When All Else Fails
Chapter Twenty Nine
Disclaimer: Nah, not my show and (mostly) not my characters. Some of them are, as I have said many times. Fehr, Bridges, Craig, and Sanchez- for example.
A/N: I don't know Froggy, you'd probably have to take that up with Sam first!
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Fehr was permitted to leave the infirmary at 0900 hours the next morning, much to Sam's dismay. Now that the young Lieutenant was no longer confined to his hospital bed she was alone the in large room, with hours to go until Cassie dropped by after her bio-medical exam. On the bright side, though, was the fact that Doctor Brightman had informed herthat she would be able to leave later that afternoon, but on one condition. Either she stay with somebody who could care for her or Brightman sent a nurse home with Sam for a few days. Since the second option was not too appealing to her she had opted to stay at Jack's place. Daniel and Teal'c were on downtime until she got better, so while he was at work they could keep her company.
It was nearing 1030 hours before her first visitor of the day arrived. Jack came walking into the infirmary, looking fairly tired, and took up his regular spot by her bed. "I just got done talking with your father," he told her.
She looked towards the door, wondering if that meant Jacob was going to be the next to walk through it. "Is he on earth?"
Jack shook his head, "No- we used the radios."
"Oh," Sam was disappointed, she had been hoping to see her father. "What did you have to talk about?"
"A few different things," he replied. "Apparently, they got the snake out of Sanchez and he's going to finish his recovery on the Tok'ra home world until they send him back, since he's still a bit out of it. He hasn't been able to tell them very much about what happened, he remembers tricking you guys into the trap, but he's far too exhausted to do much of anything at this point. He'll tell us what he knows after he's had enough rest," Jack sighed. "And, we talked about Thoth..."
Pushing the lump in her throat back down Sam nodded, "He's alive, isn't he?"
"No," he assured her. "He's not. Teal'c zatted the sarcophagus before we left and nobody even knew what was going on, or that their god was dead. For awhile, at least. I'm sure they know now..."
Sam was relieved, she had thought for sure he was still alive. "I never said 'thank you', did I?" She reached out and took hold of her hand, "You saved my life, again. If you guys hadn't shown up..." she shook her head. "Thank you."
He leaned over and kissed her gently on the forehead, "Sam you don't have to thank me, Sam. I love you and would do anything for you, no matter what it is."
"I felt like a failure out there," she confessed, tightening the grip on his hand. "My first mission back and look what happens, my team gets captured. Then one man dies and I barely keep the same thing happening to my best friend."
"Yeah," Jack said. "Danny told me about that. Listen, Sam, there was nothing you could do about Craig. Do you remember when we were captured by Nirrti? She put Ivanov into that damn gene mutation thing and it ended up killing him, then she took you. Even though I told them to take me over and over again, they still took you. There was nothing that I could do about it then and there was nothing you could do about Craig." He gave her a reassuring smile, "Don't be so hard on yourself, this had nothing to do with you as a CO. It could have happened to anyone out there, it has happened to a lot of us, just on different planets and with different alines. Ok?"
She nodded, "Ok."
"Besides," he added. "Craig is in perfect health now."
Sam frowned, "It doesn't change the fact, for a while, he wasn't."
Jack nodded, "I know. It's never easy to loose somebody that you're responsible for," a flash of pain passed through his eyes and Sam inwardly cursed herself. Maybe he was talking about Military wise, but that didn't hide the fact that he had been responsible for his son, and couldn't save him, either. She reached out for him, pulling him into a rare hug.
"I wasn't even thinking, Jack," she whispered into his neck. "I'm so sorry."
He wrapped his arms around her carefully, doing his best to stay away from her shoulder, and allowed himself to be comforted along with her. "It's not your fault, Samantha."
Another shiver passed down her spine, if he would only do that more often! Any other person and she would hate the use of her full name, but when Jack said it, it was different, it was special. She wondered briefly if he would think the same if she called him Jonathan. Not likely, though, she knew he hated his first name.
After a few moments of comfort he pulled away, kissing her gently. "Better now?"
She nodded, "Did Dad say anything about dropping by for a few days?"
"He did. Although, he won't be able to come soon, some sort of hush hush Tok'ra mission." he snorted. "Imagine that."
An amused smile tugged at the corners of her mouth, and she reached out to cup the side of his face in her hand. "You have no idea how much you mean to me, Jack."
"I think I do," he said with a smile. "Almost as much as you mean to me."
Sam shook her head, "There's no way."
"Are you arguing with a superior officer?" he questioned, humor dancing in his eyes.
"It appears that way," she answered. "Yes."
He kissed her again, deep and passionately. Pulling away, he sighed, "God, I love you so much."
The grin on her face couldn't have been contained even if she had wanted it to be, "You're such a sap."
"You love it, though," he replied with a grin of his own. The type of grin that she knew he reserved for her and only her, the same one he had always reserved for her, even before she descended and they became a couple. His smile was one of the many things that made her fall in love with him in the first place.
"More that you will ever know," she pulled him back into a brief kiss. "Lay with me?" she asked, running her hands through his short, graying hair.
"You're tired?" he questioned. She didn't seem like she was sleepy to him, and she had gone to bed pretty early.
"Only a little bit, I have hours until Cassie gets here, though, and there's nothing else for me to do. I'm sure you need to get back to work, but it won't take me long to fall asleep, and then you can leave." She shrugged her shoulders, "That's only if you don't mind, of course."
A chuckle of amusement escaped his throat and sent chills down her spine. God, she loved it when he laughed. "Why would I mind?"
Sam shook her head, "I don't know. Maybe you had too much work to do..."
"Too much work that I can't spend some time with you?" He gave her a shocked look, "Never. Besides, I can do anything that I want to, remember? I am the General."
She rolled her eyes and grabbed hold of his shirt, pulling him closer to the bed. Taking the hint, he climbed in next to her, making sure not to hurt her shoulder, and snaked his arm around her waist. They were lying face to face and for a few minutes they stayed there looking at each other, before her eyes began to get heavy and started to close. He brushed a lock of hair away from her face and sighed in content. Oh yeah, this was where he belonged.
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Cassie walked into the infirmary around 1515 that afternoon, just after Daniel and Teal'c had arrived. The two men smiled when they saw the younger woman, and greeted her accordingly.
"Hello, Cassandra Fraiser," Teal'c said with a bow.
"Hey, T," Cassie replied. "Danny."
Daniel nodded, "Hey, how's school?"
"Or," Sam asked, "more importantly, how was the exam?"
The twenty one year old sighed, "Not too bad, I was a bit stressed. I'm sure I passed it with an A, at least a high B."
"How long can you stay until?" Sam questioned, scooting up in her bed so that Cassie could sit on the foot of it. When she did so Cassie took the space, laying her forearms on Sam's legs.
"I don't have work tonight, class doesn't start until 9 in the morning, and my roommate is having some kind of party tonight with her idiot friends, so the last thing I want to do is be there. I figured that I'd just stay here with you tonight, if you don't mind, which I know you'd enjoy the company."
"Well," Sam explained, "I get to leave today, and I have to stay at Jack's unless I want to have a twenty four hours nurse. Do you care to stay at his place? We'll probably have to order out food, because there's no telling what he has in his fridge."
Cassie grinned, "I'm sure we can manage. What time do you get to leave?"
"1600 hours," she said with a smug grin. "I should be getting out of here soon to get changed and ready to leave. Nurse Richards said she would be around at like thirty til to help me. Have you eaten anything in the last couple of hours?" she asked.
"Not since this morning, I've been busy with classes all day." She shrugged, "I'm not really hungry, though. Why?"
"Well, Daniel and Teal'c were talking about heading to the commissary in a few minutes, so I figured that while I was getting ready you could hang out with them."
She nodded, "I can always get something to drink, I guess."
A few minutes later a dark haired woman wearing bright, blue scrubs walked into the room, a smile on her face. "Are you ready to get out of here?" she questioned, as she helped Sam out of the bed, even though she didn't need it that much.
"Oh, yeah," Sam replied with a sigh. "Not that I don't enjoy the company."
"Sure," Richards said with a laugh. "Come on, let's go get you out of these clothes and into something a bit more... warm."
Nurse Richards and Sam left the infirmary, headed for the locker room, and Cassie, Teal'c, and Daniel started off towards the commissary. As they waited for the elevator they were joined back Jack, "Hey," he greeted. "Is Sam getting ready to leave?"
"Indeed," Teal'c replied.
"You want to come with us to get something to eat?" Cassie asked, knowing full well that whenever food was involved Jack was game.
"Why not?" he questioned. "How was your exam?"
The elevator doors opened and the four cluttered inside. A few floors later the doors opened again and they stepped out, headed for the commissary. As soon as they stepped inside a scowl formed on Jack's face, and of course Cassie noticed it, because she had seen the reason for the scowl just as he had. However, Cassie wasn't upset by it. Not at all.
"Calm down, Jack," she whispered. "He's cute, yeah... but I don't want a boyfriend."
The scowl lightened a bit, but he still looked suspicious. They got their food, well, at least Daniel and Teal'c did. Jack got a piece of cake and Cassie simply got a soda. They sat at a table, one that Jack picked, and Cassie couldn't help but grin when she noticed how far away it was from
the very thing that had caused him to scowl. She sat across from Jack, next to Daniel, in a spot that would allow her to look over Teal'c's shoulder at the Lieutenant, if she so chose. Not like she would, though...
"So, hey," Cassie said, as soon as everybody was seated. "I guess I'm staying with you tonight."
"Really?" he asked, "Why?"
"Well, so poor Sam doesn't have to suffer by being stuck all alone with you." She grinned, "Truthfully, my roommate is having a party and I really don't fee like being there when she does. I need my sleep, although she doesn't seem to. Her friends are all jerks, anyway."
The man nodded, "Well, I've got a guest bed ready and waiting... although, I haven't been shopping in a while."
Cassie laughed, shaking her head, "Sam said the same thing." From the corner of her eye she could see that he was looking at her, and for some reason her stomach flipped and she could feel butterflies flapping their wings. Why was she behaving like she had a school girl crush? She wasn't sixteen anymore, he was only a cute guy. Yeah, right, she told herself, they're never only cute. "We're just going to order out."
Jack hadn't noticed her internal musings, and he nodded at her statement. "That sounds good to me. Are you going to take Sam home at 1600?"
"You have to stay at work, right?" she asked. "So, yeah, I figured I would."
"Good," he nodded, looking over at Daniel and Teal'c. "And you two will be over there tomorrow when Cassie leaves?"
They both gave him a promising nod, "Don't worry, Jack, we'll be there."
Daniel started to talk about some kind of rubbings he had been working on and how amazing they were, which was something Cassie could care less about, so her eyes wandered past the Jaffa's shoulder, towards the table where Lieutenant Fehr was sitting with a man who looked like he was in his late twenties. They were laughing about something, empty plates sitting on the table in front of them. From the size of them she figured they were cake plates, much like the one that Jack was still eating off of.
Fehr looked over at her and her heart stopped momentarily. Although everything in her was telling her to look away she kept eye contact and even managed to smile at him. He returned the favor and nodded a hello to her, sending the butterflies in her stomach into a frenzy. After a few seconds she turned away, back to Daniel's story, and pretended to pay close attention. That's what Teal'c was doing, anyway, and Jack, well, his attention was focused completely on the cake in front of him. Not that Daniel expected anything less, he pretty much knew that he was talking to himself.
Some things never changed.
Cassie glanced towards Fehr again (had he even told her his first name yet? What was it... Mark? Or Matt?) and grinned when she caught him looking at her. So maybe some things never changed, that wasn't such a bad thing, depending on what those things were. She was beginning to find out that eventually, some things do change, and even though change is a scary and overwhelming thing, the results were definitely worth it. Or, at least, she hoped so.
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A/N:
So anyway, let me know what you think. More to come!
