You should get drunk more often,” she said, sliding off her stool. “You’re fun.”
Sam wandered over to the table to sip at her drink. “Are you saying I’m not fun when sober? I’m wounded.”
“You’re not as fun,” Vala allowed, catching the eye of one of the players at another table-four college-aged kids, Sam judged. All four young men looked back at Vala. She winked and turned back to survey her own table. “You’re far more cautious when you’re sober.”
“Unlike you,” it was Sam’s turn to roll her eyes.
“Caution is overrated,” Vala said. “All of you, tiptoeing around when you could just do so much.” She shook her head and leant over the table at just the right angle to maximize cleavage, and at just the right position so that the other table of players could get the best view. Sam shook her head. “If I had had half your resources two years ago when I was trying to steal the Prometheus-well. I wouldn’t have had to steal her, would I?” She stood up again, smiling as sunnily as Sam when the yellow ball went into the pocket. “Then again, I would have missed out on an exciting opportunity, so I’m rather glad I took the chance.”
“Daniel also considers it an exciting opportunity,” Sam said dryly. “He looks back on that day with great fondness.”
Vala frowned at her. “Don’t mock,” she said, shaking her pool cue at the other woman. “It was the start of a beautiful relationship and he knows it.” She turned her frown back to the table as she considered her options. “He just doesn’t like to admit it most of the time.”
Sam was horrified to find herself giggling. “That’s it,” she said, “I’m cutting myself off.”
“See? You’re being no fun again,” Vala admonished her, still looking over her options. They’d both taken longer and longer to complete their shots, the more alcohol they drank. She finally completely missed getting the purple ball with a bank shot, which Sam could have told her would never have worked; she had her angles all wrong. “I say you need more alcohol.”
“You are a bad influence,” Sam said, “Daniel was right about you all along.”
Vala stiffened. “He doesn’t still say things like that, does he?”
Sam paused in her walk back to the table, glancing at Vala. She had discussed Vala and Daniel with Mitchell on occasion-even Teal’c, who had his own insights into the matter-but none of them ever brought up their relationship in front of the actual people involved. It was one of those things that you just left alone. “No,” she said at last, “not really.” Vala nodded and went back to the table for her drink. Sam tried not to frown; when she creased her brow like that, it hurt, and boy she needed to stop drinking tonight.
“Why not Rodney McKay?” Vala asked suddenly, and Sam almost hit the Budweiser light hanging over the table with her cue she was so startled by the question.
“Because he’s kind of an ass?” Sam replied. “Not quite as much of an ass as he used to be, but still pretty firmly in that territory?”
“What about Mitchell then?” Vala said.
Sam stared at her. “…because he’s my teammate? Vala, you’re not trying to hook me up with somebody again, are you? Remember what happened last time?”
“There was no need for you to throw your water in his face.” Vala had gotten all the details on that particular date the following day from an irate Sam. “I picked him for his looks, not for his brain and I told you that going in.”
“Well, just-don’t,” Sam said and turned back to the table. “Please. Ever.”
“Now you sound like Daniel.”
Sam nodded sadly. “We’ve worked together over ten years,” she said. “It was bound to happen. There was a point when the colonel-General O’Neill-Teal’c, Daniel and I were finishing each other’s sentences. General Hammond made us all go on leave for a week. Separately.”
“It’s nice, isn’t it?” Vala sounded a bit wistful, and Sam carefully did not look up at her again. “Having a-bond like that. I’ve never really gotten close to anyone like that. Of course, you couldn’t when you were a god,” she considered. “And afterwards I could never trust anyone. Besides, it meant more treasure for me.” Sam heard the smile briefly light up her tone before fading again into something more contemplative. “This is the closest I’ve ever come to anything like that.”
Sam wondered if they’d hit the maudlin phase of the evening, if they would walk out of this bar with their arms draped around each other to support each other and declare their undying friendship. It’d been years since she’d done anything like that with anybody, and a lot of those friendships had, in fact, faded, if not completely died.
But not all of them, and the ones that really counted had never involved such a scene at an anonymous bar. She made her shot-missed of course, but thank goodness she’d also missed the eight ball, perilously close to a corner pocket-and wandered over to drape her arm around Vala’s shoulders.
“I think Teal’c likes it when you call him Muscles,” she confided and saw out of the corner of her eye the smile that curved Vala’s lips and banish the thoughtful frown.
“Me too,” she said. “He definitely has to come with us next time.”
Naturally Vala ended up winning the game, though Sam insisted she got to claim partial win since she’d helped Vala, after all.
*
Despite getting a much later start the next day than they’d planned-Sam had banished a far-too-chipper Vala from the room that morning until she’d brought Sam acetaminophen, or coffee, or both-they still made it to the Grand Canyon that day.
“Okay,” Vala said as they watched the light play over the rock across from them and the valley below as the sun began its colorful descent. “It was worth it.”
Sam smiled.
*
There was a voicemail on Sam’s cell when they checked into a hotel that night; Landry, requesting that they return to the mountain as soon as possible and apologizing for cutting their vacation short. Sam snapped the phone shut, sighing, and glanced across the room at Vala.
“They want us back,” she said.
“Of course they do,” Vala did not sound surprised, and she didn’t look up as she dug around her duffel for her pajamas. “Honestly, do you think they can run that place for that long without us? Walter probably did something to the gate computer.”
“I’m sure he didn’t,” Sam said, dropping her own small suitcase onto the bed so she could dig out her toiletries and hit the shower.
“Siler, then,” Vala suggested. “Or perhaps Daniel’s gone and made some new ‘friends’ again.”
Sam started snickering, despite herself, and set down her toothbrush. “That’s just mean,” she said.
Vala beamed. “But true,” she waved her own toothbrush and sprinted across the small room. “Dibs on the shower!” she yelled as she slammed the bathroom door shut.
“You suck!” Sam yelled back and tried to remember the last time she’d told anybody that.
*
They drove through the next day, Sam occasionally letting Vala drive for very short distances so she could get a small break and rest her eyes. By the time they made it back to the mountain, they were both exhausted, sore, and ready to be done with and far away from any moving vehicle. Sam wasn’t even sure she wanted to go through the ‘gate anytime soon.
“Welcome back,” Mitchell said, clapping Vala on the shoulder and giving Sam a quick one-armed hug. “I hope you enjoyed yourselves; things aren’t looking so good here.”
“We did,” Sam smiled briefly as they walked down the corridor toward Vala’s quarters and Sam’s quarters on-base. “I hope things aren’t so bad we can’t get some sleep first, though.”
Cameron nodded. “I think we can allow you a few hours before being brilliant,” he said with that certain “aw, shucks” smile that Sam had found appealing the first time she’d met him, years and years ago. “Have a good sleep.” He nodded to both of them and veered off for the elevators.
“Hey!” Daniel called, down the side corridor, heading toward Sam and Vala. He and Teal’c were walking together. “You guys made it back.”
“Daniel!” Vala dropped her bags and ran up to the two men.
“Whoof,” Daniel said, as Vala impacted with him. She hugged him tightly. He looked at Sam over Vala’s shoulder, shrugged, and hugged her back-carefully.
“Muscles!” Vala then swung around and hugged Teal’c-as much of him as she could, anyway.
“It is good to see you too, Vala Mal Doran,” Teal’c said, hugging her back with none of Daniel’s restraint.
“How was the trip?” Daniel asked Sam as she joined the trio.
“Great,” Sam told him, giving him a quick hug of her own. “Really great.”
“Sam taught me how to drive,” Vala said.
Daniel hit his head with the palm of his hand. Repeatedly.
“Oh, hush,” Vala said irrepressibly, taking his arm and pulling him down the corridor toward her bags. “Obviously I didn’t get us into any wrecks or thrown in jail. Now help me pick up my things and get them to my quarters, would you? And I have something for you,” she added.
“You do?” Daniel sounded apprehensive. “What?”
“Nothing horrible.” Even from behind, Sam could hear the rolled eyes. She laughed.
“Really, Daniel,” Sam called to them, “you’ll like it.”
Daniel glanced back at her as Vala started piling bags on his arms. Sam grinned and waved.
“You did indeed enjoy yourselves, Colonel Carter?” Teal’c asked.
“We really did,” Sam put her hand on his arm. “You will definitely have to come with us, next time.”
“Yes!” Vala called back as she opened the door to her quarters, Daniel standing behind her, long-suffering and loaded down with luggage. “And play pool! And listen to Buddy Holly! It will be fun!”
“Yeah,” Sam said. “It will be.”