Disclaimer: None of the characters or objects described herein belong to me, otherwise I wouldn't need to write on here. Suing not worth anybody's time as I don't have anything to give.
A/N : Yes, it's another 'Threads' aftermath story, for which I can only apologise. Read enough of them, thought I might as well have a bash. I must also apologise for the title, which is banal and uninspired, but trying to come up with something compelling and original is surprisingly difficult. Totally un-beta'd, so any mistakes are indisputably mine, please forgive me. Constructive criticism good, flames bad, and anything in between the two gratefully received.
Takes place after the episode proper has finished, but before the fishing.
Jack stood on the crest of a small hill near the edge of the cemetery, gazing absently at the middle distance. It was an absurdly hot day, and he could feel the shirt of his Class A's sticking to his back. He shifted uncomfortably to try and relieve it to no avail. Behind him he could hear the low murmur of voices as the remnants of Jacob Carter's funeral attendees discussed family affairs in low voices. Carter's voice was conspicuously absent, and he glanced over his shoulder to check on her. She was stood there, dressed in her Class A's, the same as he, between her brother and sister-in-law. Jacob's folded flag was tucked under her chin and she moved her eyes between her two companions as they spoke, seemingly paying attention, but Jack knew better.
Someone moved across his field of vision and he returned to eyes front. He felt somewhat out of place, left here with only the Carter family for company, but he had promised Sam that he'd be there for her, and damned if he was going back on that promise now. For the thousandth time that day he wished for Daniel and Teal'c's presence. But Daniel was restricted to base after his second descension back to the land of mortals, and Teal'c was tied up trying to prevent the new Jaffa alliance from imploding in on itself. So it was just him. Him and the Carters. Although, judging from the now reduced noise volume behind him, it seemed as though the number of Carters had reduced itself since he last looked.
He glanced up at the sky, taking in the expanse of blue through the protection of his shades, and reflected on the irony of the sunny warmth of summer at a funeral. Did a man like Jacob Carter deserve something a bit more sombre, or would he have appreciated the cloudless sky? In all honesty Jack didn't know. Although he had spent time with Jacob, learned to respect the man, somehow funeral preferences was never a topic they had entered into.
Funerals... It had rained at Charlie's funeral, he remembered. There was very little he did remember about that day. Most of it had passed by in a blur of despair, recriminations, and, later, alcohol. But the rain, it had plastered his hair to his face and woven its way down his cheeks, crying the tears which he found himself unable to shed, locked behind his wall of stoicism.
There were footsteps coming from behind him, too heavy to be Sam's, and before he had time to try and tie the owner down any further Mark Carter appeared over his shoulder and came to stand next to him.
Mark ran a hand through his balding hair and turned to face him, "Thanks for coming, Jack."
"Not a problem," Jack turned himself to face Sam's older brother, "Least I could do." He paused. "I worked with Jake for a while. I respected him. Not coming was never even a thought. Especially because..." he tapered off, glancing at Sam from behind the safety of his sunglasses. It was pointless trying to hide it though, as Mark read his mind.
"Because of my sister."
Jack didn't say anything.
"Look," Mark continued, "I won't pretend to understand the relationship you two have, or the relationship you had with my Dad, but..." he sighed, clearly thinking through what he was going to say next, "I know you've worked together for 8 years, and Sam hasn't exactly said anything, but the impression that I've gotten is she wouldn't be dealing with this as well as she is if it wasn't for you."
Jack gave Mark what he hoped was an enigmatic smile, "She's strong. She doesn't need me."
"I'm not saying that she isn't, nor that if you weren't here to help she'd have instantly fallen apart." Mark glanced sideways at his sister. "But I think that you do help. And I think that she needs that, especially now her and Pete aren't together anymore."
Jack searched Mark's face for suspicion or hostility, wondering if he suspected Jack of having a hand in breaking up his sister and his friend. What he found was concern for his sister, along with a certain level of curiosity, which edged towards a knowing suspicion, but not a hostile kind. Jack wasn't entirely sure what to say, and settled for staring at Mark blankly, hoping that his face didn't reveal anything he didn't want it to. Mark stared back as best he could, unable to meet Jack's eyes through his shades, taking in the lines of his face, evaluating.
Mark gave up, smiling at Jack wryly, "OK, whatever, just..." he glanced at Sam again, then back at Jack with a steely expression which hadn't previously been there.
Jack recognised the look, had seen it before on the faces of both Sam and Jacob. Unwilling to fall out with Sam's brother, he lifted his hand and removed his sunglasses, looking Mark determinedly in the eye. Mark didn't continue his sentence, merely looking at Jack with something akin to a threat in his eye. He didn't need to say the words, Jack could hear them anyway... 'If you hurt my sister...' Jack inclined his head lightly, accepting the threat, but not expounding on the fact that if he were to hurt Sam, by the time Mark made it up from San Diego there would likely be very little of him left. Many of the men at the base would have squeezed him through a sieve by then.
There was a sudden call from Mark's wife, indicating that they should be leaving. Mark glanced at her to acknowledge then turned to look once more at Jack. Seemingly satisfied by what he'd seen he held out his hand, which Jack took.
"So, we'll see you at the wake tomorrow?" Mark asked.
"Yeah."
Mark nodded and turned away, heading back towards his wife. Jack replaced his sunglasses and watched him go. Mark embraced his sister then took his wife's hand and called towards his kids, currently chasing each other around the gravestones.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Sam watched her brother and his family walk away towards the cemetery's exit and sighed gently to herself. The image of the four of them walking together like that, holding hands, as a family, suddenly got to her, and for the first time today her mind wasn't on her father.
She had been so close. A couple more months and she would have been Mrs. Pete Shanahan. But not anymore. And despite the familial image her brother had just presented her with she couldn't bring herself to regret her decision. She hugged her father's flag closer to her chest. Dad. She smiled. In his last hours her father had tried to tell her she was making a mistake, as bluntly as possible without actually coming out and saying it. She had stonewalled him, flatly denying what he was saying. Even now, after 6 years of working closely with her father, being closer to him than ever before, she couldn't bring herself to admit to a mistake in front of him. It wasn't until he had died that she had taken a good hard look at what she was doing. And come up with the only answer she could. That she couldn't marry Pete. Not while she felt the way she did for Jack O'Neill.
Speaking of that man...
She turned towards him, where he was standing on a small rise fifteen metres away from her, the sun beginning to come down behind him, silhouetting his body.
One could have been forgiven for thinking that bumping into Kerry Johnson at his house would have made Sam even more determined in her decision to marry Pete. She had moved on, he had moved on, why mess with it? Right? But what actually happened was the opposite. What she had felt, stood there on his decking as Kerry had invited her to stay, didn't lend itself well to description. Jealousy wasn't the right word. She hadn't felt the little green monster rear up and instruct her to tear Kerry's hair out and beat her to a pulp. She hadn't felt a stab of possessiveness telling her to do the same thing. Both of these emotions had entered into it though, along with a sudden pang of despair.
What it had added up to was a feeling which had scrambled her brains around, confusing and enlightening her in equal measure. She had thought she was past this, which she evidently wasn't. She had thought she could live without Jack O'Neill, not General, not Sir, but Jack, in her life. The sensations she had felt had indicated otherwise.
Then she had gotten the phone call, and had changed tack abruptly, leaving little time to immediately assess what had happened in Jack's back yard. But when her father had passed, five minutes thinking made it all clear. Well, most of it anyway. She was a little unsure what to do now she had broken it off with Pete.
Pulling herself out of her thoughts she made her feet move, and headed towards where Jack stood silently. Coming up alongside him she inspected his face, but he seemed to have his 'General' mask on, and that on top of his shades meant she learned very little. He seemed to snap out of it though, and turned to face her, removing his glasses and examining her face.
"You okay?" he asked. She smiled at him lightly. He blinked, looking at her more closely, then seemed to accept her handling of the situation. She wasn't ok, and he undoubtedly knew that, but she was doing quite well, all things considered, and he knew that too.
He thinned his lips slightly and reached out his left hand to squeeze her upper arm gently, "You wanna stay here a bit longer or go home?"
She glanced back towards the new grave, "Let's go".
He nodded, and they turned, heading past Jacob Carter's final resting place on their way to Jack's truck, in which he had given her a lift to the funeral.
"Bye, Dad."
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Jacob Carter's wake was an odd affair. Held in the upper levels of Cheyenne Mountain, Sam felt like she had spent half the afternoon trying to stop her brother from asking people what their father had been working on. At some point though, Daniel had interceded, and had followed Mark around for the rest of the wake. Released from the infirmary for the event, Daniel had taken to his self-imposed assignment with the kind of zeal which had so irritated General O'Neill when it was directed at archaeological finds. Sam had certainly gleaned some amusement from the antics, as her brother had tried, both politely and rudely, to shake Daniel off, and Daniel had been stubbornly uncooperative and stuck to Mark like a limpet, interfering whenever Mark looked like he was about to interrogate someone else.
The fact that President Hayes had shown up towards the end of the afternoon had only increased Mark's desire to know the truth, and, once he had gotten over his shock, it had taken a combination of his own natural reticence in front of Hayes and one of Sam's hardest glares to keep him quiet.
She had given a short speech, as had General Hammond, and had attempted, at General O'Neill's insistence, to avail herself of the buffet, to little effect. Teal'c had returned from Dakara, and she had appreciated his rock-solid presence, as she had Jack's unspoken but constant support and occasional bad joke, and Daniel's limpet-like qualities and brotherly affection.
She was glad when it ended though, and she could leave the Mountain and see her brother off to the airport, still frustrated and cursing Daniel under his breath.
And after that... she didn't really know what she had intended to do, but somehow SG-1 had ended up at Jack's house, sprawled out and eating Chinese, drinking beer and talking over whatever drivel happened to be on the TV.
Actually, truth be told Daniel and Jack had been doing most of the talking. Teal'c was his usual stoic self, interjecting truth where he saw fit, and Sam had spent most of the evening in thought, mainly about Jack and what the next step was, or if indeed there was one.
"So," Jack started, in a purposeful tone which drew Sam's attention, "I've been thinking..." Daniel snorted into his beer, but Jack ignored him. "I've been thinking that we need some sort of 'We've Defeated the Goa'uld' celebration-thing. Waddya think?"
Sam smiled at him in encouragement, Daniel raised his eyebrows in interest and Teal'c, for those that knew him, looked mildly curious, "What did you have in mind, O'Neill?'
"Well, we've all got a lot of leave accumulated, some more than others," he paused to glance pointedly at Sam and Daniel, "so I was thinking that we should take a week and go fishing."
"Fishing?" asked Daniel.
"Sure, why not?"
"O'Neill, need I remind you that there are no fish in your pond?"
"Teal'c, need I remind you that it's not the fish, it's the fishing...?" He looked desperately at Sam. "Carter, help me out here will ya? Fishing? Yes?"
Although the tone of voice in which he said it was neutral, Sam was well aware of the connotation fishing carried within her own mind, and given her current state of wanting to come to some sort of decision with Jack, there was really only one answer. "Fishing, Sir? I don't know..." Jack's face fell, which made him look so much like a lost little boy that Sam was hard pressed not to smile at him reassuringly, "I haven't got a fishing rod." She finished teasingly.
Jack's face lit back up again, "Don't worry, Carter, I've got a spare I can lend you."
She smiled, "Then how could I say no, Sir."
"See!" Jack turned to Daniel and Teal'c, "Carter says yes, and we all know that Carter's always right. We're going fishing."
"Saaaaaamm..." Daniel whined at her, but he was obviously not that upset about it.
"Sorry Daniel," she replied, "I couldn't come up with another excuse."
"Hey!" Jack interrupted, "This is gonna be great. And don't knock it until you've tried it, Carter."
"May I 'knock it', O'Neill?"
"No, you may not."
"That's not fair, Jack." Daniel argued, the slight slur in his voice becoming increasingly pronounced as he worked himself up, "Teal'c has tried it."
"That was years ago, Teal'c's become more refined and cultured since then."
Daniel spat out the mouthful of beer he'd just taken back into the bottle and coughed a couple of times to clear his airway before opening his mouth again to argue the point, but Jack beat him to it, "Daniel, you're drunk. You blatantly have no idea what you talking about."
"First of all, I am not drunk," Daniel stated, the slurring giving him away, "and second of all, Teal'c is the most refined person I know."
Jack raised his eyebrows.
"Gee, thanks Daniel." Sam interjected, projecting a hurt tone into her voice. Maybe she'd had more beer than she'd thought, or maybe it was the idea of finally seeing Jack's cabin, and of actually talking about them, but she felt the sudden need to join in with Jack's gentle ribbing of Daniel.
At her words Daniel swivelled his head towards her, confusion clouding his eyes. He opened and closed his mouth, seemingly unable to find the words. "I... I mean, of course you're...", he blinked heavily. "What?"
Sam glanced sideways at Jack, an amused smirk on his face as he winked at her. Yep, she was very much looking forward to fishing.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*