Summary: Sam is cold.
Enjoy!
I found myself humming.
It was a song they taught us when I went camping with Cassie and her fellow girl-scouts once. It went like this: "Way up north where there's ice and snow, where the temperature drops to forty below…" And continues by telling the story of Percy the Polar Bear, who gets kidnapped and put in a zoo, and then likes it because he finds the girl of his dreams there. But the first part, I'm sure, is why I was humming it.
It was cold.
PTR-558 was a veritable ball of ice, and we'd dressed accordingly—but…
It was still cold.
Bone-chilling, nose-numbing, nosehair-freezing coldcoldcoldcoldcoldcold…
"Hey, Carter! You cold?"
Colonel Jack O'Neill, that bastard, looked refreshed. He was grinning; his nose and cheeks were red, and he was practically bouncing up and down.
Of course, I would never call my CO a bastard, so I just muttered, "Yessir. It's not a problem, sir."
Teal'c didn't look cold at all: probably his symbiote made his temperature skyrocket so he could deal with the cold. He turned to us: "If you are very cold, that is a problem, Major Carter. You could develop hypothermia, which is a life-threatening condition."
Yeah, I remembered. It had happened before. It was a lovely experience: trapped offworld, with my CO dying, and then minutes before the Colonel dies, we're rescued—and then I'm told we weren't even offworld, we were in Antarctica for crissake! In a stupid crevasse!
Okay, Carter, I told myself, calm down. Screaming at your CO will not help your record. Although I'd really, really like to.
"I'm a little c-cold, too, Jack," said Daniel. "Don't you think we could stop for a while?" Dear Daniel. When I get home, I thought, I'm going to buy him tons and tons of coffee—literally. I will fill his home with coffee beans. I will use a dump truck, if necessary.
Isn't irrationality a sign of hypothermia? I thought, but this kind of irrationality is the sort I always have. Damn, I could have had an excuse to stop, if it really WAS hypothermia. It would have been a good excuse.
All this thinking happened in a split second. "Where do you propose we stop, Daniel?" asked our traitorous CO. What right does he have to enjoy this horrible, bad, yucky cold weather? None, I thought. None whatsoever. Traitor. He continues: "If we stop now, we really will get hypothermia."
Teal'c cut in: "You seem to be enjoying this weather, O'Neill."
"Well, I grew up in Minnesota," the Colonel said defensively. "It got pretty cold in the winter."
We walked in silence for a while, and then Teal'c said suddenly, "There is a cave."
Both Daniel and I looked at the Colonel pleadingly, who shrugged. "Okay," he said, as though he didn't care. Traitor.
We got into the cave, and started a fire with some driftwood thrown to the back of the cave. "Evidence of people," Daniel said, but didn't elaborate.
"Couldn't we have come here in spring, Daniel?" I asked: after all, it was his stupid ruins that brought us here.
"Yes, except your scans told us that it would be another three Earth years before that happens."
Right.
"I wouldn't've minded," I muttered.
The Colonel was still grinning. "You guys are a bunch of wimps," he said cheerfully.
"Previous action on their parts shows that this is not true, O'Neill," says Teal'c. Dear Teal'c. When we get home I'm going to buy him so many candles, he'll burn the SGC down when he does his meditation. And if I burn the SGC down, I thought gleefully, I won't have to go to cold planets anymore!
"I'd've thought you'd be better at standing the cold," Colonel O'Neill told me. "After all, you did alright in Antarctica."
Not that he was in any shape to notice.
"I hate the cold," I said vehemently. Everyone looked at me, surprised, and I changed my tone of voice. "I had something I had to do then. But I hated Antarctica."
"Yeah, me too," the Colonel said thoughtfully. "It isn't one of my better memories."
Uh, ditto.
"Anyway, Carter, women can deal with the cold better, right? Because they have more body fat."
Oh, if looks could kill. Daniel laughed. "I think you made her mad, Jack," he said. "Be careful. She's not nearly as much of a wimp as me."
That's right. I taught Daniel hand-to-hand, so he should know.
"Uh, Carter," said the Colonel, "Ya know, I didn't mean that…like it sounded. I mean, really, compared to a lot women, you're…a stick."
Silence.
Deafening silence.
"That is, you're very…healthy. Fit, you know."
Silence.
"Actually, you're so skinny, I'm surprised you're doing as well as you are in the cold. If I had as little fat as you, I'd probably have hypothermia already."
Silence.
Daniel chuckled. "Jack, you're terrible with women."
The colonel turned to Daniel, and hissed, "Well, what do you propose I say?"
Daniel turned to me, and said gallantly, "Sam, would you like me to make you some hot chocolate?"
I grinned: yeah, Daniel knew how to charm a girl. "Yes please," I said happily. Daniel got out two packets of hot chocolate.
"That was quite tactless, O'Neill," said Teal'c.
The Colonel just sighed. "Yeah, well…"
We sat in silence for a few minutes, while our canteen water got hot from the fire.
"Ready," Daniel said, poured the water into our little camping cups, and stirred the cocoa mix into them.
"Don't I get any?" The Colonel asked plaintively.
"No," Daniel said firmly. "And let that be a lesson to you."
I smiled as Daniel handed me my cup, took a scalding sip, and started humming.
Way up north, where there's ice and snow…
So, how does everyone like it? Please review! (Yeah, it's a boring review request. Deal with it: I can't think of an interesting one right now.)
I hope you enjoyed it! -Emilie :)