Disclaimer: nope, not mine. although I wish I could say Jack O'Neill was mine. :(

Chapter Three – Plotting and Hoping

Sam headed down to the cafeteria for breakfast, grudgingly smiling to Daniel and Teal'c along the way. How could someone be so freaking happy at… Sam looked at her watch, …seven in the morning! She went over to get some suspicious-looking pancakes and poured syrup on them as she went over to the table that SG-1 usually sat at.

"Hey guys, how're you?" Sam asked with a sound of cheeriness that she didn't know she was capable of at the time.

"…Coffee…" was all that she managed to hear from Daniel, who was speaking not to her, but to his coffee cup.

Teal'c, however, ever the stoic and calm one, gave a more helpful response. "I am good, Major Carter. My Kel-No-Reem was very good last night. I was able to determine a conclusion to a minor difficulty I have been struggling with."

"That's… great, Teal'c." Sam smiled at him, questioningly. She had no idea what "minor difficulty" he was talking about, but she decided it couldn't be too important, because he hadn't told them about it.

It was at this point that Daniel looked up from his coffee cup, and looked to Sam. "God, Sam, you look horrible. Have you been sleeping well, lately?"

Sam blanched. She knew that Daniel would've been able to pick up on her issue, but she was half-hoping that he wouldn't. Instead, she took a breath and said, "Not really, too much time in the lab, I guess" she said half-heartedly.

Daniel gave her a look that clearly told her he wasn't buying it.

"Really," she said, but she knew that it didn't sound anything but a lie. "I really have to get better at lying…" she thought, but she had little time to mull over this as she had to get to her lab before the briefing. She excused herself quickly and got out of the mess hall faster than Daniel's record of drinking a cup of coffee (twenty seconds), which was a rather impressive feat.

Daniel looked to Teal'c, and in response, Teal'c raised his eyebrow.

"Do you suppose the marriage is bothering her that much?" Daniel asked Teal'c, but Teal'c's answer was relatively unhelpful:

"I do not know, DanielJackson. Perhaps asking Major Carter herself would be a wise in providing solution to your question."

"Sometimes," Daniel mused, "Teal'c really could do to be a bit more helpful…"

Sam ran to her lab after the briefing, (which had somehow managed to get delayed for four hours) looking for the solace that found in complex numbers, harsh reasoning, and cold logic. She entered and only groaned to have images of Jack flash through her mind. He would come looking for her, to bug her after she was okay. He'd never really admit to either of these things, but she knew that he felt it was necessary to make sure that she was okay. It was just their bond showing through, knowing that they would always count on one another because they just could.

"Not that he can anymore, you're marrying Pete." Sam scolded herself.

"Of course he can count on me! Besides, he was the one who told me to get a life!"

"Yeah, but you don't always follow the rules, do you?"

"Whose side are you on, anyway? Sam, you're supposed to be supporting yourself, not try to get rid of your fiancée whom you love a lot."

"Riiiiight. So Jack isn't anything at all."

"Oh shut up. Jack is the most amazing man ever. He's smart (although he doesn't readily admit it, he's ho—handsome, he's nice, he's sweet, he's generally all that I would ever want in—" Sam retorted to herself out loud.

"Oh shit," Sam muttered. "I am so screwed."

"Why?" Daniel said, standing in the threshold of Sam's lab.

"Daniel! How long have you been standing there?" Sam asked, feeling dread and the heat form in her cheeks and creep down towards her neck.

"Long enough to hear you say a few things that you should probably tell Jack…

He just went home, Sam; he accidentally got glass pieces in his hand and he suspiciously needs a new computer monitor. Anyway, you should probably see him, because, well… You need to explain a few things to him. Especially since—"

"Daniel, I think I'm okay. I was… just talking about how I could try to set him up with one of my friends!" Sam blanched though, because she didn't want that catastrophe to ever happen. "I need to see Pete anyway. I'd better go." Sam walked out of her lab, cursing herself for not closing the door, and went to go meet up with Pete to go out to dinner with him. God, tonight looked like it was going to suck.

However, in Sam's hurry, she had forgotten that she had left a scribble on her note pad saying that she had an appointment to meet up with Pete and go out to dinner with him the previous night to try to tell him that she wanted the engagement off. However, she couldn't work up enough courage, and so because that no one knew, she had forgotten. She had finally managed to work up enough courage after the briefing today to call Pete and asked to talk to him over diner tonight, but now she was questioning her resolve. Nevertheless, her notepad was left open on her desk table where she had been examining a new alien machine from a newly discovered world.

Daniel went over to it, curious to see about the new device that they had managed to obtain. As he read the recount of the prior night's events however, his eyes widened in surprise. "So she had already tried to tell him…" Daniel thought to himself.

Armed with this new knowledge, Daniel strode out of the room and went to find Teal'c, with whom he would hopefully be able to concoct a plan that would get Sam and Jack together that would get them to talk.

A/N: okay, so I'm in school now, so while I'm working on writing chapters, it's rather hard when you've got homework in an excelled college program thing. soooo, be patient, and if you feed me enough reviews, I will give you more chapters, my lovelies. ;)

Jax, xoxo