John Doe

Epilogue

XXXX

It had taken nearly twenty hours of labor, any many discussions on whether a cesarian suction would be the best thing to do, when the twins finally decided to make their presence known. There were screams of pain, lots of tears, and swearing on Sam's part, words of comfort, smiles of joy, and a fairly crushed hand for Jack's– but their first child was delivered beautiful, healthy, and female. Grace Lynne was born at 10:08 PM on the 21st of February. She was whisked away for cleaning before either one of her parents could really see what she looked like.

But, as Sam was coxed into another round of 'pop out the kid' as Jack had so lovingly referred to the birth process once. The General took her hand again, and she squeezed on it for dear life, leaning forward in the hospital bed, grunting as she pushed once more. A few dirty words slipped out of her mouth again, but it was as if she didn't notice, or care. A few minutes later there was another wail filling the air, and Jack grinned, because as they took Nathaniel Jacob to get cleaned, they handed him his first daughter.

She was incredibly small, the doctors said she only weighed three pounds, two and a half ounces. Her skin was still red, no surprise there, she had nearly no hair, but from the little she had, he knew she was going to take after her mother. Her eyes were a dark, piercing blue, that told him there was a good chance of a change in color. She was looking up at him with the same shock and awe dancing in her eyes that must have been in his. "Hello Gracie," he mumbled, as he took her hand to count her fingers and toes. All twenty were present, and amazingly small, and the strange look on his newborn daughter's face made him grin, "I'm Jack... you can call me daddy. But not pops, or anything like that," he told her. "Daddy will do fine."

Her lips curved slightly at the sound of his voice, and Jack was amazed that she had stopped crying. When had that happened?

A few seconds later, the nurse turned to them once more, holding a more vocal baby in her arms, "Mr and Mrs O'Neill," she told them with a wide grin, "meet your son." And she handed Nathaniel to Sam, who, although she had just gone through the processes of delivery twice, and once was enough to knock out Sara, sat up straight and wide-eyed, looking like she was ready to take on a nation of Jaffa. The tall, redheaded lady placed Nathan in her arms, and her expression softened, as she cooed to the boy, doing her best to make him feel comfortable enough to stop crying.

"Hush, little one," she murmured, "it's alright, Momma's here..."

Somehow that seemed to do the trick, because the wailing stopped. Sam looked over at her husband, shocked, but he only smiled and looked down at her daughter. She had fallen asleep in his arms. He watched her for a few minutes, giving Sam the opportunity to get to know their son, before they switched. And although Nathaniel was beginning to look as if he was going to do the same as his sister, Jack got a glimpse of bright blue eyes, much lighter than his sisters, and wisps of dark brown hair on his head.

Before either of them knew it, or even thought of it, they were surrounded by visitors. Sam 'shushed' them, since now both babies were asleep, and turned back to her daughter, wrapping her in the blanket the nurse had provided. Jack was doing the same, praying Nathaniel wouldn't wake up and begin crying again. He stood up from his chair, rocking the baby gently, and looked over at his father and law, then back at his wife.

"Dad," she said with a huge, amazing grin, "meet your grandson, Nathaniel Jacob O'Neill."

The man's face was priceless, a mixture of shock and honor passed through his eyes, as Jack placed his namesake in his arms. "You're serious?" he asked, looking between the happy parents, who nodded back at him, smiles growing as his appeared on his face. "That means... everything to me."

"Hopefully he'll learn a thing or two from his grandfather," Jack announced, placing a hand on the man's shoulders. "More than he learns from his father, that is."

At the same time, Sam was beckoning Cassie over to the bed she was lying in, and told her to sit down on it, so she could meet her god-daughter. Daniel and Teal'c were all crowded around Jacob and Jack, and Hammond– who she had no idea was even there– was lugging in huge masses of balloons and gift boxes, and the likes. With the help of many nurses, of course. "Cassandra," she said with a smile, "meet Grace Lynne." She was reluctant to let her daughter go so soon after meeting her, but it was only temporary, and Cassie needed this more than she did. Sam's biggest hope for the girl was that being so closely connected with Grace and Nathan would help her move on from the still recent death of her mother. Give her something new to focus her time on.

"She's beautiful," the younger girl breathed. "Perfect."

Sam nodded in agreement, "I think she looks like her father."

"It's a little soon to tell, don't you think?" the college student asked.

"Not when you've seen Jack's baby pictures. She really resembles him."

"What about Nathan?"

"I think he's pretty much a mixture of both of us, but probably more of my features than Jack's. He's got my eyes, I can tell you that much right now. He'll look very much like his grandfather, I'm sure."

"But not his grandmother?"

Sam shook her head, "No, my mother was beautiful, but she was shorter, thin, her hair was deep brown, almost black, and her eyes were the only thing I managed to inherent from her." She smiled and reached out, running her fingers across her daughters nearly bald head. "Can you believe I'm a mother now?"

"And I'm a god-mother."

"More of an aunt," she told her with a smile, "at least, that's what I'll have them call you... if it's alright with you of course."

Before Cassie could reply, there was the sound of somebody clearing their throat and all eyes turned to the head of the room, where the young girl's connected with Brad's. The cute nurse from earlier in the morning. "Sorry to interrupt," he told them, "but there's no way all of your flowers are going to fit in here, ma'am. What would you like us to do with them?"

Sam smiled, "Bring them to other patients," she said, "I don't really need them, but I would like the cards."

"Of course," he replied, smiling at Cassie before leaving the room. Daniel and the girl shared a knowing look, but they went right back to meeting their new family members, too wrapped up in the tiny bundles to care about anything else.

"Time to switch!" Jack called out, looking over at Sam with a lopsided grin. "I want Gracie to meet everyone, too, so she know's just how hard it's go on a date."

"That's at least fifteen years away Jack."

"Thirty." he replied, no traces of a joke in his voice.

Sam didn't even try and argue, there was no sense, they were just born ten minutes ago! "Whatever," she said with a smile, as Cassie handed Grace to Daniel, and Hammond handed Nathan to Cassie. The little boy opened his eyes briefly at the movement, but shut them again, far too tired to cry. Being born was hard work, after all.

XXXX

Three months later:

Sam woke up that morning, surprised to see light streaming in through the windows. Normally, she was waken to wails, and it was still pitch black outside, but that hadn't happened that day. Confused, she slipped out of bed, and quietly made her way through the house. If the twins were still asleep, then she definitely wasn't going to wake them. "Jack?" she called out, her voice barely above a whisper.

"In the kitchen!" he replied, not trying to be silent at all. She winced and waited for the first cry of attention, but heard none. This was strange...

"What's going on?" she asked, as she walked into the kitchen, to see him cooking breakfast.

"You're supposed to be asleep still, you know?"

"Jack," she said, having a feeling what this was about, "Mother's Day was yesterday," she reminded him, "today is Monday, the–"

He turned around and grinned, "Today is Monday, your birthday."

"I forgot..." she admitted, a sheepish smile playing at her lips, and her cheeks turning rosy.

"I thought you would." he replied, shutting off the oven and placing the bacon on a napkin. "Ok, so breakfast is now done."

"Where are the twins, Jack?"

"Jacob and Daniel took them out, trip to the park, then Daniel's for a nap and then they're coming right back here." Sam hadn't gone long without seeing them yet, she had just returned to work in mid-April, was still on light duty, and only working half days.

"So we've got the morning to ourselves?" she asked, a surprising grin creeping to her face.

"Yeah," he replied, "so I thought we'd have a nice–"

"Our first morning alone, without the twins, and you want to eat pancakes?" she asked, the grin growing larger.

"Well, what else–" he finally realized what she was implying, "Oh... Oh! I think I like your idea much better."

"I thought you would," she replied, bringing her arms around his neck and pulling him into a deep kiss.

XXXX

Two months later

General O'Neill stood in the control room, watching his watch with anticipation. They had five minutes to get back before he was sending SG-3 and 5 after them. And the Marines weren't very nice about going on rescue missions and finding a bunch of science nerds poking around in the dirt. Just as he was about to have Walter page the teams, the 'gate activated, and the shimmering blue liquid whoosed forward.

"It's SG-1, sir," Walter informed him, and after telling him to open the iris, Jack took off for the embarkation room. He greeted the three maned team with a wide grin, mostly because his wife was smiling sheepishly at him.

"You're late, Colonel Carter."

"Yes, sir," she replied, "sorry, sir."

"What happened?"

"Um... that's my fault, Jack..." Daniel confessed, "I got kind of caught up in the ruins..."

Yup, playing in the dirt, it was.

"Go to the infirmary and get checked up, briefing is at 1400 hours." Daniel and Teal'c walked off, but Sam stayed behind, and she and Jack left together. "So," he asked, "how was it?" It had been her first mission back, and even though SG-6 had gone to the planet three times before, he'd still been scared out of his mind. Not that he'd ever admit such.

"It was good. Daniel learned a lot. I took some samples."

"Good."

"How are the twins?" she'd been gone for a full twenty-four hours, and three minutes, and that was the longest she'd ever been away from them– not to mention thousands of light years away, of course.

"They're fine. Hanging out in the infirmary with all the nurses. You'd swear they'd never seen babies before."

"Well, a lot of them don't see kids that young often, Jack– mostly it's Daniel and Siler waltzing through there that need taking care of, not twin babies."

"Yeah, I guess. You wanna go see them? Nathan's learned to make spit bubbles."

"Oh joy. I wonder who taught him that..."

Grinning, Jack turned the corridor, taking his wife's hand in his own, "I bet it was Teal'c."

XXXX

A/N: So that's the epilogue. Story's officially over. I'm still thinking about the sequel thing, but if I do, it won't be anywhere near fifty-six chapters! And yeah, my next project is the sequel to When All Else Fails. Hopefully that'll be out soon. Let me know what you thought of it.