Chapter 13 - Commitment

The sight of Jack's eyes as he turned to face her suddenly derailed the drive and determination that Sam had been building up since the shock of Jen Hailey's proclamation. She floundered, and could only stare back at him.

In that one second, she recognised his expression to be the one of years before when they had been caught on opposite sides of a force field, when the only certain knowledge they had shared in that instant was the simultaneous realisation of utter love and complete loss. She couldn't help but contrast her sharply-etched memory of his face from that time with the picture that now filled her senses - the stress lines radiating from the corners of his eyes, the grey stubble beard and longer, whiter hair that made him look as though he might be coming to terms with the weariness and ardour of life, like an old sailor who no longer fears the sea.

The unthinkable happened. Her sudden awareness that asking him to keep that emotion hidden from the world had been quite probably the biggest mistake she had ever made in her life. They would have found a way, surely, to be true to themselves as well as the military. But what had she done instead? Lost his trust, not in her abilities as a scientist or a fellow officer, but as his kindred spirit in life. The kind of 'life' that means everything from the simplicity of contentment at just knowing the other is alive, to the ultimate sensation of expressing love to one another in so many ways. She had in time taken him for granted as a colleague and run headlong into an affair with someone else right in front of him, knowing that he would still die for her, just as she'd heard him say in 'that room', but would suffer only heartbreak in return, in the silent way that he had mastered in his tortuous life.

Her mouth formed shapes but words still wouldn't come, but the tears did, in volumes down her cheeks and neck. Jack reached up slowly, and gently wiped at them with his thumb. "I know." was all he whispered. She grasped his hand and turned it to kiss his palm, and then held it to her face.

At first her voice was a squeak, but she soon found it again. "I was just going to say 'I love you', Jack. But I don't know how to say it and tell you everything it means to me now." He made to interrupt her but she shook her head slightly and he stayed still. "Even saying that we'd die for each other isn't it, not when the life we're leading puts us at risk like this for much of the time. Please, Jack, I'm so sorry for not having the courage to have done the right thing by you when we were forced to confess our feelings three years ago. And I'm just beginning to understand what you've been going through lately when I lost faith. Dad knew somehow, and got me to tell him, and now I want to say it to you."

"Go on." He said softly, the faintest trace of a smile beginning to appear.

Sam took a deep breath. "For however long it might last, I want to spend the rest of my life with you. Not just to make love to you and have you love me back, but to know that we're living for each other, whether we're together or apart. You've always been there for me, no matter what. The difference now is that you can count on me just the same. I let you down, and now I know that my life has very little meaning when you're not in it. I've never felt anything like this before. I love you."

"You got me, Sam." he sighed, knowing that she had just exposed her soul for him to take or break. "I'll just never know why, and I don't know how I'm going to live up to expectations."

The kiss that followed was electric, their lips lingering softly, their fingers intertwining. They broke apart, with just their foreheads touching lightly, and stood for an unknown time. But the fire raging in Jack's chest was no longer due solely to his loss of emotional control, and she could feel the heat he was radiating as the effect of the drugs began to wear off. Looking down, she noticed small red patches again beginning to appear in places through his t-shirt.

"Take your shirt off." she said in a low voice.

"Only if you let me take yours off first." he replied, the full smile of an expectant man now fixed in place.

"And have Dad walk in on us? Later, perhaps." she said, kissing him again. "This is for medicinal purposes."

"So was my suggestion. It'd sure as hell make me feel better."

But his facial expression had nowhere near the dimensions of Jen Hailey's, as she relaxed after the strain of listening to a quiet conversation from her vantage point behind Jeff in the adjoining room. She even took her fingers off his nose so that he could begin snoring again.

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"I don't like the odds, Jack." said Jacob, staring at the person he still could not think of as his future son-in-law. "I think it would be better to drop all four of you on a friendly planet until this thing with the Andans blows over. Until recently, I'd have let you take your chances, but since Sam, let's say, *made her position clear*.." He glanced meaningfully at her sitting beside and leaning against Jack on the floor by the bulkhead wall before continuing. "Well, the stakes have changed."

Jacob looked round at Hailey as she sat at the pilot's console, taking a turn at another personal accomplishment, actually flying the Tel'tak, with Grogan standing nearby. "You two are probably not at quite as much risk, but there's still a chance that you could end up back on that planet as well."

"But if we hide away, there won't be anyone to put up any evidence to stop the deal going ahead." said Jack. "Sam couldn't even get support to have us returned from Andar before. Both sides want this to happen so much, but our 'side' consists of an NID group pulling strings in Government and theirs is a tight-assed group of power-hungry elders on a ruling council. On the one side, we're giving them an improved means to subdue and kill off anyone on their world who opposes them or they just don't like. We're getting a magical doohickey that will upgrade electric power, but might just destroy the planet in the process. But we'll take it up anyway, and soon today's technology will be abandoned and we'll be addicted."

"But there's no guarantee that we'll get anyone to listen when we get back." said Sam. "We need to find another way around the uncertainty."

"Or an insurance policy." said Jen Hailey, not looking away from the instruments. "Something that would stop them sending any or all of us back to Andar if we lost the argument."

An air of expectancy built up in the silence that followed. "Jen?" asked Jack eventually.

"Ma'am, there's no evidence back on Earth that you've actually been on this mission, is there?"

"No, there isn't." agreed Sam, puzzled as to where this was leading. "Daniel knows, but he won't say anything. He could just say he left me to spend some time at Jack's cabin, where Dad picked me up."

"You've been to my cabin and I wasn't there?" Jack asked incredulously. Everyone ignored him.

"So if you got off back there within the next twenty or thirty hours, you could return from your leave and no-one would be any the wiser, right?" Jen continued.

"Well, yes, I could make excuses for being a day late. But where would you be?" said Sam.

Jen turned to Jacob. "Could you drop the rest of us on a relatively deserted planet with a Stargate in the next day or two?"

"Yes, I think so." replied Jacob. "But why?"

"I can use that piece of junk they didn't take have time to take off me back where you picked us up." said Jen. "It's good that Jeff jumped into the water to save Jack. I'd never have made it with the weight of that Multiplier inside my coat. I can use it to good effect."

Sam's head snapped round to look at her sharply. "You wouldn't!"

"Yes Ma'am, I would." said Jen determinedly. "I'd give a warning first, of course, but it'd be up to them to heed it."

The puzzled looks of the male contingent on board did nothing to elicit an explanation from the two scientists.

"Dad, can you or Jack take over, please?" said Sam after a moment's silence. "The Captain and I have work to do if this is going to happen. Can you locate a planet like the one she asked for?"

"Yes, I think so." Jacob said, but got no further before his daughter stood up and started moving towards the cargo bay, followed by Hailey. He looked at Jack with a raised eyebrow, the unspoken question obvious to all. All he got in reply was a shrug of the shoulders and a wince.

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