'So how long do you think it'll take you to fix the cloak?' The Colonel asked Sam held open the cloth door letting her out into the baking Egyptian sunlight. She paused, waiting for the Colonel holding her hand over her eyes for some shade, looking around at the rag tag village.
'I honestly don't know. I've never had any experience with this sort of technology and none of us even found a hint of a cloak back in our time.' Sam mused as she hurried along to keep up with the Colonel's longer stride.
'So a half hour tops?' Sam turned to look at him with a baffled look. The Colonel managed to keep a childishly innocent look on his face for all of two seconds.
Sam heaved a sigh as she looked away from him, squinting in the bright light. This was far too much to deal with in less than a day.
Having a reasonable conversation with Jack O'Neill.
Being allowed to join the first team of intergalactic explorers.
Traveling through a wormhole (one of the brighter points in her day).
Getting captured by aliens.
Escaping prison and forced to watch as most of the men who came with her, die.
Poor Daniel. One of the few friends she actually managed to make in the past few years.
Then traveling back to the past, which was another of the few good moments in her day. Unfortunately that was eclipsed by everything else that had happened.
Then there was the other Daniel, tangible proof of what had happened. That they had screwed up the timeline. Well not them the other them, the real SG-1.
And now the dawning realization that she was actually attracted to Jack O'Neill.
That was something she should have figured out sooner.
It was all far more than enough to make her head hurt.
She reached up to rub her temple as she scurried along after the Colonel.
'Try not to think so much. I find it gets in the way.' He murmured more to himself than to her, to which she arched an eyebrow in response.
'And I usually find it helps ever so much.' Sam found herself muttering unable to help herself. The Colonel started chuckling and Sam felt her cheeks grow increasingly warm. God damn her mouth anyways.
'I knew you had a sense of humor! Sweet!' Sam looked at him in amazement. All her life she thought that Air Force officers were all stoic and hard-nosed. Everything Jack O'Neill did flew in the face of what she thought the Air Force was growing up. Something in her face must have showed her bafflement as he grinned at her.
'Sorry I've never been one for sticking to the rules and regulations. I like stickin' it to the man!'
'Is that why you retired ten years ago?' She asked before she could help herself. And Sam immediately regretted her lapse as she saw his face fall.
'No. I had other reasons.' Came the expected clipped reply. Sam closed her eyes and mentally kicked herself.
'I'm sorry I shouldn't have said anything. I usually stay quiet in order to avoid making a fool out of myself as I just did. Sorry.'
'I avoid saying anything as I'm usually the dumbest person in the room.' The Colonel fiddled with his gun whilst staring resolutely at his boots.
'Now that's just insane. You don't get to be a Colonel, let alone get reactivated, by being dumb. I do actually know a thing or two about the Air Force.' Sam sped up to walk alongside the Colonel and look directly at him.
'Really? How do you know about the Air Force? Or are you just one of those people that knows' a lot of things? Being a genius and all.' He still didn't look at her but was staring out at the sand dune ahead of them.
Sam's head dropped, wishing she didn't have to tell him.
'My Dad. He was a two star.' She admitted looking at the same sand dune, but stopped once she realized that the Colonel had stopped. Judging by what she could see out of the corner of her eye, he was putting two and two together.
'Wait a min-...Holy crap. Jacob Carter? Major General Jacob Carter?' He exclaimed staring at her in sheer shock. It was Sam's turn to stare down at her boots. Oh yes he ended up with four.
'Maybe?' She half whispered scuffing one boot off the other, not daring to look up at the Colonels face.
'I never would've guessed. No wonder you kept that one to yourself. I heard he passed a while back. Sorry.'
'Yeah, he wasn't an easy man to deal with. And he certainly didn't know how to deal with me. He died six years ago, lymphoma. Thanks.' Sam smiled slightly looking up at him.
'We better get moving. Ship won't fix itself after all.' He gruffly told her marching past her; Sam nodded and walked behind him lost in thought.
'Also who the heck named it 'gate-ship'? Worst name ever.' Sam had never been so mystified by an individual in all her life. One minute he was a tough sarcastic man, and the next he was like a hyper active child.
'McKay I guess, and yeah it is pretty terrible Colonel, a little puddle jumper like that?' The Colonel turned to grin at her. Sam once again found herself trying to suppress a blush, and of course she failed miserably. This, of course caused the Colonels grin to widen further.
'Puddle jumper! Now that's more like it! And for the last time, call me Jack will ya?' Sam nodded again at him, once again avoiding the amused dark brown stare.
She jogged to catch up with him and held on to her sleeves in a nervous fashion as she turned to look at him again.
'You ever wonder what your life's going to be like in the future?' She wondered looking at him briefly.
'Won't really be my life now will it?'
'No, but still, I mean, I've led such a small and unimportant existence, I can't ever imagine being a hero who saves the planet.' Sam rambled on, determined to have a conversation with this man without having a decidedly idiotic moment.
'Well, we do have a time machine. We could go check it out.' The Colonel-Jack suggested looking at her intently. Sam immediately started shaking her head. She was definitely not risking messing up the future again, and no one was going to convince her otherwise.
Doctor Sam Carter was going to live up to Colonel Sam Carter's legacy for once in her pitiful life.
'No way. We've already screwed up enough. Once we're done with the gate, we need to destroy the ship.' She spoke stubbornly, knowing it was the right thing to do.
'Seriously?' Jack looked at her in shock. He was probably surprised that a geek would be advocating destroying an amazingly advanced piece of technology.
'Absolutely.' She nodded again but felt her stomach drop as she saw the look of dawning realization on the Colonels face.
'You mean we have to stay here?' Luckily for her, he didn't seem to be angry by her statement. Just stunned by it. Sam figured he'd probably get mad later they had a ship to fix after all. And then the planet to save.
Sam mentally stalled at that, saving the world, how cool was that? Then she started thinking about Colonel Sam again, and what her life was going to entail.
'I wonder if the future me has a boyfriend.' She mused, barely aware that she was actually speaking out loud. Then she blushed fiercely, praying to whatever super being out there, that Jack was thinking it was the sun.
So much for not having an idiotic moment.
Sam tried her best not to groan at the sight of the staff blast damage. She plodded in behind Jack as he moved into the ship. They both looked worriedly at the dashboard as it didn't automatically light up. A part of Sam couldn't help but be horrified by the fact that he had to smack it several times.
Yes, it was a hardy piece of technology but honestly hitting in order to get it to-
'So what do I do?' Sam blinked quickly and tried to think of what would work.
'Ummmm, try thinking 'invisible'' Judging by the look he aimed her with he was thinking it was pretty idiotic. Well if McKay didn't manage to break it, Sam guessed it was pretty idiot-proof.
'Okay'
She looked around her as Jack shrugged and grabbed the controls and closed his eyes. Sam didn't hear any humming coming from the ship. So probably not working... possibly?
She then noticed that Jack had opened his eyes and was looking at her.
'How do we know if it's working?' He asked in an obvious tone. She raised a finger at him and scurried away. Sam moved out of the ship, once again mentally kicking herself, this time however for complete lack of common sense. She then looked around as she got outside.
'Nope!' It was time to go fix alien technology that she had next to no experience with.
Sam heaved a breath as she re-entered the ship, Jack had already spun round in the seat to face her.
'No go?'
'At the moment pretty much yeah, sorry.' Jack rolled his eyes at her.
'Stop saying that seriously? It's not your fault; it's the 'other' Jacksons' for not saying anything about the cloak!' He exclaimed gesturing wildly, a bit more then Sam was comfortable with given where they were and the gun around his neck.
Sam blinked at him bewilderedly.
'Sor-' she started but on seeing Jacks face she stopped herself. 'It's a habit. Since I tend to stick my foot in it, apologies are just automatic.' She mumbled more than a tad embarrassed.
'Yeah I got that, but apologizing for something you couldn't possibly help? That's just nuts Doc.' He looked at her beseechingly leaning forward on the time device.
'Thanks. And Sam.' Sam muttered looking at him with her head slightly lowered. As if she had a chance of hiding her blush. Blushing seemed to be a constant state of being around this man.
Damn it.
'Sorry?' He looked at her, smirking at his own little joke.
'Call me Sam.' Sam refused to look directly at him given that he seemed to be enjoying her embarrassment. She pulled open the panel overhead and grabbed the stylus. She bit her lip as she looked at the glowing sections.
Where to begin?
She pulled out one panel and examined it closely and prodded it experimentally with the stylus. She arched her eyebrow and slotted it back.
A challenge was it?
Sam squared her shoulders and took a deep breath. She may be slightly clueless in social situation, but science? Science was where she could excel. It was about damn time to prove it to both herself and everyone else.
Thoughts were whirring round Sam's head at an almost alarming rate, fixing the cloak was imperative and she was the only one who could do it. A part of her was exhilarated by the fact that she had to use science on the fly. Maybe this was why the other Sam did this for as long as she did. The adrenaline rush must have been extremely addictive.
Heck, she could easily get addicted to this if this wasn't the only mission she'd ever be on.
After selecting and rejecting a few more panels, she snuck a glance at Jack. Who was staring... at her? No he had to be looking what she was doing.
Not her.
Not a snowball in hells chance of that happening.
Of all the people she could've been attracted to, why him?
Oh she knew why, what woman wouldn't be, but it was totally impossible.
Mentally Sam began hitting her head off a wall. She shook her head before focusing back on the task at hand.
She let go of the stylus for a minute and turned to examine the panel closest the cockpit. After about ten minutes of scanning each of the panels before determining that none of them were related to cloak.
Sam turned back to the first panel and selected a couple of panels and picked up the stylus before trying to reroute so of the subroutines.
'So how's it goin'?' Jack asked her as he stood in the door way to the main compartment.
Oh where to even begin?
Sam faltered slightly turning to face him.
'I'm working on it. I think the power relay was overloaded. I may be able to reroute the circuit to the control interface...' Sam felt him stare at her and she turned round to face him.
'What?' She asked, trying to figure out what the look he was aiming at her meant.
'It's just a little weird hearin' that kind of stuff come out of someone so...' Sam immediately straightened up, not liking where the conversation was heading. Just when she thought she had met someone was different, the same old stuff starts happening again.
'So what?' She snapped looking at him, holding the stylus perhaps a little too strongly then was wise.
'...Hot.' Sam's eyes shot wide open.
Hooooooly Hannah.
No, she had to have heard that wrong.
Sam coughed but also managed to breath in slightly causing a noise she couldn't quite define to emerge from her.
'Really?' At least she managed to keep the incredulous tone out of her voice.
'Yeah.' So she hadn't misheard him.
Crikey.
This was new.
Sam Carter was used to guys like McKay being attracted to her, not... well not the Jack O'Neill alpha types.
'Wow. Um, it's just that you... you're not the kind of guy that I usually attract.'
If only he knew, well actually that would be the last thing she'd want him to know.
'No?' Sam began to see that he was expecting a response to the 'hot' statement.
If she was the other Sam she'd know what to do!
Actually, she was a Lt. Colonel and he was a General.
That was more impossible then this.
Sam knew that she liked him, but she needed to know more about him.
'No. Huh. God.' She mentally smacked herself. Her poor psyche was terribly beaten up and it was all due to this man. Who was looking decidedly more and more awkward by the second.
'This is kinda awkward.'
Talk about stating the obvious, the awkward tension was so high, a spoon could cut it. A wooden spoon.
'Yeah, it's gettin' there.'
Oh what was she going to do?
'I'm kind of attracted to...' Sam panicked yet again. She had to lie to him. She needed to know more about him before she risked anything more then she already had.
'Daniel.' That sounded wrong even to her own ears. She looked awkwardly at Jack as he stared at her in complete disbelief.
'What?' He shook his head at her. He stepped closer to her and leaned on the time device as she shrugged. 'Really?' It seemed like he actually believed her. And Sam was convinced that she was a terrible liar. Maybe she wasn't as bad as she thought, or he was really clueless.
'Sorry.'
'No that's OK, n-no problem there. I, it's just, you know... first impressions, I kinda thought he was...' Sam looked at his hands and then up at his face in confusion as he gestured strangely. 'Never mind.'
Sam nodded at him as he turned away. She let go of the breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding. As she started working on the cloak again she thought back over the conversation she'd just had and winced.
Oh isn't it just obvious that I love geek! Sam? She's just so funny!
I think I may be leaving her alone for another while alas... I'm not sure what else I can get out of the episode that hasn't been done to death. Won't she be relieved?
Anyways as always read and review!
Much love! (Also I still don't own Stargate... I think it'll be my first step in my plan for world domination... but I didn't say that alright!)
Thanks!