Jack. He was so pale, so still. No. It couldn't be.
"Sam!" Her Dad was hugging her now, a strong, comforting, needy embrace. His mouth grazed her ear. She melted into tears when she heard the whispered words, "He's alive."
Two weeks later
The lab at the Alpha site had been Sam and Jacob's home round the clock ever since they had accompanied the Tollan through the Gate to the secret outpost. They'd gated through to help with the rebuilding effort only two days after Jacob and Jack had been found and brought home.
Sam had kept a round-the-clock vigil at Jack's bedside in the infirmary when he and Jacob had first been rescued, refusing to leave even when her own eyes wouldn't stay open, so eventually Janet had quit harping at her and simply handed her a pillow and a blanket. Janet had operated to set the compound fracture in his leg as soon as he'd come through the infirmary doors, along with giving him a unit of blood to replace what he'd lost. But once he'd come out from under the anesthesia, Jack had been safely on the road to a full recovery.
In fact, now he was fine, other than being confined to bed with a broken leg.
Too fine. With the rest of his team offworld, he was already annoying Janet so much she had resorted to sending other nurses in to check on him in order to get herself some peace and quiet.
The Tollan and the Tok'Ra had turned out to be a good match, at least at this early stage. Tollan, T'auri and Tok'Ra scientists alike were all now involved in the unprecedented task of combining all three race's knowledge to come up with weapons to defeat the Goa'uld. The work proceeded with a sense of urgency, for all knew it was just a matter of time before another of their worlds would be threatened again.
A prototype weapon, using combined elements of all of their knowledge, was almost ready to be field-tested, and the scientists were rightfully proud of what they had accomplished in so short a time together.
Jacob had been making vague comments to Sam here and there while they had worked in the Alpha site labs. Sam had been confused at first, but she'd soon figured out that Jack and her Dad had 'talked.' Once she'd realized that, Sam had confronted her Dad and demanded that he just tell her what he was thinking once and for all. His response to that had pleasantly surprised her. She'd always assumed her Dad disapproved of her feelings for Jack, but he had actually encouraged her to pursue a relationship.
"Why now, Dad?" she'd asked. "Hand me that reverse wave amplifier, would you."
"Because you deserve to be loved the way I know he loves you."
Well.
That had shut her up for the better part of an hour while they'd labored side by side. She'd finally felt ready to probe some more.
"I think we're just about ready to shoot an energy beam through these circuits. Dad, how do you know Jack loves me like that?"
Her Dad had stopped what he was doing and gazed at his daughter with adoration.
"I just know. I can see it when you're together. I could tell from how he talked about you, down there in the tunnels. I can't believe I'm going to say this, but don't let this slip through your fingers, Sammie."
Sam had also worked with Narim almost every day since coming to the Alpha site with the other scientists, but their relationship was irretrievably altered in spite of Sam's assurances to him that all was forgiven. Narim was guarded, polite but nothing more. Sam was distant and formal, not wanting to encourage what could never be. They both knew the truth now, and the truth was that Sam's heart belonged to another.
And that had been true for a long, long time.
And as soon as her job of overseeing the planetary defense project at the Alpha site was over, Sam planned to act on that truth.
"Doc!"
Janet bit back a sigh of annoyance.
"Yes, Colonel?" She responded as sweetly as she could muster, yet again calling to him from her desk.
"Can you change the tape in the VCR? I've got this one memorized. Backwards."
"Believe it or not, Colonel, I am actually trying to get some work done," Janet pointed out patiently.
"Isn't part of your work taking care of your patients?"
Janet couldn't argue with that, so she dutifully changed the tape and then came over to sit next to Jack.
"So, wanna hear the latest gossip?" She asked resignedly.
"Sure."
"Geez, I was just joking. You really are bored."
"Heard anything from the Alpha site today?" Jack whined plaintively.
"You mean, have I heard anything from Sam? Yes, actually. She told Hammond last night, and then Hammond told me, that she and Narim have almost finished their modifications to the Alpha site's defense shields, or defense systems, or something. I didn't actually understand it completely."
"Yeah, well, join the club. Did she say when she's..."
"Coming home? Now," a familiar voice answered from the doorway. Jack's head jerked around, knowing what he'd find.
"Carter! Get over here! I've got a whole list of things I need you to do for me..."
"He's all yours," Janet breathed gratefully as she gave Sam a welcoming hug and changed places with her.
"So, what do you need from me?"
Jack turned to her with a completely self-indulgent smile on his lips.
"For starters, you can go get me some of my favorite VCR tapes from my house. My truck keys are in the warden's office. I'll give you a list of titles once you get me a pen and some paper. And there's a remote control car in my office that I'm in need of. Then, the warden-" he gestured with his thumb in the direction of Janet's office, "hasn't brought me any dessert today, and that's just not acceptable. I was thinking, cake, pie, chocolate fudge, maybe some...hey, Carter? What's up?"
His slightly ridiculous string of banter drew to a halt and he leaned closer to Sam's face, all traces of playfulness now vanished. Seated very closely to the head of his bed, she was staring at him so intently it made his heart twist in an odd way.
"Sam?" He started again, quietly waiting.
She shook her head, breaking the spell, and chuckled gently.
"It's just... I promised myself that if I ever saw your eyes again, I'd make sure I memorized everything about them. And when you were talking, I realized that this is the first time I've seen you, really seen you, since...since we gated to the poisonous Tollan planet."
She looked up again to find that he had inched closer to her while she'd been explaining herself. How had he gotten this close when he was flat on his back in bed with a broken leg? Maybe because she was moving inexorably closer to him at the same time that his face, his eyes, his lips, were advancing towards hers. It only took another second or two before his eyes were so close they blurred out of focus.
Now this was a known entity. Closing her eyes, Sam reached her hands out to his face and ran her fingertips over the familiar contours, 'seeing' him the way she had so many times during the short but terrifying weeks she'd been blind. Her touch on his face broke through the last of his mostly crumbled barriers and he deliberately closed the short distance between them until his mouth had completely captured hers.
"Jack," she whispered as soon as she could bring herself to end it. "We're in the infirmary." They both reluctantly pulled back.
"I don't care," he responded, yet unable to pull his hands away from her face and hair.
"I missed you," Sam murmured, her hands still delicately tracing his features.
"Me too," he agreed.
"When can you get out of here?" Sam pleaded.
"When hell freezes over," he replied glumly, looking in the direction of Janet's office.
Sam laughed helplessly, then fastened her gaze on him again.
"How long are you going to keep staring at me?" He asked her.
"Oh, until hell freezes over."
"Sweet."
The End.
A/N: I tried to keep going past this, but this fic just seems to end well here.
Once they kiss in my fic the fic's usually over.
Perhaps a sequel- this unknown Goa'uld is a persistent little evildoer who may attack Earth or the Alpha site out of a thirst for revenge. I'm guessing he will attack, because I really like writing disaster stories. (Stories about disasters, not stories that are disasters. I hope.)
In the words of O'Neill, We'll jump off that bridge when we come to it.
