In the past few days wedding preparations had become an easy cover for plans of a wholly different sort. A.J. and the other lawyers didn't know that however. Janet had supposedly taken Teal'c with her to get the rings though no one in the jewelry store would remember a big black man in a hat having been in the store that day. Nor would he be remembered at the bakery where Janet paid extra to have a small tiered wedding cake prepared on short notice. Someone might have noticed a quiet meeting in front of the Lincoln Memorial between a mountain of a man wearing a baseball cap and a shorter, stockier man sporting a graying beard. Cassie had taken care of acquiring a dress for Sam, but it wasn't the only thing she'd been charged to buy. Daniel hadn't been shopping for a china pattern this morning either. Despite the Herculean nature of their tasks, everything had been completed in time including the preparations for tomorrow.
When A.J. led his guests into his home, they found it had been transformed. Through the dining room window, they saw that the gazebo in his backyard had been draped with garlands of flowers and ribbon streamers. In the dining room itself a small but beautifully decorated cake sat at the far end of the table where a buffet dinner had been arranged. Lt. Simms was just arranging the last tray of food as they arrived. "Lieutenant, what are you doing here?" Chegwidden demanded.
"I called her, sir" Mac admitted. "I thought Harriet might be of help to Major Frasier and her daughter in arranging things for the ceremony."
"I'm off-duty today, sir" Harriet explained. "I was happy to help."
"Very well," A.J. acknowledged. "Is there anything else that needs to be done, Lieutenant?"
"The bride needs to get dressed," Cassie answered as she came out from the back of the house to take Sam's hand and drag her back to the bedrooms.
"We're just waiting on Commander Turner to get here with his father," Harriet told her commanding officer.
Jacob waited a few minutes then followed them back. "Can I come in?" he asked from the doorway. He blinked back tears as he watched Janet and Cassie fuss over Sam's hair and makeup as they helped her get ready in the spare bedroom in Admiral Chegwidden's home. Cassandra Frasier had a very sophisticated sense of style for a seventeen year old. While Jacob had a limited fashion sense himself, even he realized that most off-the-rack dresses would hang on Sam as thin as she was now. The standard style wedding dress would only have accentuated the weight Sam had lost on Panersh, but Cassie hadn't found her a standard wedding dress. She now stood before the dresser mirror in a designer version of a white peasant dress. The simple design of the dress should have made it unsuitable for a wedding, but it was eclipsed by the opulent sheer fabric that draped in layers on the skirt falling to mid-calf. The off the shoulder bodice was made of a fine raw silk weave and had sleeves that billowed out with the same translucent fabric as the skirt. The sleeves flared out to end just below her elbow mimicking the flare of the skirt. Completing the ensemble was a long chain belt of burnished gold that looped around her waist. The ends hung down from where they crossed at her right hip. The loose bodice of the dress disguised the prominent ridges of her ribs. At the same time, the sheer fabric of the skirt and sleeves combined with her short hair and gaunt face gave her an almost ethereal quality like a character from J.R.R. Tolkien's imagination. "You look beautiful, baby" Jacob told her as he stood with his back to the door.
Sam turned away from the mirror to smile at her father. "Thanks, Dad" she said.
"So do you have something old, something new, something borrowed, and something blue?" he asked with an unusual hint of nervousness in his voice.
"Well the dress is new," Sam said, "but the belt is antique. So that covers something old and something new." She blushed a little as she added, "Cassie got me a blue garter."
"And for something borrowed," Janet interjected as she held her hand out to Sam. Nestled in her open palm were the petite doctor's favorite earrings. "I thought you could wear these."
"Thanks, Janet" Sam told her friend as she took one of the small hoops from her friends hand and placed it in her ear.
"That just leaves the last part," Jacob said as he handed his daughter the object he'd carried into the room.
"Last part?" Cassie asked fearing they'd overlooked something in their preparations. She had a typical teenager girl's fascination with the romance of weddings and wanted this marriage of her beloved Colonel Jack and Sam to be as perfect as possible.
Sam smiled as she took her parent's wedding album from her father's hand. She unerringly opened the book to the correct page as she said, "And a sixpence for her shoe." She turned the book so the teenager could see the album. The page on the left showed a much younger Jacob Carter standing beside his bride in his class A uniform that at that time bore captain's bars. The opposite page held the dried remains of her father's boutonniere, the garter her mother had worn, and the penny that had been concealed in her shoe. Sam carefully pried the penny off the page it had been adhered to with rubber cement. She stepped out of her shoe, then using her father's arm for balance bent down to place the penny inside.
There was another knock on the door just before it was cracked open and Daniel stuck his head in the door. "Chaplain Turner is here," he announced.
Sam took a deep breath as she nodded to Daniel. "We're ready," she told him.
Janet joined him at the door. She smiled as she tucked her hand into the crook of the arm he presented to her. Cassie gathered her own bouquet and Sam's from where they rested on the dresser. She handed the more elaborate to Sam as she gave the older woman a quick hug. Cassie then joined Teal'c in the hall outside the bedroom where she took the gentle warrior's proffered arm. Lieutenant Simms had stationed her husband at the end of the hall to watch for them and at his signal she began urging people into the back yard. There had been no time to arrange for seating so the guests gathered around the gazebo in small groups to stand and watch.
As thanks for their help over the days of the trial, Sam and Jack had invited the JAG personnel to attend this celebration. Their willingness to pick up the slack for Chegwidden, Rabb, and McKenzie had allowed the three attorneys to focus solely on the trial. Sam and Jack had no doubt that that focus had been a large part of the outcome. No one could quite bring themselves to call it a success, but it was as near to being so as they could have hoped. Within that sea of uniforms around the gazebo were friends of the bride and groom. Some were from Sam's time at the Pentagon. Others were old friends of Jacob Carter who had known Samantha from the time she was a baby. Still others had come out of the woodwork of the black ops community. Even in the crowd of uniformed men and women, those men stood out just in the way they carried themselves. Their presence helped make up for the absence of their family of friends and colleagues at the SGC.
Lieutenant Roberts nodded from the end of the hall once everyone was outside then turned to follow them leaving the bride and her attendants to begin the procession to the gazebo and Samantha's waiting groom. As Sam and her father followed the others towards the gazebo the sun was just beginning to set burnishing the skyline in shades of red, orange, and yellow so that it almost seemed like it had been set afire. Against that glow Jack stood before Chaplain Turner watching his bride walk towards him. When they reached the gazebo, Jacob gave his daughter's cheek a kiss then placed her hand in Jack's before joining his son at the front of the gathered crowd.
"We're gathered here this evening to witness the joining of Jonathon and Samantha," Chaplain Turner began. "Yesterday, when I met them for the first time, we talked for several hours about their reasons for marrying. As we spoke I very quickly realized that the vows they make today are merely affirmation of unspoken promises they have already made to one another. Promises that began between soldiers. The promise to guard each other's back and leave no one behind. Promises that continued between officers. You lead, and I will follow. These promises evolved into the promises of friendship. The pledges of friendship became the bonds of family. A family that extended to the other two members of their team just as their friendship had, but in time they realized they stood at the edge of a line neither would cross. Other promises kept them from it. The oaths they made as officers in the Air Force to serve God and country."
Chaplain Turner paused to take a breath before continuing, "Just as their earlier promises had never been spoken so to was the acknowledgement of that line. With it came another unspoken promise though. A promise more simple and yet more profound even that the others they had already made. Someday. Someday the line wouldn't be there. Someday they would make those final promises." The elderly man smiled at Sam and Jack as he concluded, "Someday has finally come." With that he opened the bible he held in his right hand and began the ceremony.