Walking Blind
It was a nice dress. One that made Cameron Mitchell actually look at Sam in a way that wasn't particularly professional. Not that he was blind up until now, the moment he first met Samantha Carter in the hospital all those years ago he did happen to notice that she was beautiful.
But usually, military just wasn't his type and Cam believed there was a "type" to most military officers– male and female. It made sense really, it took a certain kind of personality and personal code to chose the military as a career. Cam had a great deal of respect for women who selected this tough career, and he often enjoyed the company of female officers while at work. But maybe because he spent so much time working with them, he just couldn't seem to work up much non-professional interest in them.
Seeing Sam Carter in a low-cut dress and sexy boots, well, he felt an odd exception coming on. On Vala, the outfit would have been predictable. On Sam, it was quite the opposite. Cam played it off, teasing them about the girl-only shopping trip he wasn't invited on and wearing more sensible shoes for the upcoming mission. It ended up being a mission they never went on because Vala's father had shown up.
The double-cross of the double-cross that followed happened a few weeks ago. Since then, they'd had an incident with Adria and a few other missions before SG-1 found themselves in a holding pattern. Carter was being considered for the Atlantis command position. Until that decision was final, one way or the other, the team was ordered to remain on Earth.
Cam was proud of Carter and glad she was being considered. He knew he was the rookie among them and was still learning from the great SG-1. But he also understood that at anytime, any one of them could be needed elsewhere. The band wasn't going to be together forever.
Mitchell considered for a moment the fact that if Sam got this new job, she would no longer be on his team. He wasn't sure he liked her in a romantic way, but he wouldn't have even considered it before the dress incident, and only after she wasn't a member of SG-1 any longer. With the Atlantis thing, suddenly asking her out on a date wouldn't be inappropriate.
But appropriate and much appreciated were entirely different. Before Cam even thought about it, he needed to do a little intel gathering first. Only one person in this galaxy knew things about Sam that no one else knew.
"Jackson," Cam broadcast as he entered the lab. Daniel's head appeared from behind a pile of books.
"Yeah?"
"Chow time. Let's go."
"Ah." Daniel made a face. "I'm kind of in the middle of something here."
"When's the last time you ate?"
As Daniel stopped to think about it, his stomach growled, almost as if it were answering the question on Daniel's behalf.
Cam smirked and several minutes later, the two made their way to the mess hall. It wasn't packed, being that it was early afternoon. They loaded their trays with sandwiches and coffee and sat down together.
Midway through the meal, Mitchell said, "Can I ask you something about Sam?"
"Sure."
"Is she currently on or off the market?"
Daniel's eyebrows nearly hit his hairline. "Excuse me?"
"You're like one of her best friends, you'd know if she was dating someone. Wouldn't you?"
"Probably," Daniel said, "but that doesn't mean I'd tell you."
"Why?" Then realization hit. "Oh, it's some sort of secret affair. Married man?"
Daniel blinked. "Look, Mitchell–"
"I've been thinking– only thinking– about asking her out and only if she gets this new job. I was hoping you were enough of a friend to prevent me from doing something stupid. I don't need to know the details and I'm not asking you to betray any confidences you have with her. All I'm asking is… am I walking into a situation where it's a given that I'm gonna be totally shot down?"
"Yeah," Daniel smiled slightly, "you are."
"OK. Thanks." Mitchell took a bite of his sandwich, thinking while he chewed. "Know anything about that cute redhead that works in the botany department?"
Later that afternoon, Vala was sprawled out across a table in Daniel's lab, flipping through a magazine mindlessly.
Daniel was attempting to decipher text on a device that SG-8 brought back the day before from a routine mission that turned up some rather interesting ruins. They seemed to say something about the Ori and the Ancients so Daniel couldn't help but be fascinated by the implications.
Clearly, implications weren't enough to keep the ever-attention-deprived Vala busy and leaving him alone to his work. She'd been peppering him with questions all afternoon. Strange ones, that seemed to have no coherent connection from one to the next.
"Why do brides carry flowers?" Vala asked.
"I'm not entirely sure," Daniel said absently. "I think it's derived from the tradition of garland worn around the head in ancient Greece."
"Did you and Sam ever hook up?"
"What?" Daniel jerked his head up and looked at her. What was with all these people asking weird, totally unexpected questions about Sam today? It was freaking him out. Alien influence? Some kind of disease going around?
"Hook up," Vala repeated. "As it's been explained to me, in your Earth culture, it means when two people–"
"I know what it means, Vala." Daniel squinted at her. "No, we never– why in the world would you even ask that?!"
"It's not that crazy of an idea. You two are close, you worked together for years. Sometimes it happens."
"It never happened."
"Why not?"
"Why not?" He repeated but in a completely different tone of voice than she had used, much more baffled. "I don't know. Lots of reasons." He went back to his work as if the subject were closed.
"OK, fine, don't tell me." Vala flipped another page in her magazine. "Someone mentioned that General O'Neill is going to be on the base starting tomorrow while Landry's out on holiday. I wonder… is General O'Neill well enhanced?"
Daniel closed his eyes and counted to ten.
"What?" Vala asked innocently. "There must have been times in the locker room when you'd have a glance. I'm just wondering."
"Guys don't look."
"Well that's just plain silly. Wouldn't your natural curiosity lead you to wonder how you stack up against other men?"
Daniel gave her a glare, didn't answer, and returned his focus on the object in front of him.
Vala continued on, unaffected by his lack of response. "Or perhaps you simply rely on the opinion of women you've been with? You do realize Daniel, that as your lover, they may not have wanted to hurt your feelings and therefore weren't entirely honest."
"I'm trying to work on this translation. So could you please, oh, I don't know, shut up?"
Vala dramatically rolled off the table and put a hand on her hip. "I'm only offering to give you a completely objective assessment."
"I don't think so."
Vala sauntered out, in search of more receptive company. She found Sam working in her lab with almost identical concentration as Daniel. It was quite amazing how much the two of them had in common. Maybe too much, perhaps that's why they never got together.
"Hi," Vala said brightly as she entered the room.
Sam looked up and smiled. "Hi, yourself."
"Daniel kicked me out of his lab."
"Ah. Come to bug me instead."
Vala asked, "Any word on that Atlantis thing yet?"
"Not yet. I'm certain it will take a while."
"Are you going to take it, if they offer it to you?"
"I don't know," Sam paused. "It's an honor to even be considered. But, honestly, I'm not sure I want to go three million light-years away."
Vala's eyes glinted. "Is there someone special that you don't want to leave behind?"
"Vala," Sam said in her 'cut it out' tone.
"I'm right, aren't I? Ooo, what's his name?" Vala leaned closer, put her elbows on the lab bench, and perched her chin on her hands. "Is he as dashing as that McDreamy guy on the television show you had me watch with you?"
Sam smiled, but a little bit of color was also rising in her cheeks. She really didn't want to have this discussion with Vala. Not right now. It was just that this was big, and not a lot of people knew. Was she really ready for this to be out there? And Sam was sure that as soon as Vala knew, it would be out there. Everywhere.
"Vala, look, I don't want to talk about it right now. I need to finish this before it gets shipped to Area 51 tomorrow."
"OK," Vala responded, though in a way that told Sam her teammate wasn't going to let this drop forever. It was probably for the best, Sam was forced to admit internally.
As Vala rattled on about a strange song she'd heard on the radio that morning, "It doesn't sound like a very effective tribal chant. 'Bow wow wow yippee yo yippee yay…'" Sam was momentarily lost in her own head.
Sam knew others looked at her friendship with her newest teammate and wondered. It seemed that they were an odd pair. But she knew better, the things that made them different, also made each of them stronger. Vala giving a gentle nudge to be more open about men, sex, relationships, was just one more example of how the friendship was good for Sam.
Sam knew her own annoyance toward Vala at times was actually more about fighting against herself, against those things Vala tended to draw out of her that once made Sam uncomfortable. But Sam was getting better at it. She was fighting less these days, letting her walls down more, lightening up. Soon, she'd have to think about letting Vala in on everything in her life, including the best part.
Vala finally concluded, "Do you think that Daniel has more of an inferiority complex when it comes to women, or to dogs?"
Sam was snapped out of her thoughts. "What?"
Several hours later, Sam dashed toward the closing elevator door. "Hold it, please?"
A hand appeared just in time, preventing the elevator doors from closing. Sam slid into the elevator and her face lit up with a smile.
"Daniel."
He unburied his attention from his book. "Oh, hey, Sam." Then he did a double take and noticed she was wearing civvies. "Going home?"
Sam smiled. "Yep."
"But it's only…" Daniel looked at his watch dramatically and Sam knew he was teasing her.
"Cut it out. I go home at a normal hour on occasion."
"Yeah, but only when… oh." Daniel acted as if he suddenly put two and two together. "Say 'Hi' to Jack for me."
Sam fought the urge to roll her eyes at him. "It's not only because Jack is in town."
"But he is."
Sam refused to get pulled into a verbal sparing match with Daniel, the kind Jack always seemed to walk right into. She decided a change in subject was in order.
"Did you manage to get work done after you kicked Vala out? And thanks for that, by the way, she came straight to my lab."
"You're welcome," Daniel replied flippantly. "Oh, that reminds me. When are you planning on letting her and Mitchell in on the secret finally?"
It really didn't need to be a secret, Daniel knew without the regs in the way they technically weren't doing anything wrong. But even so, Sam had insisted in the beginning on secrecy. She was nervous that things were fragile between her and Jack early on, despite the fact that they'd been building something for years in some sense. They'd taken their time after his move to Washington last year, and now that the relationship between them was solid, it was time. Yet, Daniel knew that Sam still found it comfortable and far too easy to hide.
She questioned, "Why now?"
"Please, soon," Daniel groaned. "I don't want to deal with the questions."
"What questions?"
"You don't want to know."
"I don't?"
"No," Daniel shook his head. "But unless you want Vala making a play for Jack, you might want to clue her in that he's already very much taken."
A smile twitched at Sam's lips. "Very much taken?"
Daniel shrugged.
"And," Sam continued, "you think a little healthy competition might get me replaced?"
"No, I didn't say that." Daniel turned to her, suddenly afraid that she might take offense. "It just might save Vala some embarrassment… and Jack too."
"Ah. Well, we wouldn't want that."
"She cares about you." Daniel took a softer tone. "Mitchell too."
"I know."
"Vala's convinced you have someone significant in your life."
Daniel let that hang in the air, while the elevator passed a few more levels. When Sam didn't respond other than a deep inhale, Daniel continued.
"She's Vala… she is always going to be silly, play, pretend, no matter what she's feeling inside. But I know deep down Vala's a little hurt that you would keep something like this from her. She'll never tell you that."
Sam glanced at Daniel, always the expert at laying it out there. Guilt trips were also a specialty of his. The thing was, it was long overdue, and they both knew it.
"It's just…"
"Hard. I know." He knew Sam was a private person, sometimes to a fault. But she was learning and growing and Daniel had hope for her yet. "They're going to be OK with it, Sam. Probably happy about it."
The elevator jerked to a stop. The door opened and Sam and Daniel exited, headed in two different directions.
"Goodnight, Daniel." She held his eyes a moment longer than usual.
It was enough; he knew that she'd think about it.
Two days later, General O'Neill strutted down the halls of his old stomping ground wearing his favorite worn-in-the-knees BDUs. Yes, it felt good to be back, if only for a week. And perhaps the best part was that anytime he wanted to, he could do this–
"Carter," Jack said, as he turned the corner and entered her lab.
Sam looked up and smiled at Jack.
The rest of SG-1—Mitchell, Vala, Daniel, and Teal'c were also in the room. Daniel had a cup of coffee in hand. Mitchell had a file tucked under his arm. But the atmosphere and body language immediately told O'Neill that this was a casual conversation he interrupted, a friendly team thing he'd walked into. Not work, not Earth was about to be attacked. It made for a nice change.
"Sir," Sam acknowledged but stayed seated, while Mitchell crisply stood up.
O'Neill eyed him as if he'd just grown a third head. "At ease, Mitchell. Before you pull something."
What Jack didn't know as he entered the room, was that seconds before Sam Carter had come to a very important decision in her mind.
Jack may never learn what caused that decision to be made. Whether it was the fact that she had just been asked again by Vala who the dreamy mystery man in Sam's life was. Or that the decision had come through earlier that morning that Sam would in fact be the next leader of the Atlantis expedition. Or it could have been that although Sam was excited, it meant she would soon be millions of light-years away from her team that had become like family, even the newest additions. Or worst of all, she would see even less of the man that she had fiercely loved for nearly a decade now, and only of late had finally been given the opportunity to act upon those feelings.
Perhaps it was none of that. Perhaps it was just temporary insanity, the brief abandonment of the by-the-book, good girl politeness, and refinement that defined Samantha Carter.
Sam stood, crossed to Jack, and put her arms around him. Before he had a chance to register his surprise, Sam kissed him and she kept on kissing him. Tongue was involved.
Somewhere in the hazy background, Sam recognized the sound of Vala cheering enthusiastically, Mitchell's jaw dropping, and Daniel coughing at the display that made him ever so slightly uncomfortable. He'd seen them kiss before, though, never quite like this.
"What a way to make the announcement," Daniel said to Teal'c.
"Indeed."