A/N Hello! I meant to put an author's note last week but I was on the phone with my mom while I was posting and got distracted hahaha. I wanted to say how much I appreciate all of you for reading and reviewing! Also, I was wondering what y'all picture Onica looking like. I didn't write a lot of details about her appearance, just the fact that she's shorter and small. This was intentional because I wanted the readers to picture her in your own minds. I asked my friend, positivelythatredheadgirl that same question and she and I both pictured Onica differently. So, please tell me, what does she look like to you?

Chapter 13: Sam and Janet

"I can't believe she's so grown up now." Sam says as Cassie leaves the room to talk on the phone with her boyfriend, or not boyfriend according to Cassie, just a boy that she likes but won't admit that she likes.

The girl was only about 12 when they found her on Hanka, or PX8-987, as it's referred to by the SGC. Cassie was the sole survivor of her home planet after Nirti paid them a visit, she even tried to use Cassie to kill everyone at the SGC by planting a bomb inside her. Sam had been taken with the girl right away and the feeling was mutual. Cassie had been given permission to stay on earth and Sam had wanted to be the one to adopt her and was heartbroken when she realized that she wouldn't be able to, not unless she quit SG-1. Thankfully Janet Fraiser, Chief Medical Officer of the SGC, had taken on that responsibility. Her working hours were much more conducive to having a family, and Sam was off world too much in constant danger, so it wouldn't have been fair to the child.

They found Cassie in their first year at the SGC, which was 4 years ago now, the girl had a hard time at first, not surprising since she had literally lost everything and everyone she knew. In time however, Cassie adapted, which impressed Sam, and this girl has continued to show unexpected strength and determination.

At times Sam is still sad that she didn't get to be the girl's mother, but seeing her now, Sam knows that Janet was the right fit so she's happy to be the fun aunt. It doesn't seem like that long ago that they found Cassie alone on her home planet, and now here she is, 16 and into boys and will be graduating high school in the next couple years. It's hard for Sam to not think of Cassie as that small, scared little girl she was, but here she is now, not a little girl anymore, but a young woman.

"I know, she's really grown up a lot in the last couple of years," Janet agrees, pulling Sam out of her thoughts.

"I wonder when she'll finally admit she likes this boy." Sam says smiling and shaking her head, then adds, "It's so obvious."

"I seem to remember saying something similar to a young Air Force Captain a couple of years ago." Janet replies, looking pointedly at Sam, causing her to blush.

Janet laughs a little and thinks back to shortly after she met Sam, and how they had become instant friends, after all there weren't too many other women working at the SGC in positions of authority, most of the women on base were civilians.

Sam was the envy of all the women in every department though. She had the distinct privilege of being the only woman on the flagship team, with three of the best looking men in the facility. Though with that privilege, came rumors. Janet had always dismissed the rumors as nonsense, until Sam and Colonel O'Neill got stranded in Antarctica by some freak gate accident. Oh, Janet knew that Sam was close with the colonel, she was close with all her teammates, but after that incident, there was a subtle shift in Sam's relationship with Colonel O'Neill. Janet had asked Sam about it once, Sam, of course, denied that anything had changed. Janet decided to let it go but kept an eye on the two of them, not to catch them in a compromising position or anything, but to try and make sure her friend didn't do anything she would later regret. Plus at the time, any relationship between the two officers, outside the professional one, was forbidden by Air Force regulations.

Janet was always careful to not bring the subject up while at work, the last thing she wanted was to have someone eavesdrop and hear something they shouldn't. After a little while, and more than a little prodding, Sam finally admitted to having, what she described, as a small crush on Colonel O'Neill. She insisted that it was nothing and the matter was dropped. Then about 10 months ago, an incident occured and both Colonel O'Neill and Sam were forced to admit they had feelings for each other. Janet will never forget it, Colonel O'Neill didn't actually say the words 'I'm in love with her,' but it was definitely implied. When he said that he would rather have died himself than lose Sam, chills ran down Janet's whole body.

Teal'c was in the room when all of this had been said too, and he said that he was not surprised that Colonel O'Neill would have been willing to trade places with Sam. He would have been willing to do so for any member of his team stuck on the wrong side of a force field and on a Goa'uld ship that was about to explode. However this was different, the colonel could have escaped, in fact Sam had yelled at him to do just that.

Another incident occurred about 3 years ago in which Daniel Jackson had been severely wounded on a mission. He had been hit with several staff blast shots, there was no way he was going to survive, the colonel, however reluctantly, left Daniel at Daniel's urging. In the end it had all worked out and everyone had survived, but the colonel didn't stay to die with Daniel like he had been willing to do with Sam. The colonel has a rule that no one gets left behind if he can help it. He also has a rule that his team's safety comes first, and he gets as many of them home as he can. In the case with Daniel, Colonel O'Neill had made the best decision possible, there was no sense in allowing his entire team to die when he could get three out of four of them home safely.

In the case with Sam and the force field, Sam wasn't injured, just stuck on the wrong side of a force field, the colonel could have escaped, there was nothing stopping him. It's not even that he was distracted trying to disable the forcefield, he had tried, and failed to do that, there was literally nothing he could do for Sam. The best command decision would have been to save himself, lose one to save more. So when the colonel said that he would rather have died too, he wasn't saying that he would have traded places with her like Teal'c had thought. No, what the colonel was actually saying was that he would rather have died with Sam than go on living without her.

Just a couple months after that, SG-1 had been captured and forced to work in an underground factory with memory stamps, preventing them from remembering who they really were. Apparently things happened and things got said between the colonel and Sam that couldn't be undone, or unsaid. They both had a hard time trying to work together after that. Janet isn't sure exactly what happened but somehow or another, the regulations regarding interpersonal relationships were altered, and next thing she knew, Sam and the colonel were in a full fledged relationship. So much for it only being a small crush, Janet thinks wryly, though she couldn't be happier for her friends.

"That was different." Sam says, pulling Janet back to the present.

Janet laughs and says, "Oh yes, because you were never a girl who wouldn't admit to liking a boy."

"Shut up," Sam says chuckling, then adds, "That was different, Cassie is 16 and won't admit to liking a boy in her class."

"Oh yes, you were much different, you were 31 and wouldn't admit to liking a boy you worked with, but that sure seems to have changed." Janet retorts.

"Oh stop it." Sam says, blushing a deep shade of red.

Sam wants to be upset, especially after everything that's happened today, but Janet is about to fall out of her seat from laughing and Sam can't help herself and joins in. At some point the laughter turns into sobs, for Sam anyways, and Janet is at her friend's side rocking her as she cries. Janet rubs Sam's back and says soothing things but makes no move to end the embrace. She just holds Sam until she's ready to talk.

Finally, Sam lifts her head and looks Janet in the eyes and says, "I'm losing him Janet."

"Oh honey, why do you think that?" Janet asks, concern written on her face.

Sam closes her eyes in an effort to stop the tears and after a moment she starts speaking.

Janet sits there quietly and patiently as Sam tells the whole story. When Sam finishes, Janet tries to process everything, and keep straight who did what and when, it's all very confusing.

Janet decides not to ask questions to clarify things, that's not what Sam needs right now. No, right now Sam needs a friend and a listening ear. All Janet says is, "I'm sorry all of this has happened Sam, I mean, what are the odds?"

Sam laughs bitterly and says, "I shouldn't be surprised, after all, it always seems to be too much to ask that I get to be happy for any length of time."

"Sam, Jack loves you, I know that his ex fiancé being your sister-in-law is awkward, but that won't change how he feels about you." Janet reasons.

"He almost kissed her." Sam says softly.

Janet gasps, as she did not expect for Sam to say that. "Why would he do that?" she asks.

"He said it was her that tried to kiss him, but it takes two." Sam replies sadly, then adds, "And now Mark is demanding that I end things with him and I just don't know what to do, Janet."

Janet reaches over and takes Sam's hand in hers and asks, "You love him, don't you?"

Sam nods and Janet continues, "Talk to him, hear him out, let him explain his side of all of this."

Sam nods again and says, "He called me a little while ago, but I couldn't talk to him just yet, but you're right, I do need to talk to him." She sits back on the couch and lets out a long breath, then adds, "Tomorrow though. I can't deal with it today, I can't even go back to my house because she's there." Sam says rolling her eyes.

Janet nods in understanding, claps her hands as she stands and says, "Well, you can stay here for as long as you need. Why don't you help me figure something out for dinner."

Sam looks at her watch and is surprised when it reads 16:43 and she says, "Whoa, when did it get to be almost 5?" Then as an afterthought, she adds, "I missed lunch."