TITLE: Letting Go
AUTHOR: VIDZ
PAIRING: Jack/Sam, mentioned other past canon Sam/man, Jack/other pairings
TIMELINE: Season 9
DISCLAIMER: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc of the TV show Stargate: SG-1 are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author of this fic. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.
AUTHOR'S NOTES: inspired by what Amanda Tapping said on JS ship, that she's proud TPTB never took SJ all the way and had gotten them involved, and what she would've wanted to happen... basically J&S having one night of sex and then moving on from each other for good. I was once an SJ shipper and I gotta tell ya all, most of her statements on SJ ship after S5, or S6 I think, pissed the hell out of me, but after S7 and especially S8 I just couldn't see any way for S&J to get together and it being believable, because TPTB have made too much of a mess by then to that ship. The only thing that after S8 bugged me is how they had Jack just fade away, so in my mind Jack had completely let go of Carter and he and Kerry reconnected sometime in/after S9 because Kerry too disappeared. This doesn't end with Sam/Jack happily ever after, it's Jack letting go of the past so he can move on. Jack and Sam have sex to get each other out of their system, to clear away the UST and get on with their lives, just like Amanda Tapping wanted.
! NOT FOR SAM/JACK FANS !
SUMMARY: Amanda Tapping on Jack/Sam ship: "I'm proud of the fact that they didn't go there with these characters... They should get together, have a wild, crazy night of just unbelievable sex and then go, Wow, that was great. OK, movin on..."
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Her body sagging into itself she collapsed on the bed next to him, before rolling away to the opposite side of the bed, promptly falling asleep. There had always been walls around Carter, thick, high walls made of reinforced concrete with barbed wire on top and guard towers with machine guns. "Affectionate" and "tactile" were not ways with which anyone would describe Samantha Carter and after her paranoia of the past few years of anyone finding anything out if they so much as looked each other, Jack hadn't really expected her to be a cuddle. Even though he himself was a cuddler it was better this way - he wouldn't have had to untangle himself from her when he'd make his escape.
Jack enjoyed his boneless state for a short while before getting up to carefully dispose of the condom. Sure, they'd known each other for a long time, but he also knew too much of her private life to believe she was celibate. Wouldn't do to catch anything or, worse, have to deal with an unwanted consequence of carelessness 9 months later. There were relationships to have children in and there were relationships to not have children in. Whatever he and Carter had left was firmly in the last category. It hadn't always been like that, but now was.
Checking his wrist watch he determined it was the about time he got up. Much better to take an early Walk of Shame than risk what would without a doubt be a very awkward situation if she woke up while he was still there.
As he got dressed he recouped the previous few hours in his thoughts, analyzing them before storing to be used as a guideline for the future.
The main conclusion was he was glad it had happened, but only sorry it hadn't happened sooner.
If it had, then the past few years thrown away, wasted in such vain, would've been so much easier, so much simpler and, perhaps, so much nicer because there was a chance they could've been spent with someone who actually returned his feelings. Not to mention, he wouldn't have screwed things up with Kerry, a relationship that had been so great.
He and Carter had namely done it, gotten "it" and each other out of their systems. It had been one of the few good ideas she'd come up with concerning her private life.
For the past few years the only thing tying them to each other had been the what-ifs, sexual tension and ideas forced onto them by realities that were never them, whatever feelings they'd shared having cooled off due to neglect and abandonment. Now that they'd gotten rid of these last binds, finally satisfying the UST and recognizing the other didn't make the planet shake, cutting those last bonds, they were ready to move on.
Jack stood, silently looking at the sleeping woman as his mind supplied the best designation ever for her:
' My past.'
Then he looked at the door, the world outside, knowing it was time.
' My future.'
Turning around Jack then walked to the lift, boarding it when the cab arrived.
Had they had sex, say 7 or 8 years earlier, for example when he resigned when Kinsey closed the SGC on the eve of Apophis' attack on Earth; then none of that unnecessary, unwanted tension would've existed between them, souring the team spirit and messing with it's cohesion. Either they would've cleared the air for good and cleaned their systems of each other or they would've started a relationship.
They'd finally had sex and this knowledge was food for the much-needed analysis of the situation.
If he was completely truthful with himself, it had actually been somewhat disappointing, because the expectations over the years of anticipation had grown so big that the real thing could never live up to it.
He'd always been painfully aware he was, except for the time spent with Kerry, the only one celibate in this twisted affair, Carter's dalliances far from secret.
He'd never called her on them, though, or demanded she cease her behaviour, for the simple reason that he'd never had any sort of claim on her on which basis he would've been able to demand fidelity from her, something she'd made damn sure of in that room so long ago.
That's not to say he hadn't had any opportunities for some action himself, he was still good looking enough to arouse a woman's interest, but he simply hadn't had the interest or the wish.
That was not only out of some blind devotion to the woman who shared no such devotion or need to be faithful, but he'd had plenty of reasons for losing motivation to seek out empty sex and/or to start a relationship.
The causes for the failure of his marriage were still there through his entire time at the SGC, nothing had changed.
He'd still been working long hours, spending more time on the base or on missions than at home, had been even more in danger of getting hurt or killed than during his Spec Ops days and he still wouldn't be allowed to tell anything of his work to his girlfriend/wife. Keeping secrets had been one of the bones of contention between him and Sara, because at times she'd been frustrated enough to accuse him of having affairs under the false disguise of work and of the word she hated so much, "classified".
It was these reasons his marriage had been dead in the water even before Charlie had shot himself.
It's impossible to retain motivation when the woman you're interested in doesn't want you, after a marriage that was not a marriage, but a cohabitation of two people no longer in love with each ohter, crowned with the death of your child, a hardline feminist for a subordinate and an unwilling one night stand that then gave you an intergalactic lethal STD to boot.
Especially when the STD in question is THE ULTIMATE STD, involving a date rape through a drugged cake, no matter how honest and well-meaning the intent had been; microscopic robots in your body and an STD that causes you to age 50 years in a matter of days and has a 100 percent mortality rate within a week.
Sure, there'd been women interested in him and he'd almost gone all the way with Laira when he'd thought he'd have to stay there for the rest of his life, but there was an emphasis on almost. He hadn't been that drunk.
His situation had reminded him too much of that old 80's movie "Witness" with Harrison Ford. The community he was living in wasn't one to take sexual relations lightly, just as the Amish community from "Witness" wasn't. It was pretty simple: on Edora sex equaled marriage and first-time-sex equaled wedding. Had he given in to Laira he would've been sentenced to that life forever, even if rescue came and after a little more than 3 months Jack hadn't been that far yet, he hadn't given up on SGC yet. As it turned out, with good reason.
Not to mention Laira hadn't been hiding her desire for a baby and Jack DEFINITELY wasn't ready for that yet. Both because Charlie's ghost still haunted him and because he wasn't ready to have kids with her yet. It was too soon, he'd only known her for three months and that in his books was too short and unsteady a relationship to bring a child into.
The relationship with Kerry, on the other hand, had started out lightly, one could even say shallowly.
Kerry had entered his life at the exact moment he'd given up on Carter for good and became ready and acceptive of the idea of getting involved with anyone but his former 2IC. Carter's wedding had been just a couple of weeks away when he had finally realized and accepted that he and Carter had never been meant to be and that, if he didn't want to spend his last years by himself, he had to be responsive to other possibilities.
Two people, lonely and alone, starved for companionship, found each other by pure chance and immediatealy clicked. Not just that, they also genuinely liked each other. He had never had that kind of chemistry with any woman, the moment his and Kerry's eyes had met in his office when she'd come to introduce herself, the sparks that had flown that second alone could've powered the Stargate for at least 60 uses. Considering a single wormhole cost a couple million dollars in electricity that was a lot of chemistry.
The beginning was far from serious, a casual night on the town, 4 dates later a night between the sheets, more filled with awkward bumbling with moves both of them had long forgotten, rather than anything spectacular. Quickly, though, that easy, casual thing they had turned serious, true to both of their personalities. Kerry started spending most night at his house, her things stealthily migrated into his drawers and cabinets... Suddenly he was finding tampons and birth control pills in the bathroom, high heels among his shoes, bras in his washing mashine, female reading glasses and romance novels on his coffee table, female clothes among his, his sheets smelling of perfume, nice curtains in the living room...
When he returned to the house from the mountain he was welcomed by a brightly-lit home, not a cold, dark place he lived and was even greeted with a smile, a hug and a kiss; there were always the sounds of someone else moving around or just breathing, meals were no longer just short, annoying choirs, but a time to relax and enjoy a round of conversation, cooking was no longer a bother because he didn't cook just for one anymore, he didn't sleep alone in a big, empty, cold bed; instead there was someone warm and affectionate he could press himself against and cuddle as he fell into slumber...
To someone who's been alone and lonely for over TEN YEARS this was worth more than all the Naquada in the galaxy. This... this kind of happiness can not be measured nor graded with a price.
In those short few weeks he had almost everything he'd wished for, but believed he was no longer worthy of ever since Sara had left him and Jack's family and life had fallen apart around him.
And then, the best thing that had happened to him in a decade, just when he'd relaxed and really started to enjoy this new-and-yet-old way of life, Carter had had to mess up everything and it was over because he'd been hung up on something that'd been dead for a long time.
By something that had mostly brought him only pain, misery and loneliness.
Getting out of the lift into the hotel's lobby Jack brought to mind the memo he'd received a couple of days ago. Kerry was being reassigned back to DC... And he'd just gotten rid of the only thing holding him back...
No more ties to the past, he was ready for a new start.
Hopefully it wasn't too late.
THE END
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