The next day, Sam hurried to the SGC, half an hour late for work. She huffed into Jack's office, Daniel in her arms as she reported in for work. "Sorry, sir." She said, her hair disheveled, without any make-up on and breakfast crumbs all over her civilian clothes.
"Toast?" He asked, barely looking up.
"Huh?"
He finished the paperwork he had been working on and looked at her, pointing at her civvies. "Did you have toast for breakfast?"
She looked down. "Oh my gosh! No."
She nearly dropped Daniel as she tried to brush the crumbs off of herself.
"So, what'd you have for breakfast?" He asked, casually as he walked over and took little Daniel from her.
"Pop-tarts." She mumbled.
"Carter, the health food junkie, ate POP-TARTS for breakfast?"
She looked up quickly. "Yes, sir, I ate pop-tarts for breakfast because I overslept. I overslept because Daniel woke up three times last night with nightmares or other needs. And, before we left, I had to changed Daniel's outfit twice after he had an overfilled diaper in the first and spilled his grape juice down the front of the second one.
Jack looked at her, plainly. "Is that all?"
She gave him a look that told him that it had been a bad day already and that she wasn't in the mood for his sarcasm.
"Well, good news: Thor's coming back."
Her face literally lit up with the news. "Are you serious?"
"Yep."
She kissed him. "That's great news!"
Jack looked stunned for a moment, but shook it off. "Yes…well, that's the good news. Here's the…not so good news. He's bringing the real Daniel with him."
She raised an eyebrow. "Then that's not…?"
"Nope. This is a failed clone."
"He's a…clone? As in…mini-Daniel?"
"Yeah. Apparently Daniel decided that my clone needed someone to discuss the top-secret stuff with, reminisce, etc. Anyway, he made the decision to have Thor make a copy of himself. I guess it didn't work the way he thought it would."
"What the hell was he thinking?" She blurted without thinking.
"Wha' da heh!" Daniel said, good-naturedly, clapping his hands.
Jack had to keep from chuckling at the timing of the little guy. Obviously he had always been…blessed with impeccable timing. Meanwhile, Sam just looked at the little guy. She started to cry.
Daniel just looked from Sam to Jack, and then, with a quivering lip, giant crocodile tears began to fall down his own cheeks. Just then, Thor and Daniel appeared in the briefing room, a young man in tow, looking a great deal like Daniel.
"Oh for cryin' out loud!" Jack said, looking out his office window and finding the sight that met his eyes. He patted Sam's shoulder. "I'll be right back. Gonna pass Daniel off to…Daniel."
She nodded, and Jack practically ran out the office and handed the crying infant to Daniel wordlessly and ran back to Sam. Poor Daniel just stared at his clone, and smiled self-consciously. He bounced the crying baby up and down, much like Sam had done when the clone had first entered the Gate room, but unfortunately for him, the baby just wailed louder and louder.
The little gray Asgard standing beside him looked up with wide eyes at the infant's behavior. Then, he slowly brought his hands up to his tiny ears. He didn't understand how such a tiny creature such as this baby could make so much noise as this.
When Jack walked into the office, he was instantly at Sam's side. "What's wrong?" He asked, so startled by the scene of Carter crying for no reason at all.
She wiped at her eyes with one of the tissues that she had gotten from the Kleenex box on his desk. "I'm sorry, sir. I'm just…this has been such a long day!"
"Carter, it's nine-thirty." He said, puzzled.
"I know." She said, sniffling. "But I feel like I've been working non-stop for three days. And quite frankly, I'm so tired that I'm crying."
"Ah." He said, though he really didn't understand this at all. He just attributed it to the difference between men and women and just patted her awkwardly on the back.
Several minutes later, after the fits of spontaneous crying had been taken care of, SG-1, Thor, Jack, and the two Daniel clones sat at the briefing table with Sam holding the youngest Daniel on her lap and the other clone sitting to the left of Daniel.
"So…Loki came upon our little project and hit a button, attempting to sabotage our work, but instead he stopped the aging of the clone and the downloading of my mind into the body. As he tried to get away before his mistake was noticed, he accidentally beamed the clone back onto the planet from whence I had come." Daniel said, concluding the telling of his story.
"Ah. So, your plans for Daniel, Jr. the first?" Jack asked, a smile on his face, indicating his pleasure at seeing the archaeologist fail to plan.
"Uh…I don't know really."
Thor sat, his arms on the armrests of the chair that he sat in. The humans had chairs that were three or four times his size, but as much as this could have bothered him, it didn't. "We can dispose of the clone in a way that would be humane."
Sam looked up from playing with the blond curls of the young clone. "NO!" She said, firmly.
"Colonel Carter, I assure you. He will not suffer at all. And…I do not share Loki's same feelings on the matter of clone research. We shall simply deposit him on a planet where there are others who can care for him. It is most probable that he shall be placed on Cimmeria with Garen's family. She has been asking for a child to call her own for some time now."
Sam looked at the child that sat, contentedly on her lap. Yes, the last day had been particularly draining, emotionally and hard on her sleep, but…she couldn't picture a life without the little guy.
"Thor, I'd like to adopt him. He could stay with me." She said, looking up at the alien.
"Are you certain, Colonel Carter?"
She nodded. "It's going to be a big adjustment, but…" she smiled at Jack. "It's worth it."
"O'Neill, will you grant Colonel Carter's request?" Thor asked, eyeing the General's proud look toward Sam.
"Huh?" He asked, turning back to the rest of the meeting after a few moments that only he and Sam had enjoyed the fullness of.
"Will you be granting Colonel Carter's request to become the mother of the clone?"
Jack nodded. "Yeah, sure. I'll talk to the President. And the minute he knows you're behind it, I'm sure he'll be happy to do whatever he can do to get it taken care of." Jack said, smiling.
Daniel looked between Sam and Jack. "Guys…did I miss something?"
"I believe that O'Neill and Colonel Carter have reached a mutual understanding of the events that have transpired between them over these last many years."
Daniel looked from Teal'c to the two blushing Air Force officers. Suddenly, Jack coughed to break the silence. "All right. Carter's taking the little Danny. Daniel's taking the bigger Daniel to see Jack, Jr., and Teal'c and I are just along for the ride." He paused. "Did I get everything?"
"I will stay within communication range for a few months to be certain that all the arrangements are satisfactory." Thor said with a great deal of precision.
"Great. Then, dismissed."
And with that, Thor beamed away, the two older Daniels walked toward the elevator to begin their journey to the high school that currently had Jonathan O'Neill enrolled as one of its students, Teal'c left to go to the mess for breakfast, and Jack, Sam and Daniel, Jr. stayed for a few moments.
"I guess I should name him something other than Daniel Jackson." Sam said, thoughtfully.
"Probably. That'd just be…"
"Weird." She agreed.
"So, what's his name?"
"Probably Jacob Daniel Carter." She said, shrugging.
He nodded, as if he was approving her choice. "You know your dad's going to try and have my head for this. Because somehow or another it's going to be my fault."
She shrugged. "Dad may be a little…impatient with you, but it's just because he knows you're smarter than you let on to be. It frustrates him that you find such pleasure in being sarcastic and…clueless." She said with a smile. "In a simple cliché, he just does it because he cares."
"So what now?" He asked.
She looked up from the little toddler she had on her lap. "I don't know, sir. From now on, I'm in unfamiliar territory."
"Maybe you'll let me help out from time to time." He said, nonchalantly.
"I'd like that." She said with a grin.