Author: Rysler
Email: strmscalmaol.com
Rating: G
Pairings: Janet/other
Category: Post-"Heroes" fiction
Date: 03/06/04
Website: MGM owns them. I just have the calendar.
Archive: With author's permission.
Summary: Sam discovers a secret about Janet's life.
Notes: Spoilers for "Heroes"
Major Samantha Carter, USAF, wasn't sure what woke her as she grunted and opened her eyes blearily into sunlight. She was lying flat on her stomach, sprawled diagonally across a large bed. Slowly, she moved her face away from the pile of drool that had collected beneath her, and tried to orient.
Janet's dead.
I'm in her house, lying across her bed.
Cassie is--
Sam listened. The house was silent.
Where's Cassie?
Sam peered around from her vantage point for the kid, but all she could see without moving was the pattern of the comforter under her nose. She thought for a while, and deduced she had probably been awakened by the slamming of the front door as Cassandra went off to school. The morning routine.
She rolled over onto her back and stretched. Her first night at the Fraisers, she woke up with Cassie curled up at her side. Her fourth night she slept alone, but woke up in the morning under an afghan throw that the child had tossed on her sometime during the night. More recently, Cassie hadn't bothered to make an appearance, so Sam slept on top of the blankets in the previous day's street clothes.
Actually sleeping in Janet's bed would feel too strange. She was afraid she would miss Janet more if she got that close to the fading patterns of her life. Sam should probably be sleeping on the couch, but the comforter in the bedroom smelled like Janet. The comforter she was currently lying on. Sam took a deep breath, but she was facing the wrong way to catch Janet's scent. Loneliness overtook her. The bland ceiling held no reminders of her friend. Fraiser was absent. Sam shuddered with the pain of constantly remembering why she was lying there.
Sam's beeper and bladder simultaneously yanked her away from her thoughts. She had indulged long enough, the day informed her--It needed her attention.
Now night had come, and Cassandra wasn't in the Fraiser household.
Sam knew she shouldn't worry. The kid had a lot to work through, her mom had just died, and she deserved her space. Besides, it was only seven o'clock.
She paced in Janet's living room, trying to convince herself she could absolutely not get on Cassie's case. Sam'd always been more of the father figure in the girl's life, letting Janet do all the discipline while she got to play nice and spoil the brat. Reining in the teenager now would just lead to resentment, confusion of roles, and probably Cassie thinking that Sam was trying to replace her mother. Bad idea. Sam imagined an ugly scene. Better to trust Cassie to do the right thing, because, really, she couldn't think of an alternative scenario that would end well.
But this is ridiculous, she thought. She was lonely, and worried, and stressed, and if seeing Cassie, just for a second to make sure she was okay would make her feel better, then she should go do it. Sam wouldn't intrude. Right?
Sam headed to the mall. Cassandra was a seventeen-year-old, and Colorado Springs wasn't that exciting a town. Cassandra preferred the outdoors, like the rural planet she reared from. Despite the changes in her life, she was still drawn to the forest. You can take the mutant DNA out of the girl, but...
What if Cassie saw her spying? Accidentally? She'd feel like an ass, and probably be violating the kid's trust in her. Don't be silly. You're a Special Ops Major in the Air Force, surely you can sneak through a mall.
So Sam crept through the Gap and the Hole and Spencer's, while the bright lights and garish music increasingly annoyed her. The food court beckoned, like a holy fluorescent beacon. Her stomach rumbled. She'd ignored dinner in all her inappropriate panicking. By now, Sam had herself convinced that Cassie had never been at the mall, because what person in their right mind would be there, when she spotted her target.
Cassandra was sitting at one of the ugly plastic tables across the gallery, Chinese food spread before her. Across from her at the same table was a woman about Sam's age with short black hair. Sam couldn't see her face, but the stranger was holding Cassie's hand, and Cassie seemed like she was trying not to cry.
She gaped. Another woman was taking care of Cassandra, in Sam's place. A torrent of emotions ran through her. Shock. Anger. Fear. Concern. And under that, finally, aching sadness. Sam had thought she knew everything about that kid's life. Now, she felt left out.
Alone.
Where was Janet to explain what was going on, and tell her everything was going to be all right?
Sam crept inside Dr. Fraiser's bedroom with hesitation. She wasn't sure anymore that she was welcome.
She sat at the edge of the bed and looked down at the bedside table. Adoring the faux wood square was a framed photograph of Cassie at thirteen, a box of Kleenex, an alarm clock, a lamp, and a paperback. Sam glanced at the cover of the book. Unrevealing.
Sam took a deep breath and let it out slowly, but still her hand shook as she reached for the drawer handle. She was violating Janet's personal space, big time, and she whispered a prayer for forgiveness.
There in the drawer, just beneath the surface, was the black-haired woman. A stack of 4 x 6 photographs lay silently, immune to what their exposure meant. Sam pulled them out to flip through. First was a picture of the woman alone outside a coffee shop, no name on the back, then Cassie and the woman. Then Janet and the woman, and finally, the woman, Janet, and Cassandra all together, in a park.
Tears began to roll down Sam's face as she looked at the final shot, a family she didn't know. She realized she had met the woman before, but couldn't place where. She wasn't sure she wanted to think about it. She missed Janet even more in that moment of truth, wondering what it would have been like to know this dynamic, to have been a part of this family. Why had Janet never shared this side of her life with Sam?
"Sam?"
She futilely scrubbed at her face. "I didn't hear you come in."
Cassie came over and sat beside her on the bed. "You found Jamie." Her tone was flat and unsurprised, like she had been waiting for this moment.
Sam held up the picture. "Her?"
"Yeah."
"You're not mad?" Sam looked over at the girl. "That I--" Sam guiltily thought of her spying. "Found out?"
Cassie was slightly surprised. "No..." She shook her head. "It's a relief."
Sam nodded, and looked back at the picture she was holding. "Um..." She tried to find some words. "She looks nice."
"Yeah." Cassie agreed. She exhaled heavily, and then looked at Sam. It took her a few tries to get the words out. "She read about Mom in the paper." Cassie exhaled again. "There was no one to--to tell her."
Sam looked away from Cassie, and buried her face in her hands, feeling the shame of that. A long time passed before she looked up again, her face more composed and ready for the pursuit of knowledge. "How long have they..."
"Since before me," Cassie answered quickly. "Mom left her when I came along, but they met up again when I started high school. Casually. Like the movies and stuff. They didn't--." Cassie swallowed. "Janet knew this," she waved her hand at the empty home, "would happen eventually. She wanted Jamie and me to be prepared." She paused, as if giving a secret its due. "They used to have horrible fights."
Sam slipped her arm around Cassie, to encourage the teen to keep talking.
"Mom would come home hurt, or tired, or sad, and like, try and explain it away like a needle had slipped, or a patient was contagious, or something. Jamie never really believed her."
Cassie finished her confession, and leaned into Sam. The girl remained quiet, quivering slightly against Sam, and it was long minutes before Sam prompted her. "Is there something else?"
"Jamie wants me to live with her." Cassie said it in a rush, and then froze, on the cusp of something else. She didn't look at Sam.
Sam stayed perfectly still, turning pale with the effort not to scream. She waited for Cassandra to continue.
Cassie eventually found her voice again. "I think it would be a good idea. She wouldn't--"
Be killed.
Cassie shut her mouth tightly, and then Sam could do nothing but hold her tightly, and try to shelter her against the unceasing pain of loss.
"Major."
Sam looked up to see George Hammond standing in the doorway of her lab.
"General," she replied, giving him a faint smile.
"Can I see you in my office?"
"Sure." Sam looked at him curiously, but he offered no explanation as they walked down the hall. She settled herself into the visitor chair and he pushed a stack of papers toward her on his desk before he spoke again.
"Doctor Fraiser is up for the bronze star. I'd like you to handle the investigation."
Sam stared at him in disbelief. "Shouldn't an outside review officer do that?"
"Normally, yes." George folded his hands over his stomach. "But this is a top secret facility, and I think only someone at the SGC has a solid enough understanding of her work. Really, this is merely a formality." He looked at her.
"I can't, sir." Sam pushed the paperwork back toward him.
"Why not?" George looked surprised.
"Janet's gay."
George opened his mouth, looked at the papers, looked at Sam, closed his mouth, and cleared his throat. "Surely you knew...that I knew that, Major."
"You knew?" Sam's eyes widened. "I didn't..." She caught herself, and saw the concern and confusion on the General's face. "I didn't know. Until," she looked down, not willing to voice the event that brought them to this exchange. "Recently."
"What?!" George thundered. "I thought you two--" He stopped at the look on her face. "I mean, I thought you and she were close." When Sam looked at her hands and didn't speak, he continued rambling, trying to fill the suddenly empty space. "I assumed she'd never bring it up at work, but you two spent a lot of time together--" He was exasperated in his shock.
"It's the Air Force, sir." Sam's face was white with the struggle not to show her emotion.
"Major Carter."
Sam managed to look up at him.
General Hammond pushed the paperwork forward. "It's okay. You're the right person for this."
Sam took the papers and stood up, walking to the doorway. She'd go to her lab and collect herself. But a question nagged at her. She turned in the hall to look at him. "Sir," she exhaled. "If you knew--"
"Damn the regulations. She'd have rather been kicked out of the military than put our lives at risk by having a secret like that, that one of our enemies could use. Especially the mind-reading bastards. She told me in order to deal with the threat to national security, and I knew what steps to take if it ever came up. I didn't see a need for it to go any higher." Hammond looked steadily at her. "You might."
Several weeks later, Sam walked up to the front door of a house, in carefully pressed blues. She knew this would be better coming from some nameless officer, who would add formality and legitimacy to such a ceremony. Then this would be coming from the Air Force, not someone with a personal agenda. But the selfish side of Sam had wanted to own this moment, to form and hold this new link to her old friend.
She knocked at the door.
After a moment of shuffling, the black-haired woman answered the door. She looked at Sam with surprise, and after a moment, recognition and wariness.
"Jamie Alexander?"
Jamie nodded, watching her guardedly.
Sam offered to her a small polished ebony box. "It is my honor to present you with Major Janet Fraiser's bronze star."
Jamie took the box, and Sam saluted, then quickly turned to walk back to her car.
"Major, wait," came Jamie's voice behind her.
Sam turned around.
Jamie smiled at her, hesitantly. "Would you come in, and tell me about Dr. Fraiser's life?"
Sam sat next to Colonel Jack O'Neill on the top of the stairs leading down to the gate room. Every so often, an airman stepped through them en route to somewhere. When Sergeant Siler had clambered up the stairs, he had looked at them askance, but they had remained silent.
"A... billion for your thoughts?" Jack asked, bumping Sam's shoulder.
"I was wondering how many airmen are like Janet," Sam said quietly.
"There's no one like ole Doc Fraiser."
Sam chuckled, in spite of her mood. "That's not what I meant, sir."
"Hm." Jack glanced at her, and thought for a moment. "Lots, probably."
Sam ran her hand through her shaggy hair and sighed. "What can we do?"
Jack thought some more, chewing on his inner cheek. "Keep giving them medals, I suppose."
"Colonel..." Sam said warningly, and then turned to see his expression. He looked sad.
"Oh."
She sighed and wrapped her arms around her knees, missing Janet. Always.