A/N: Wow! So everyone is rooting for the underdog here, the little spitfire. It's all go Sam go and kick his ass! I guess no one wants to vote for the winning team here, and be on the side of poor Teal'c here? Does no one want to see me have Teal'c suspend little Sam by her ankles and mop the floor with her face and blond hair? Now that would be fun… Oh well… guess you'll just have to read on to see how the fight turns out! And there's only one way I could have ended it. Teal'c is after all four years older, and much bigger than our little Sam, righteousness aside!
Chapter 11: A Little FightHe'd only left them alone for five minutes, but when he'd returned, the sounds issuing forth from the room had the unmistakable ring of a scuffle in full blown, no-holds-barred, fist flying glory. Jack wasted no time in slamming the door open. The scene stopped him in his tracks.
The room's single table was overturned; the food it had held was everywhere. The four chairs in the room had been scattered. And in the center of the room, one small, blond haired, pale skinned fury and one taller, lanky, dark skinned youth twisted and fought, kicking, biting, and landing blows on each other with furious abandon. He didn't see Daniel for a moment, then spotted him, cowering in the far corner, arms wrapped around skinny knees tucked under his chin, glasses askew, eyes locked on the struggling combatants. None of the children even noticed his noisy entrance.
Sucking in a deep lungful of air, and belting out in his best military command voice, the one that sent raw recruits tripping over themselves, he shouted, "And just what the hell is going on in here!"
That got their attention. Three sets of eyes looked up at him, the two combatants locked in a pose that was almost comical. Teal'c had a handful of Sam's hair while Sam looked like she was prepared to take a bite out of Teal'c's free right hand. Jack surged forward, hauling both children roughly to their feet by their upper arms, putting his body in the middle, giving them a little shake. He ignored Daniel for now. He gave them each a glare, while assessing them for damage. "What is the meaning of this? I wasn't even gone five minutes, can't I even trust the three of you that long?" He punctuated his words with another little shake.
They squirmed, and started to talk at once, but he silenced them with a look. They were a mess. The food they had knocked all over now liberally covered their clothing for starters, and they had done quite a bit of damage to each other. Sam's left eye was already starting to swell spectacularly, and her nose was bleeding freely. But despite her small size, she'd managed to hold her own on the larger boy, since he noted Teal'c sported a split lip and bruised cheek of his own. He frowned in concern at Sam's bloody nose.
Letting go of their arms, he quickly righted two of the chairs, and placed them in opposite corners. He pushed Sam into one, and Teal'c into the other. "Stay there, and don't move until I tell you to, both of you." He gave them both one last glare before ducking into the small bathroom and grabbing two washcloths, which he ran under the coldest water he could get on the tap. Returning to the room, he was pleased to note the two had followed one of his orders at least, though he noted that Daniel had inched closer to Sam's position, giving him a hint about what the fight had been over.
He pushed one of the washcloths at Teal'c. The boy looked confused. "Put it on your lip." Teal'c blinked, and nodded, wincing slightly as the cold cloth came in contact with the open split, then returned to sitting stoically. Some things never changed.
He turned his attention back to Sam. She was seated defiantly, arms crossed. Somehow, he doubted he'd be getting any information out of the two of them anytime soon, so he settled for stemming blood loss. Before she could fend him off, he pressed the cold washcloth to her face, effectively pinching her nose, and bringing up his other hand to tilt her head and hold it still. As he'd expected, she protested, her startled yelp muffled under the cloth, but he was much bigger and stronger than she was now, and a lot angrier, so he easily deflected her small hands. "Shh, hold still," he told her, "We need to stop the bleeding." She mumbled something in reply, but he couldn't make out what she said under the cloth, but she stopped fighting him at least.
After a few minutes of steady pressure, he lifted the cloth away to note with satisfaction that the steady bleeding had slowed to the barest trickle. Now for the hard part. "Sam, I just have to touch your nose now, make sure its not broken ok, it might hurt some." Her eyes widened, but she nodded. She squirmed under his touch, his fingers gentle, and he frowned as his fingers encountered an area that might have a little bit of give. He sighed. "I think we need to go see Dr. Fraiser, I'm not sure if it's broken or not."
Across the room, Teal'c looked mortified. "I-I did not mean to hurt her." He was staring at the floor, and shifting awkwardly.
Jack's gaze softened. "We'll talk about this later. I'm still really disappointed in all of you. There's no excuse for fighting." Teal'c looked up and met his gaze, nodding, but his eyes were sad. Jack looked at Daniel's worried face, and Sam's scared one, gently squeezing her shoulder. "I need to take Sam to the infirmary. While we're gone, I expect the two of you to behave yourselves. And start cleaning this place up, you made this mess, don't expect someone else to clean it up for you." With that, he pulled Sam to her feet and steered the reluctant little girl from the room, leaving two just as reluctant young boys in the room behind him.
AsLongAsWeGotEachOther,WeCanTakeAnythingThatComesOurWayArriving in the infirmary, Jack effortlessly lifted the little girl onto one of the beds, surprised when he heard her sniffling. She was staring down at her lap, refusing to meet his gaze. Gently, he tipped her chin up and looked at her face. Tears rolled down her bruised cheeks, and snot now mixed with the blood in her nose, making her quite a sight. "What's wrong Sam?"
"I'm s-sorry C-colonel Jack. I d-didn't mean t-to get in a f-fight with T-teal'c. It's just… just, he was p-picking on D-danny, he s-said Danny was w-weak and n-needed to d-defend himself, and s-started pushing him, and-and Danny didn't like it. S-so I s-said s-stop…" Her words tumbled out punctuated by sobs, and all he could do was stare at the little spitfire before him. "A-and I-I'm s-sorry C-colonel Jack, if-if you want t-to send me away, I, I understand."
Jack was momentarily struck speechless. Realization hit him like the blind side of a truck. Deftly, he caught her chin again, forcing her to look at him. "Did Teal'c tell you that?" Wordlessly, she nodded, and Jack sighed, resigning himself to a long and private talk with the young boy. "Sam, no matter what you do, you can never do anything to make me want to send you away. I care about you. You, and Danny, and even Teal'c. We're like family, all of us, and family takes care of each other. Do you understand?"
She stared at him, and he could see the emotions on her face, that she wanted to believe. She was thinking, hard. Frowning, she seemed to recall something. Briefly, she looked back down at her lap before meeting his gaze again. "Even if, even if I took apart your X-box?"
He blinked. "You took apart my X-box?" Noticing the fear on her face, he sighed, and hastily reassured her. "Even if you took apart my X-box. You're stuck with me kid." He reached out and ruffled her hair, grinning. She grinned back hesitantly, looking quite rakish with her black eye and swelling nose. Impulsively, he hugged her, smiling when he felt skinny arms circling around his neck.
"I'm sorry about your X-box Colonel Jack," she whispered, her words muffled into his chest.
"Yeah? Well, me too." He received a giggle in reply, and pulled away. "Okay, lets go see if we can find a doctor around here."
As if on cue, the curtain pulled back, and Janet Fraiser stepped into view. "I thought I heard voices! Oh my! What happened?"
"Doc! I was just about to come looking for you! I'd say you should see the other guy, but unfortunately, this one is the other guy." Jack cocked his head towards Sam, who was now staring at her hands and fidgeting again. Janet didn't waste any time in moving in on her small patient. "I can't tell if her nose is broken or not," Jack continued, "I thought I'd better let you check her out. Teal'c is fine, just a split lip and a few bruises."
Janet shot him a look, and turned back to her exploration of Sam's face, and Sam was squirming under her touch. "It's okay sweetie, I just need to check your nose. Try to hold still for me, okay?"
When she was done, she looked up at the Colonel. "I don't think it's broken, I'm more worried about her cheek, but I think we'll get an x-ray in either case just to be safe. I'll give her some Tylenol for any headache and pain and have her keep ice on it tonight for swelling, she's going to have quite a shiner."
Jack look relieved. "Thanks Doc. Listen, how much longer will this take? It's just that I left Danny and Teal'c alone, and well…" He trailed off with a significant look in Sam's direction.
Blinking, Janet understood immediately. "Probably about another half an hour, and I can keep an eye on her longer if you need it. Go. I'd rather not have to treat them too."
"Thanks a million Doc, you're a lifesaver." Jack beamed at her.
"Saving lives. That's what I do." Janet made a few notes in Sam's chart, hiding a smile over Jack's antics. Even at half size, SG-1 still seemed to manage to get in twice as much trouble as usual.
"Sam, you gonna be ok with Doctor Janet?" When Sam nodded, he ruffled her hair again. "You behave, and you do what the Doc tells you to do. And no taking apart anything else."
Raising her eyebrows at the last statement, Doctor Janet Fraiser watched Colonel Jack O'Neill leave, and turned to regard the small child sitting on her infirmary bed, clearly wondering if she should be worried or not.
A/N: Line break created with lyrics from, "As Long As We Got Each Other," the theme from the mid 80's TV series, "Growing Pains." Lyrics by John Bettis, Music by Steve Dorff and the song was sung by B.J. Thomas and Jennifer Warnes.
A/N: This chapter was where I originally started to write this story, the scene that started it all! I kinda got this picture of little spitfire Sam taking on much older and bigger Teal'c for some reason, and wrote out the fight scene and the infirmary scene and talks, and it wasn't until some time after that I wrote out the actual reason for the fight and the beginning of the fight, which actually turned out to be a lot of fun too! So now you can see where this story started, and I hope you enjoy it as much as I have. Of course, there's still a lot of story after this!