There were three empty beer bottles on the coffee table and a fourth one half-full when Jack pulled out the laptop again. The letter appeared as soon as he logged in.
General,
If I'm gone and you'd like to read it, there's a letter behind Schrodinger.
It was truly an honor serving with you, sir.
S.C.
Behind Schrodinger. Jack stared at the words, the wheels in his head spinning furiously. Behind Schrodinger. She'd had a cat named that once, but the damn thing had died years before, and it wasn't like she'd kept his ashes on the mantle. Or at least Jack didn't think so. Maybe she had, and he'd never noticed.
Behind Schrodinger. Wherever that was, it had to be in her house. And whatever was in that letter, she hadn't wanted anyone else to find it. Which meant Jack had to. Stumbling toward the kitchen counter, he picked up the old rotary phone and called the airport.
~/~
Hank Landry stood just off the end of the ramp, watching the parade of wounded personnel come through the Stargate. A few limped with assistance, but most were on litters. And one of those litters held the woman he was looking for. "Welcome back, Colonel," he greeted as Daniel and Teal'c carried her down the ramp.
"Thank you, sir." Carter's voice was weak, her face edging on gray, but she offered him a smile.
"Has O'Neill been contacted?" Teal'c asked from his place at her feet.
"He's still not answering his phone, I'm afraid. Before long, he'll be learning about this miraculous recovery on the news like everyone else," Landry told them with a wry smile.
"Isn't he in Washington?" Carter murmured.
"Uh, he took some leave," Daniel supplied. And because they were surrounded by two dozen other people – mostly military – he didn't feel like going into why. "We can talk about it later."
She was too exhausted to argue. "Okay."
~/~
Jack pulled up to the curb in front of Carter's house and parked. He'd stopped directly in front of the gate, where her Volvo usually sat, and the memory made him nauseous. The sight of her house, her neatly clipped lawn – Daniel must have done that – only made it worse. He'd done his damnedest for two weeks to avoid anything that reminded him of her, his former team included. He'd even deleted her number from his phone. And now he was here. And it was so her. It took Jack a long moment to get out of his truck and step through the gate.
He still had a key to her house. There was no reason for that; they hadn't been teammates for more than a year. He'd moved more than halfway across the country, and she'd been engaged to another man. But she'd never asked for it back. And he'd never offered. Taking a deep breath, he stepped inside, pulled the door shut behind him, and stepped into the front room.
The weight of her – of being surrounded by her belongings and the house she'd so carefully curated – was almost crushing. It even smelled like her; the scent of the vanilla candles she loved so much gently wafted through the air even when they weren't lit. God, he missed her. He'd done everything he could to sidestep that fact, to avoid feeling it, but he couldn't run from it there.
Jack had a mission, though, and he couldn't fail. Steeling himself, he headed for the bookshelves in the corner and started searching.