Unit Cohesion
by Remi Craeg

2. Celestial Bodies

"…but the chicken is probably better that way," she was saying. Jack happened to be looking at her but was definitely not listening. She smiled, "Sir?"

"Yeah, chicken…sorry, what?"

Carter chuckled, dropping her head, "Is something wrong?"

Oh boy was that a loaded question. Um, why yes, Carter, something is wrong. It seems we've been so caught up in each other's presence that we've become unprofessional. Daniel says so, so it has to be true.

"Huh? No, of course not." He gave her a silly grin, but she didn't seem to buy it. Jack set his water down. "Carter…"

She watched him carefully, suddenly completely serious. She seemed to know exactly what he was going to say.

"Let's enjoy our dinner. We can talk about…this, later." Jack thought she might protest, but she smiled weakly and refolded her menu.

"I think I will get the broasted chicken."

****

The remainder of the meal passed easily. They ordered, they ate, they chatted. Sam was pleasantly surprised to find their camaraderie had returned from its rather lengthy absence. Truth be told, she'd felt something was amiss a few missions back, but was loathe to bring it up. Before tonight, she was convinced it was just her.

Then, when he'd first approached her this evening, she couldn't quite believe it was entirely Jack's idea. When they'd returned from the latest disaster planet, lovingly referred to as the Ice Bucket by Jack, Daniel had given her a thoughtful look before following Jack to where ever it was he ran off to after such a clusterfuck. Guess it wasn't just her imagination.

Sam wasn't sure she could pinpoint when the shift occurred, only that it had. She could probably work a theory around the events of P3R-118 and the Dome City, but she couldn't quite convince herself that that was the beginning. No, the embers were smoldering long before she was Thera.

Thera had allowed the flames to engulf her.

And that, Sam supposed, was the crux of the problem: Thera was never introduced to the UCMJ.

"Feel like a stroll?" Jack asked, an elbow nudging her out of her post-meal lethargy.

"Sure." Because it was all she could say.

The small development surrounding the restaurant was quiet and relatively lifeless as the sun set on this-side-of-Earth's inhabitants. It occurred to Sam that it'd been nearly ten minutes, two laps around suburbia, since either of them spoke.

Of course they would try at the very same moment.

"Sir, I—"

"Carter, we—"

Sam looked down with an embarrassed smile, indicating he had the right-of-way.

"You're going to have to stop me if I cross any lines here…" he started. She glanced at him, startled. "I think it's safe to say things have been a little…strained lately." Jack watched his own hands as they gestured between them but couldn't find a thought between them. He stalled before he ever really started.

"Sir. May I?"

He looked at her quizzically. "Go for it," he allowed, relieved.

"I think over the past few months we've become…complacent."

He stared. Didn't see that coming.

"…Before the Za'tarc incident it may have been easier not to say anything. Then? I think we've just been fooling ourselves that things were working."

"Hey, it was your idea—"

She cut him off, "I know. And when you asked if we would be okay with it, well I guess I assumed we didn't have a choice. And we don't, really."

"I guess that means you don't have any brilliant ideas…"

"Sorry, sir. Not about this anyway."

Jack's eyes opened wide, but she didn't elaborate. He seemed a little peeved that she'd let that 'sir' slip in. "So, what do we do?"

Sam sighed. For once she didn't have a solution. "I could always trans—"

Before she could finish the word, Jack was shaking his head. "Not a chance, Carter. We're not splitting up the team." He was adamant and her own stomach rolled with the thought.

Moments passed in silence. Sam tried to focus on the rise of the earth beneath the sidewalk and the wicked fissures it'd caused in the concrete. She didn't want to acknowledge any resemblance.

Just when Sam thought it couldn't get worse, he spoke. "Do you really think that's our only option?" His voice was soft, sad.

"No."

His head shot up, a question hanging in his eyes. The vulnerability of this hope she spied seeped from every pore in his body and it was hard for her to maintain eye-contact. There were very few times Sam could remember seeing such an expression.

And every time it had terrified her.

"The Leonids Meteor Shower," she blurted, suddenly very anxious. He followed her eyes to the eastern sky. "This year is supposed to be one of the best. Could be over 200 hundred an hour."

"Sam," he breathed, grabbing her attention. He paused, unsure himself, and tugged on her jacket to turn her to him.

"I don't think I can do this," she admitted, still not meeting his gaze.

"Do what?" he wanted to know.

"Choose. I think it goes without saying that SG1 is more than just another billet…for both of us. But neither are we just another CO and subordinate."

Jack smiled regretfully, "Truer words, Major."

Her tone turned abruptly serious. "I never wanted to be that woman," she began. Jack watched intently as she carefully formed the words. "I worked so hard at the Academy, during training, because if I didn't bust my gut with the guys, I wouldn't be worthy."

"You could take me," he offered with a defeated roll of his shoulders. It got him a smile.

"It was never actually about being the best, I just had to earn it." She glanced at him quickly, then continued. "I accepted that a long time ago. Unfortunately, it's just the way the world works and I've certainly never had any illusions about that. Something I know I have no way of controlling.

"But with you…" she said pointing an accusatorial finger at his chest. Jack stiffened and feigned a 'Who? Me?' shrug. "I never had to prove myself. Maybe at first, but after that first shot, you never thought twice."

"Eh, you're an okay shot, but that was kinda obvious. It was the lab coat that made it weird," he explained. "For me…personally." He schooled his face, completely deadpan.

Another smile.

In front of them was a small park nestled between three streets that met at odd angles, forming a triangular swath of land. It was just large enough for a swing set, two teeter-totters and a picnic table. She led them to the swings, bypassing the table altogether.

Jack, having nothing to add, swayed sideways in his swing, occasionally bumping her on her forward arc.

"Don't be so hard on yourself, Carter. We haven't done anything wrong." He was trying to make her feel better, but it didn't really work.

Sam winced. "Maybe not, but I'm not sure that matters. Take yourself for instance. People will look at you and see you as the same strong leader, perhaps a bit more eccentric. But me? I'm the one that pulled you off the honorable path, the harbinger of wayward desires."

What the hell. And Jack laughed, a full-bellied laugh. "I think that's the stupidest thing I've ever heard you say…" She looked wounded, so he nudged her again. "You can't really believe that. Every soul in that mountain regards you with more respect than anyone I've ever known, because they know they owe their lives to your work—on more than one occasion."

His boots dragged a scar in the sand and slowed him to an abrupt stop. His continued stillness spooled enough intensity to crackle the air around them. "And, Sam. That is the only thing they need to know. The only opinion that matters," he told her firmly. "Everything else is..." he trailed off, waving his hands at the ether.

Sam sighed and let her head hang loosely, finally succumbing to the weight of the situation. This thing between them had always been cumbersome, lingering like a bad cold.

But he was the only cold she'd never mind having.

A beat of silence passed through them, each lost in their own struggle to work it out for themselves.

"Orion," he said leaning into her space a moment later, and pointed in her line of view.

"Yeah," she confirmed and added, "…and Jupiter, it's the brightest. Then Saturn…" She pointed over his shoulder to each place in the sky.

Jack was silent. Committing the sky to memory, she supposed. Sometimes she forgot that he had once been an amateur astronomer, before wormholes and Ha'taks, and proving to her long ago that he was never as slow as he pretended to be—not that he'd ever had her fooled.

"The way I see it," he began, picking up their previous thread. "We have three options. Two are impossible," he declared.

"And the third?" Sam knew the first two options were their resignations, whether it be from SG1 or the SGC all together, she couldn't be sure.

"We stop ignoring it."

A/N: Oohhhh, evil I know...