"Let's take a walk, Jon. We've got a lot to talk about."

PART 13: GROWING UP

They'd gone about half a mile from the house, before Daniel started, "Your mother will never stop loving your dad." Daniel paused and walked besides Jon a bit further, waiting for a cue from the young boy before he continued.

"Then why doesn't she want to see him; why can't we go?"

"Jon, your mom and dad do some very exciting, very dangerous work for the military. Most of it is top secret. Do you know what that means?"

"I know Dad always says he can't talk about work and Mom won't let me listen to lots of her phone calls. They've told me that I'm still too young to know very much about what they do."

"Well, that's true. It also means that things happen to your parents at their job that couldn't happen where other parents work. So when your dad is hurt at work, lots of times he can't be helped at a regular hospital."

"He's going to die, Uncle Daniel, isn't he?" By now, Jon had stopped and turned to face Daniel. Jon was embarrassed to feel tears making their way down his cheeks and violently wiped them away.

"We don't know, Jon. None of us know what's going to happen and its making us all very sad. By the way, it's okay to cry."

"No, it's not! Dad wouldn't cry."

"Oh, yeah? I've seen your dad cry. He cries when he's really worried that you or your mom might be hurt. Of course, just like you he tries hard to be sure no one sees the tears.

Crying is just a normal way of expressing how sad you are. If you didn't cry right now, I'd be worried."

Daniel and Jon continued walking for nearly an hour that cool fall evening. Little else was said, yet Jon knew clearly that his Uncle Daniel would continue to walk with him, in any way he was needed, in the days ahead.

OoOoO

Back at the Jackson home, both Sam and Janet had just completed phone conversations with their children. Daniel had used his cell to ring Sam so Jon could let her know the walkers were on there way back; Janet had just been talking with Cassie.

Cassie had called Sam shortly after P3X-779 to express her support and tell her she was coming home to be with family. Tonight, she'd called Janet to say that her plane would be getting in early tomorrow morning. Rather than drive home and back, Sam decided the O'Neills would make the visit a sleepover and be around to welcome Cassie home in the morning.

This would be Cassie's first trip home in nearly 6 months, what with post-doctoral studies and the demands of her research fellowship. Sam regretted that the reunion had to be under these circumstances. Jack had always been a father figure for Cassie and Sam knew she was hurting too. She had to admit, as hard as it might be, Cassie belonged with family during this time and everyone would benefit from her presence.

Beth had been put to sleep an hour ago. The twins were in the next room with the Xbox and seemed to be having a good time deep in competition with each other. Daniel had returned with Jon and finally interested him in a computer game focused on Indiana Jones style archeological exploration (what else?). Janet and Sam, finally alone with each other and their thoughts, sat quietly in the living room.

All of a sudden, the sound of tiny feet on the stairway alerted Sam and Janet to the arrival of little Beth. Sam got up and walked over to the stairway. She scooped up her daughter and brought her over to Janet on the sofa. "Beth, I thought you were sleeping," Sam said with a slightly concerned tone.

"Bad dream, mommy," the little girl answered, her bottom lip quivering and her lids heavy with sleep. Beth remembered that her parents had told her the things she saw in her dreams weren't real. But she didn't actually understand why she would see them if they weren't real.

"Daddy went away. He's mad at me," Beth continued.

"Baby, why would Daddy be mad at you?" Sam asked, feeling an extra pang of regret at the thought that her daughter might believe she'd caused her father's absence.

"'member, I broke his yo-yo …"

At the mention of the yo-yo, Sam actually stifled a chuckle, recalling an incident a month ago where Jon had enlisted Beth's help in a practical joke directed at his older brother. Jon, using all his ingenuity, had planned to jury-rig a trap for his brother with a trip wire that would activate when Jake opened his bedroom door. Of course he needed a trip wire and put his younger sister up to getting one. Jon had decided the string from Jack's favorite yo-yo would be just the thing. Unfortunately for the plot, Daddy walked into the den with a pile of paperwork in his arms and just about fell over a certain little girl plopped in the middle of the floor pulling apart his yo-yo, much like she would an Oreo cookie. The trademark, "For crying out loud", was out of his mouth before the last of the papers hit the floor.

"Beth, Daddy wasn't really mad at you. He just let you know that it's not okay to break other people's things." Turning the little girl's face directly towards her own, she said gently and clearly, "Daddy isn't sick because of you, honey. In fact, I know that he'll do everything he can to get well faster just so that he can come home to his baby girl very soon."

Despite her mother's reassurances, this was yet another night that Beth ended up crawling into bed with her mother and not leaving her side till the morning.

OoOoOo

Two days later the 3 oldest children did return to school. It wasn't an easy adjustment for anyone. For Sam, it meant letting go of children who had, despite her intent to be their source of strength and comfort, quickly become her constants in a sea of turmoil. For the kids, it meant attempting to focus on peers and grades while they still didn't know their father's fate. Last but not least, for the teachers, the return of the O'Neill children meant the need to help those particular students, and their classmates, deal with the uncertainties of life. The reality was that at any moment, for any of them, the life they knew could be turned upside down; for the time being the O'Neills were reminders of that often forgotten fact.

Although it was clear from an early age that both Jake and Grace were academically gifted, Jack and Sam had opted to have them remain with their age mates and not skip ahead in grade. Jack had somewhat reluctantly accepted the idea of advanced placement classes, yet remained a bit fearful of his kids becoming unadulterated "egg heads". As he saw it, he could live with kids who were brilliant like their mother, but not unbearably pompous and socially maladjusted like some other scientists he'd come to detest over the years.

On this particular day both students were in the advanced placement chemistry lab for junior high students. Normally, Grace in particular, was especially adept at managing the intricacies of the basic lab set-up, but today, she was badly off her game. She'd managed to break 3 empty test tubes, knock over a classmate's book and just now she'd nearly lit a notebook on fire. That was the final straw and the instructor came over, clearly distraught about the near miss that could have injured at least one of her students.

Mrs. Scott, in her early 40s, was an experienced teacher. She'd prevented many mishaps in her lab by her vigilance and was disappointed in herself that she hadn't paid more attention to Grace's distractibility today. Like the other faculty, she'd been briefed about the "illness" in the O'Neill family, so when she called Grace to talk with her privately, she had some idea what was affecting her most promising student. While the teaching assistant took over the class and Jake watched with concern from the other side of the lab, Grace, her face downcast and color ashen, approached her favorite teacher, very embarrassed by her out of character clumsiness.

"Grace, are you alright?" Mrs. Scott began. "This isn't like you at all".

"I'm so sorry, Mrs. Scott. I can't concentrate at all; I just keep thinking about my dad. He's very sick in the hospital and I don't know if he is going to get better".

Although the teacher knew little of the situation, she did know Grace's parents were career military and involved in some top secret activities. To her credit, she was not one to hunt for information and simply encouraged Grace to express herself. Grace took the opportunity to vent her frustration and fear.

Nearly 20 minutes later, Grace and Mrs. Scott came out of the office. The assigned experiment had been completed by the class without further interruption. Jake was relieved to see his sister return with slightly more color to her face and immediately went over to her as the bell rang for the end of the period. Mrs. Scott used the break to phone Sam at the mountain and suggest that she come for the children today, rather than let them take the bus home.

OoOoOo

Sam had started a new daily routine to be sure that she was home to welcome the children when they came home from school. She planned to keep this up until Jack came home and things were back to normal.

She'd leave the SGC by 1500, pick up Beth at daycare and be home before Jon's bus pulled in at 1530. As scheduled, the twins usually pulled in a half hour later

But today, she'd gone directly to the school with Beth in tow after she'd received Mrs. Scott's call. Within 10 minutes, she'd collected Grace, Jake and Jon and started home.

The boys teased each other about something Sam didn't even begin to listen to and Beth sang a rather annoying nursery rhyme, all the way home. Grace sat silently, staring out the window, having ignored all of her mother's attempts at conversation since she'd first arrived at the school.

Once inside, Grace went directly to her room and slammed the door. Jake, Jon and Beth stared after their sister then continued on with their activities while Sam approached Grace's door and knocked.

"What?" came the very familiar response.

"Grace, it's your mother, I'd like to talk with you".

After a few moments Sam heard pounding feet coming across the bedroom floor. Grace opened the door a crack and went back to sit at her desk.

"What's wrong, Grace? Did something happen at school?"

"What's wrong? How can you ask what's wrong? Our family is falling apart, Dad is gone and you ask what's wrong! You expect us to go on like nothing's happened. How am I supposed to do that, Mom? How?"

Sam reeled from the verbal barrage unleashed by her daughter. "Are you done?" After a brief pause and a deep breath she continued, "Grace, yes, our family is hurting and we're worried and we miss your dad. We are not falling apart and I don't expect you to go on ….perfectly. But I do expect you to go on … and so would your father."

Receiving and expecting no answer at that point, Sam left quietly, gently closing the door behind her.

By the time 2000 hours rolled around, Grace had finally come downstairs, much to Sam's relief. Sam was in the kitchen, popping a second bag of microwave popcorn, the traditional snack for 'Simpsons watching'.

"I'm really sorry, Mom," she began, going over to Sam and wrapping her arms around her mother. Sam quickly returned the gesture, her eyes misting with tears.

"I know you are sweetheart. We're all in this together, you know that, right?" she said, fixing her daughter with a serious yet compassionate gaze.

"I know, Mom. I just can't stop thinking about where he might be, what he's doing".

"Neither can I, sweetheart. I think about your dad every minute of every day."

Grace saw the tears in her mother's eyes and realized afresh that she was not alone in her fears. She regretted that she had caused her mother more pain today and found herself with a bit more understanding of what her mom was trying to accomplish, holding on to some normal activities as they waited.

"Now, what do you say we join Beth and your brothers in the family room? It is Simpsons' night after all. You get the popcorn, Okay?"

"Okay, Mom; I'm coming".

OoOoOo

Just as Sam was getting ready to turn out the last light after a very long day, the door bell rang. It was George Hammond.

"General Hammond, it's good to see you, come in".

Stepping into the den quietly, so as not to wake the children, the man who was really "Uncle George" to Sam began, "I wanted to update you personally on what we know about the situation on P3X-779".

From the sad formal tone he used, Sam knew there was little to look forward to in this message and decided to focus on a social visit. "General, please make yourself comfortable, what can I get for you?"

"I'm fine, Sam. Just come sit with a tired old General, will you?"

"Tired, maybe, sir, but never old."

"You look tired, Sam. Have you been sleeping at all? And don't lie to me; I've known you since you were younger than Beth."

"It's been hard, but you know that. What news do you have, sir?"

"SG7 came back this morning. They made an extensive search of the area where the reconnaissance station had been located. There was nothing there, no sign that anything or anyone had ever been there. Sam, the last they'd heard from Homer and Garland was that the team had gone into an underground lab in search of the sarcophagus. After that, there's been no more news. They've done soundings where the compound would have been, but nothing."

"There must be some sort of energy field blocking transmissions, or a cloak…"

"That's what everyone at the SGC thought initially Sam, but what would have triggered it? Initially Homer and Garland gave pretty clear descriptions of a set of rings and a small reconnaissance station. Now the same area is totally empty".

"General, we'll need to send out another team, one equipped with more specialized sensors. I'm sure Thor could help us with that".

"Sam, that's a problem. We tried to contact the planet soon after SG7 came through. The Gate won't connect. We've tried to reach the Asgard, but there's been no response. The Daedelus is on its way back from Pegasus; I suspect they'll be ordered to swing by P3X-779 on the way home and take a look. I'm afraid that's the best we can do right now. To be honest we're not certain they're still on the planet. At this point, we have no choice but to declare them all missing in action.

Over the past few days, Sam had feared it might come to this. Each small piece of information about fruitless searches had added to the slowly rising panic. This was the next step, an official statement that they were missing. Her team had been missing before and they'd come back from worse situations, hadn't they?

Hope you are continuing to enjoy the story; I'm planning about 4 more chapters. Appreciate any and all reviews!