Chapter 10
Jack was eating his favorite breakfast the following morning-Fruit Loops-at the regular SG-1 table when Sam sat down across from him.
Jack looked up, but didn't speak for quite some time. "Were you even going to talk to me about Cassie living with you this summer before you left?"
Sam gaped at the accusing tone in his voice. "Cassie is our responsibility sir, Janet gave his co-guardianship. I honestly didn't think that you would have a problem with it. With you being in charge of the SGC and everything I just didn't think-"
"That I'd make time for Cassie?" Jack accused her.
"No!" Sam exclaimed and then lowered her voice, "I just knew that Cassie wasn't comfortable coming back here to Colorado Springs right now and it's not like you can transfer somewhere else. You're needed here."
"So are you."
Sam shook her head. "Not like you are sir."
Jack snorted. "They only need me to sign requisitions for toilet paper and potatoes, it's not like I'm the leading expert on the Stargate."
"You do more than that," Sam reprimanded him. "You're a leader. No one else would have the trust of the men and women on this base like you do. General Hammond couldn't have left the base in better hands than yours."
"If you say so."
"I do," Sam declared with a finality to the words that told Jack arguing would get him no where.
"So I'm guessing Cassie is going to live with you?"
"Yeah," Sam said, reluctant to continue speaking for fear they would end up in argument.
"What about when you're away working on the X-303?" Jack questioned.
Sam shrugged her shoulders. "Cassie's a big girl, I'm sure she can handle living by herself for two or three day stretches. Besides, I was kind of counting on you and Daniel to check up on her occasionally and even visit. I figured I get a house with three bedrooms. One for me, one for Cassie, and an extra for when you guys visit. I was even thinking about putting bunk beds in it." Sam finished with a hint of a smile.
"So you're not going to just disappear and never be heard of again?" Jack questioned, starting to feel bad about getting angry with her in the first place.
"God no! Would you let me?"
"No way! I'm convinced this place will fall apart without you. Mark my words, we'll be calling you once a week to fix a problem with the gate," Jack remarked.
"Will you miss me?" Sam asked, turning the tide of the conversation.
"Of course," Jack insisted. "I won't have anyone to barge in and interrupt my paperwork anymore."
"I don't do that sir," Sam claimed.
"Do too."
"Do not."
"Do too."
"Do not." Sam dissolved in giggles, realizing that she had fallen into his trap by continuing the conversation.
The sound of the klaxon prevented any further discussion though as they were both called to the control room. Thankfully the returning team wasn't under attack, they had just been hit by a bad rain storm and had decided to head home early rather than try to work through it, something that Sam could easily understand.
Sam arrived in her office to find that the folder she had taken away from her meeting with the General the previous day had been moved. When Sam opened it, she found every single form signed and dated, along with a notation that the forms had already been submitted. On the top was a sticky note with the words "We need to talk" written in the unmistakable scrawl of Jack O'Neill.
Sam looked up to see Jack standing in the doorway of her lab.
"Is there any way I can talk you out of this?" he pleaded.
"No sir. I need to do this," Sam affirmed.
"How long will it take you to finish up here?" Jack asked, indicating the spread of things throughout the lab.
"A day, probably less," Sam responded.
"As soon as you're done, let me know and I'll grant the leave you requested and inform Area 51 when to expect you," Jack ordered.
"Yes sir." Sam answered with a smile on her face.
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In fact, it didn't even take much past lunch to finish up her projects. Clearing out her lab, marking the things that she would need at Area 51, and finally clearing out her quarters and locker took the rest of the day though.
Her personal things fit into two boxes. Sam was standing, trying to figure out how to get the two boxes out without making two trips when General O'Neill poked his head into the locker room, almost as if he expected to find her there.
"You ready to leave?" he asked picking up the bigger and heavier box.
Sam took one more glance at her now empty locker and nodded. "Yes sir." She joined him, picking up the other box, and following him as he led the way out of the locker room, but just as she got to the door, she stopped and took one more look around.
"You know, you can come back any time Carter, you'll always be welcomed here," Jack softly reminded her.
"I know, it just seems so…" Sam explained but was lost as to how to finish the statement.
Luckily, Jack seemed to know exactly what she meant. "Life altering? Final? It is," he claimed, "But even I know that your transfer is only on a temporary basis."
Sam looked at him in shock.
"Hey, even I read the small print on important things. You're transfer and your position as the head of Research and Development at Area 51 will be reevaluated after the new X-303 launches. At that point, the Head of Homeworld Security will decide where your talents would be best used. You could easily be reassigned to the SGC," Jack said, shrugging off her questioning look.
Sam shook her head, and walked side-by-side with the General out of the locker room belonged to SG-1 and into the elevator for the long trip to the surface.
On the way out, they received many questioning looks. The SFs at the security checkpoints had to wondering what the General and leader of SG-1 were doing carrying boxes out of the mountain.
Once they got to her car, Sam opened the passenger door so Jack could slide his box in on the seat. Then, he took the second box from her and put in on the floor. Carefully, he shut the door to the vehicle, and stepped back to look at her. Sam stepped back and stood at attention. She pulled her hand up to offer him a salute. "It's been an honor General," Sam said as she saluted the man who was more than just a commanding officer to her.
"The honor was mine Colonel," Jack claimed, returning her salute with the same note of pride in his voice that had been evident when he had promoted her a year ago.
The two of them stood there grinning like fools for the longest time until Sam walked around and got into her vehicle, driving away without a word. Jack stood and watched her leave, wondering if what he had planned for the evening would be too forward or if she would understand.
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Sam was packing clothes into her suitcase and talking to Mark, who had decided to apologize, when someone knocked on the door. Sam went to the door and opened it, not even bothering to look to see who it was, leaving the door open so that he could walk in.
"You're forgiven Mark," Sam said. "I'll talk to you when I have my new address and phone number," she promised, hanging up the phone and turning to her guest.
"How did you know it was me Carter?" Jack asked, slightly bewildered.
"You always knock the same way," Sam answered.
"Oh. Can I help you pack or anything?" Jack offered.
"Not really," Sam responded. "I'm not taking too much with me. The house I'm renting is mostly furnished already so I won't need to take a whole bunch of stuff with me, just personal items. Was there something that you wanted?"
Jack rocked back and forth on his feet for a few seconds. "What did you mean when you said that you were leaving the SGC to get a life?"
Sam placed the last item in a box and turned to Jack. "What do you think it means?"
Jack shrugged his shoulder. "That you finally got fed up with being on the frontlines and waiting for…so you took the first offer that some guy made and ran with it."
The way Jack talked about her just put Sam on the defensive. "So what if I did? It didn't have anything to do with you! I never let personal relationships interfere with my job-even when it involved my Dad. I put my work at the SGC in front of everything else. When a nice guy came along asked me to marry him, no one, not even you sir, had any objections! As the big day got closer, once again work was getting in the way, until I finally realized that if I want to have a relationship at all, I'm going to have to be away from the SGC to do it. So excuse me SIR if that bothers you but it's my life and as long as I have the opportunity to try and find that life you've ordered me to get, I'm going to do it!"
If it was physically possible for a person's jaw to be on the floor, than Jack O'Neill's would have been after he heard Sam's rant. Several times Jack opened and closed his mouth, almost like he was going to speak, but no words came out. When he finally was able to make words come out, he said the last thing Sam expected.
"Jack," he stated, "My name is Jack, Carter-and since I'm no longer your CO I can't order you to use it. And I wasn't asking as your ex-CO, but as your friend! I'm sorry that as your CO, I kept you from obeying an order that I gave."
Sam threw her hands in the air. "For cryin' out loud-it's Sam! We both say that we're friends, but prior to a month ago, I think we could count on one hand the number of times that we called each other by our first names-and they all include near death experiences, two hands if we include alien influences and concussions."
Jack started laughing, which would have made Sam mad if he hadn't pointed out, "You know we have the strangest jobs in the world. Most people would talk about the times they were drunk not counting and we list things like alien influences!"
Sam offered him a small smile, not one that said he was forgiven, but one that said she agreed with him.
"And the strangest relationship," Jack added.
Sam looked at him curiously, trying to decipher the meaning of his comment.
"Come on Sam-we've known each other for eight plus years and only recently, under orders, have you started calling me by my first name. Why is that?" Jack asked.
Sam ducked her head and stared at the ground. "Because I didn't think it would be appropriate."
"Why?" Jack asked, wanting her to spell it out for him.
"Because I was your 2IC. Because I was a woman. Because people already thought that we were sleeping together. Because it was the only way I could convince myself that you were off limits," Sam listed as reasons.
"Off limits?"
Sam stared at him, wondering if he was testing her or if he really didn't understand. Knowing that he often pretended he didn't understand when he really did, she figured it was the former and the stare turned into a glare. "If you don't know what I mean by that, what it meant to me, then leave now and don't come back until you do," she insisted, pushing a confused and surprised Jack O'Neill towards the door, opening it, and slamming it shut once he was outside.
Sam went into her bedroom and cried herself to sleep, clutching her pillow.
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Over the next few days, Sam finished packing and making preparations to leave her house unoccupied for a long length of time. She got one of the neighborhood boys to mow the lawn and check up on the house once a week in exchange for a check once a month. She also paid one last visit to the Air Force hospital, where the OBGYN that had the proper security clearance and was the most knowledgeable, after Janet's death, about the problems that Jolinar had caused for Sam. The doctor agreed that Sam could have her birth control implant removed, something that the General had signed off on along with her transfer paperwork. The doctor removed it and gave Sam a clean bill of health. They also discussed how to deal with her medical file, given that most people would not have the necessary clearance to know about her condition.
Three days after the conversation with Jack, Sam loaded her car up with the boxes she needed. Then she finished closing up her house. Finally, she set the security alarm and with one last glance, drove away to escape the hurricane that had become her life.
She arrived at her newly rented house to find it just like she expected-everything already furnished and ready to go except the room that had previously been a kid's playroom. This was the room that would become the guy's guest bedroom. But she knew it would be at least a couple of weeks before any of them showed up, if Daniel or Teal'c showed up at all, and since her and Jack weren't on speaking terms any longer, she wasn't worried about him making an appearance either.
In the meantime, Sam concentrated on unpacking and getting the house ready for Cassie's arrival in two weeks.
After she got the house settled, she reported to Area 51 where she took over the R&D job, much to the relief of General Marcus Smith there. While Sam thought he lived up to his cold hearted reputation, he seemed genuinely grateful to have someone who actually knew what all the scientists and researchers were talking about. Most importantly, she could tell him if it was worthwhile to pursue, and since Sam was so experienced and had dealt with much of the technology previously, she didn't have any problems dividing the scientists who were trying to show off from those who actually knew what they were talking about when she met each of them for an official introduction to them and their projects.
What amazed Sam was the progress being made on the new X-303. The ship was almost ready to have all of its systems installed and hooked together. The most exciting piece of technology would be the Asgard hyperdrive that was slated to be installed and tested in three months.
Overall, Sam was settling in rather well to her new job. She even enjoyed her weekends off and slept in late on Saturdays like a normal person. She went shopping and spent evenings on the phone with Cassie. She even went out with some of the other scientists in her department. While the group didn't have near the amount of fun as Sam experienced with SG-1, it felt good to be part of a group that she could relate to on some level once more.
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