AN: Want to know what I hate? hate being this close to the end of a story. /i hope everyone had fun with Ernest and could hear him in your heads. He's a little Mac and a little Jack and all fun.

The only easy day was yesterday

Sam looked around the sleek interior of the Jumpship and all but salivated at the tech. "There's so much more room than it looks like there should be on the inside, sir." It was still slightly cramped with nine people inside however so Sara stayed at the controls with Ray who looked a bit worse for the wear.

"Buckle up, people. The next stop is 2001." Sara announced.

"You guys got some kind of cloaking device on this thing?" Jack asked.

"Of course." Ray told him. "Time jumping tech too so we don't have to dock with the Waverider to get home."

"There's a bigger ship?" Sam asked, her eye lighting up.

"Not only is there a bigger ship… your math models based on Lantian tech you guys find in a few years are the basis for the tech we use now." Ray confirms.

"Huh… it does look like a mini Prometheus." Daniel agreed.

"Indeed it does, Daniel Jackson." Teal'c agreed.

Only Jack was quiet. Seemingly unnoticed by his team, that he was quietly fingering the brim of his hat, a motion that he always had ever since he was a child, lost in his own thoughts.

While Sam excitedly asked Ray and Sara questions about the ship, Mick watches O'Neill with narrowed eyes. Here sits a man who'd like to go right back to where he was before and pretend none of this ever happened, Mick thought. He glances at Sam who Jack is studiously avoiding looking at. She's chattering; she's so excited. Mick observes a flash of pain on O'Neill's face and then it's gone. Had he not been looking he might not have even noticed.

"Sir, should we try to set down at Peterson or Cheyenne?" Sam asks Jack.

Jack thinks a long moment. "Someone is liable to try to shoot at us either way but the detail outside Cheyenne should at least recognize us on sight."

"You sure about that, Jack?" Daniel, who was still in a brushed velvet suit, asked him. Teal'c was dressed in an ornate dress shirt with bolo tie and Sam was in the pale blue morning suit she had picked out that would have been her wedding dress in a few months had things turned out differently.

Jack shrugged. "Our hair is a bit longer except the big guy but yah."

Daniel nods slowly in understanding. It probably isn't about the base. It's that the sooner they are home… the sooner Jack can escape his feelings away from Sam and most likely in the bottom of a bottle or two.

"All right, Cheyenne it is." Sara says agreeably.

When Ray starts answering some of Sam's more detailed questions because he's easily influenced by big blue eyes and dimples Sara kicked his shin.

"What?"

"How is she supposed to learn it herself if you just tell her?" Sara asks pointedly.

"Oh… oh right. Sorry Sam." Ray says abashedly.

"It's all right, Mr. Palmer. Usually no one will tell us anything." She says with a dimpled smile.

"Carter…" Jack warns tiredly.

"Sorry sir." Sam says and frowns a little. Wondering what's up with his attitude. Didn't he want to go home?

"Jack, couldn't we just have them drop us off at your house and then go to the base?" Daniel asks.

"How are we going to get there, Danny? My truck is at the base parking lot as is your car… Carter's car…" Jack pointed out.

"We could call the motorpool." Daniel suggests.

"Daniel Jackson, if we are meant to be on P78-548 would we not attract the military police rather than a motor pool vehicle?" Teal'c pointed out.

"Huh… I uh, I guess I didn't think of that. There really isn't any discreet way to do this is there?"

"No, and I don't want the CIA trashing my house and digging through my vintage magazines." Jack groused. Said magazines involved scantily clad women and his entire team knew it. Daniel had teased him more than once that the pages tended to open to the leggy blonds. He'd held back in the 1880s because Sam's depo shots were no longer in her system and he hadn't been kidding about not trusting nineteenth century prophylactics. He'd willingly go to his perdition if he knew she was protected. The issues they had on their trip were entirely due to suddenly being faced with being allowed to have exactly what they knew deep down they wanted… A life together. Some people might say what was going on cheapened them both but sacrificing themselves on the sword of regulations and still being desperately in love was just stupidity. Many couples in the military remained discreet until their assignment ended. This one was just running longer than average. But he needed to get his emotions under control or he was going to make a fool of himself and worse… trash her career. He couldn't do that to her. They would need to talk after they got back.

"Sir… returning to the SGC isn't going to go well either. Is this craft space worthy?" She asked Sara.

"It's going to be uncomfortable with this many of us and we should probably make a pit stop first but yah. Yah it is…"

"What have you got in mind, Carter?" Jack asked her.

"What about the Alpha site, sir?"

"Carter, the location of the Alpha Site is classified." Jack reminded her.

Ray turned to the hold. "Ah, Colonel, I can let her punch in the coordinates than erase them when we get there." He suggested.

Sara nodded.

Jack thought for a few moments. "All right but no one is going to believe us if we just show up a few minutes after we left. Can you take us there a couple days later?" Jack asked. They had a twenty four hour check point that would raise alarms if they didn't hit their dial in time by thirty six hours. At that point, Hammond would dial P78-548 and run the video from the MALP and see they never got there. But Carter was right, if they came back through a few hours late from the Alpha site, their story would be considerably easier to explain and they would be less likely to be shot at too.

"We were already going to return you to your own time. Got a convenience store on the edge of town?" Sara asked.

"I know just the one." Jack said with a grin. "Carter, you're going to have to lose the dress." There was literally nowhere to be even remotely private in the ship.

"I'll just stay onboard, sir." She said blushing.

Ava gave her a sympathetic look and patted her hand. "I can hold it if you can." She said which made Sam give her an amused smile.

They landed still cloaked out of visual range of the gas station and those in clothing that could look slightly normal piled out. Ava, Gary and Sam stayed in the ship.

"We could have just told the attendant, we're LARPers." Sara said.

"What is a LARPer?" Teal'c asked.

Jack snorted in amusement while Daniel explained live action role play.

Half an hour later they returned to the ship with snacks paid for with money generated on the Jumpship's mini molecular generator. Jack noticeably relaxed separated from Sam then tensed up slightly once he was in her presence. It was obvious to everyone but him that he was afraid of saying the wrong thing to her. Jack opted for his standard fall back. Cracking jokes. "Got yah a wiener, Carter."

"Thank you, sir." She said and smiled brightly at him.

"Oh! And animal crackers… and a diet Coke." He said triumphantly as he produced the can which made her laugh.

"That was very sweet of you, sir." She told him and took the proffered snacks. Their hands brushed when he handed her the hotdog and they looked at each other sadly.

Everyone else politely looked away. It was such a clearly private moment between the two.

"All right, people, if you all have your snacks, let's get going." Sara announced.

"Shotgun!" Jack yelled and bounced up to go sit by Ray.

"Ah… Sir… won't I need to enter the coordinates first?"

"Of course. I was just warming the seat for you." Jack said with an innocent frown. "Want me to hold your wiener?"

"I'm not sure I trust you with my wiener, sir." She teased him which made Mick crack up.

"What? That's a great joke." He said when everyone gave him the shut up look.

Nate looked the worst for the wear and passed out against a bulkhead.

"Drank Old man Steele's moonshine, huh?" Jack asked Daniel.

"A very small woman tried to warn him not to." Gary piped up.

"Oh that would be Zorelda. She's a family legend." Jack supplied.

"You can have your seat back, sir." Sam called back to Jack after she typed in the coordinates for Alpha site.

"All right… let's get this underway. I'd like to get you guys home before Mick is a grandfather." Sara said.

Mick glowered. His daughter was something of a sore point right now.

They set down well outside Alpha site. "All right… everybody out." Sara ordered.

"I have to pee so bad." Ava admitted as Ray helped her up.

They stood in the grassy meadow about a mile from the base. "It's been a pleasure, folks. I'm technically supposed to wipe your memories but all of you deal with classified stuff all the time so I'm going to trust all four of you to keep quiet?" Sara says archly.

Jack nods

"Of course." Sam says.

"Indeed." Teal'c agreed.

"Yah, yah we'll keep quiet." Daniel mutters.

"We have to tell them how we got home but exactly who doesn't need to go into our official reports, Captain Lance. Thank you for getting us home." Jack finally said.

"You're welcome. Sorry it took us so long to extract you. There were apparently some things some of you needed to do historically before we could come get you." Sara admitted.

Jack gave her an exasperated look. "We figured." He admitted.

"Well. This has been fun but I'd like to get home and scrub off three weeks of old west funk." Mick told Sara and headed back for the ship.

"Not very chatty, is he?" Daniel noted.

"Nah. We have Gary for that." Sara told them. And for reasons she wasn't sure why she hugged Sam and then Jack fondly. While she hugged Jack, she whispered something to him that made him smile just a little. "Everyone not from 2001 back in the Jump ship." She ordered and dragged Ava along with her who was waving goodbye enthusiastically to SG-1.

"I really liked them." Ray observed. "I wonder how things turn out with those two?"

"Well now that they can't hear us, let me fill you in." Mick said as he plopped down on a seat towards the front.

The ship flew away and SG-1 waved them off.

"Well, Carter? Ready to go explain why Daniel is dressed like an extra for Seven Brides for Seven Brothers[1]?" Jack asked her as he put out his elbow for her.

Sam laughed. "First, I need to pee. I'll be right back." She says and heads for a shrub.

"Sir, there is a group of four humans walking towards the base." Airman Spicer said to Colonel Lou Ferretti who was acting commander of Alpha base this month. The SGC was still rotating out team leaders rather than stick any one commander with an offworld base assignment permanently.

"Anyone we know, Spicer?" Ferretti asked him.

"Sir…. I… It's SG-1, sir!"

"What? No! What are they doing here and why didn't they use the gate?" He asked himself, stymied.

"No idea, sir, but they seem to be dressed like… well like extras in a western, sir."

"Wah… what?!" Lou decided the kid was yanking his chain and put his hand out for the binoculars. Sure enough though marching though the tall grassy field were Dr. Jackson, Major Carter, Teal'c and Jack…. And what was going on with Jack's hair that was beyond no longer regulation long. This was a story he needed to hear.

"Welcome back, SG-1. Please hit the infirmary then a briefing in two hours." Hammond told them. The team had returned in borrowed BDUs that didn't fit any of them quite right after confirming biometrically that they were, in fact, SG-1, their western clothes in bags with the exception of Jack's hat which was currently perched on Teal's head. The only other thing they brought back were their zats which had remained hidden at almost all times and grabbed on their way out.

"Glad to be home, sir. Can I keep the hair?" Jack asked and ran his hand though his foppish locks that made him look like Sam Elliot without the mustache.

"No Jack, you may not." Hammond said with a chuckle.

"Nuts…" Jack grumbled but there was a twinkle in his eyes when he said it.

Two hours later, SG-1 sat in the briefing room with Hammond, the door closed. They gave him a full accounting of their misadventure.

"Major Carter, I'd like you to fix the gate programming ASAP." George told Sam.

"Yes sir." She agreed.

"Eight months. And you say you ran into your great-grandparents, Jack?"

"And his great-great-grandparents and one of the people he was named for." Daniel added in.

"Did your rescuers say why the specifically traveled back in time to rescue you?"

Before Sam could tell George anything private, Jack piped up. "Yes sir. According to Captain Lance and her crew, our absence would allow a hostile Goa'uld foothold on Earth."

Daniel nods. "So we have at least another attack coming."

"Did they say when?"

"We were not made privy to that information, General Hammond." Teal'c told him.

George sighed. "Well… all right. Sounds like you folks have earned a couple days down time. I expect your reports on my desk by Monday."

In unison, Jack and Sam said "Yes sir."

Both Teal'c and Daniel nodded in agreement.

"All of you go get some much needed rest." George told them by way of dismissal.

Everyone shuffled out. George was very tempted to call back O'Neill and Carter and ask them if they needed to tell him anything but he decided if he didn't know he could deny all knowledge of the sad expressions on both their faces as though they had their world yanked out from under them. George frowned thoughtfully. He was owed some favors. Perhaps when the situation with the Goa'uld was handled he could call some of them in so they didn't spend their lives pretending they were just good friends in public.

[1] This joke brought to you by RDA having played a roll in the TV series. Like Legend it only lasted a year but it needed a nod. lol