Jack's eyes... they'd seen a lot. And others saw a lot in them.

Those dark brown, sometimes beady eyes were the portals that took in the world. Middle-aged, now, with full, salt-and-pepper brows interrupted by a deep crease, those eyes. Life hadn't always been good, but it had always been full.

In the military, they'd seen a lot of action. In the Gulf they'd seen blood n' guts, pain and terror... soul-wrenching stuff that he often wanted to physically and emotionally shut out. He wanted, then, to just close those eyelids and erase the images captured by the camera of his mind... but it never worked.

In the desert, at night, when they finally closed in utter exhaustion, he did not find the mercy of dreamless oblivion. Instead he found the terror of remembered, intensified, and distorted reality. His eyeballs roamed restlessly under closed lids when that happened.

It was the same off-world, too, as leader of SG-1, though with much different enemies, in a different time, different locale, and with other men and women fighting by his side.

Jack's eyes had seen the noble – the acts of bravery and heroism, of selfless acts. He had only to concentrate just a bit to remember the situations, to bring those people's faces before him. That was the only way some existed, now – in the recesses of his mind, and in the minds of others. They would never again be seen again in the "ordinary" sense.

Those eyes had seen things that were so damned wrong – political blustering and posturing, pride and belligerence. People who were out for "#1," and the rest of the world, or worlds, be damned. Things that should've been made right, but weren't always. His eyes would flash with impatience and disgust, then.

Sometimes, almost as if he was watching someone else, he had seen himself doing things. There was the time he looked down to see his right hand slowly and reluctantly reach out to clasp the pale, bony hand of Thor. It was a strange yet momentous thing, a moment that boded well for Planet Earth.

Another time he saw his trousered leg swing forward, viciously hard, much harder than required to roll over the probably already-dead Jaffa. The crunch of bone beneath his boot would stay with him. His eyes were black with hatred and revenge, then. It was not his proudest moment.

His eyes were often on the members of his team, of course, whether trying to locate them in the heat of battle or just settling on their faces when eating cake in the lunch room. There was T'ealc, a character if he'd ever seen one, a loyal if taciturn friend. And Daniel, the archeologist who was sometimes annoying but usually – difficult to admit – right. A good man. And Major Samantha Carter. Oh yes, there was Sam.

oooooooooooooooooo

Sam was a student of Jack's eyes, as she was with all of him, really. His eyes told so much. She could read them perfectly by now. She knew that red and bleary meant pain or lack of sleep (that was an easy one), that a glint of merriment and raised brow (or brows) meant something sarcastic was on its way, and that if his eyes rolled up, quickly, he was getting irritated. That was usually accompanied by some verbiage. Those chocolaty brown eyes often startled wide-open in surprise at some of her antics. And when they half closed, and he reached out for her, and his lips sought hers, it was "Lookout, Baby!"

It was "her Jack" whose eyes widened and warmed at the sight of her on their wedding day, that held an extra bit of moisture when their vows were imminent. He denied this after, but she saw. It was not surprising to her; she knew him intimately.

His eyes said "love" in the strongest yet gentlest of terms now. They moved from the pink, wrinkled face of his new-born daughter, back to the tired but glowingly beautiful face of his wife. No words were even necessary. For the moment, none were even available.

Jack's eyes. They said so much.