3
She had only just got back to her lab when she received a call asking if she fancied a trip to Abydos and she went to gear up.
She spent the rest of the evening after they got back helping Daniel to cope with what had happened on the planet, he was already regretting leaving the child with Kasuf, but as she told him, he would not be able to search for Sha're if he was looking after a newborn. He agreed eventually and she realised as she walked away that she had managed to forget her own problems for a short while.
The next afternoon she was once more called into the Generals office, he had been contacted by Bollinger, the head man at NASA asking if it was likely that she would be applying within the next few months as he had an opening that she was exactly the correct person to fill, he had been lead to understand that George had been 'in the loop' and that he had even encouraged her in her ambitions, she rushed to assure him that she had no intention of leaving.
She cursed her father silently as she stood to attention, the General asked if everything was OK with her work… the team… he even asked after her personal life! In the end she cracked and told her fathers oldest friend about him putting pressure on her to transfer, and about the cancer. It turned out he already knew about the illness, in fact he had known before she did! She cursed some more under her breath, asking to be dismissed. He let her go, she turned back as she was going around the corner and saw pity on his face. She gnashed her teeth and stormed to her lab.
She tried to work, really she did, but no matter what she tried to do she couldn't concentrate, her mind kept going over and over her fathers interference, she would get to boiling point, almost to the stage where she wanted to pick up a phone and call him, tell him to stop interfering with her life and then she remembered his illness.
Though she did not want him to get away with his meddling, she knew he would, she couldn't face him in anger when each time she saw him may be her last.
In the end she decided to give up, she called the General and he gave permission for her to leave the base, even though she was supposed to be on duty for another 3 hours, she went home.
She had been home for only 30 minutes when the doorbell rang. She looked through the peephole. She wasn't exactly sure who she expected to see, maybe the Colonel asking again if she was alright, maybe Daniel wondering why she had left early… not something she had done before in all the time they had worked together. She got a surprise when she saw who it was.
She opened the door quickly to let him in. He entered her home and went straight to the living room, he sat down and only then did he look at her.
"George called" he told her "He had words about NASA and my interference with your life."
She just looked at him, she dare not open her mouth in case all the nasty things she had been thinking spewed out.
"I only want to see you settled Sam, see you happy." Her face was made of stone.
He got to his feet and walked out the living room into the hallway "I'm sorry, I won't interfere again" he said as he opened the front door. They both saw Colonel O'Neill stood on the step, his hand raised as if he was about to knock.
Her father turned back to her, his face tight and angry "I suppose I can see now why you don't want to be reassed" he said, she got the implication straight away, but though she could feel herself getting very angry and red, she still dare not say anything, especially as he CO was right there. "Does George know?" he asked looking back at the Colonel "Never mind, don't answer that" he stormed past her CO and out of her small garden.
She lowered her head in shame, not shame that he was correct, but that he could even think it of her!
"Carter?" he asked
"What are you doing here Sir?" she didn't invite him inside, but he stepped in anyway.
"The General had me in the office this morning, asking if there was any reason that you would be thinking of transferring." She should have known, of course he would ask her CO first. "Then he called to let me know there was nothing to worry about, and again he called to tell me he had allowed you off base." Oh shit! Of course she should have asked HIM not the General.
He nodded in the direction of her front door. "Would that have anything to do with it?" he asked, she closed her eyes, she had to tell him now.
She offered him a coffee and they sat and drank it in the living room while she explained about her father, his dreams of her getting into NASA as a child and his string pulling. She also told him of his cancer and how she could not confront him at the moment, he pulled her into another of his fabulous hugs and held her tight while she once more cried into his shirt.
She hated being a helpless female, but she could not lock everything up in its box while so much was pulling at her.
She felt safe and warm as he held her, something she had not felt since she had been a girl. She pressed herself into his body more, twisted as she was on the sofa, but eventually she stopped crying. He really was the best comfort she could ever imagine, and thoughts of what her father thought flittered briefly through her mind. She opened the box and shoved them in!
He lifted her chin, and she looked straight into his eyes, she was surprised to see pain reflected there, and she remembered that it had not been that long since he had lost his son. He could sympathise with her, though she could not help but think his pain was worse than hers. He kissed her forehead and told her to go wash her face, as if she were a child. She smiled at him and did as she was told. He offered to order pizza, but she wasn't hungry he ordered it anyway.
The door bell chimed, she was getting up to answer it when he stopped her. He went to the door and took delivery of 3 huge pizzas! She eyed them as he returned to the living room, the bell went again and when he returned this time Daniel and Teal'c were with him.
They were in for a team night by the looks. She enjoyed the company of her 3 favourite men, they had a few laughs, the Colonel causing most of them by his deliberate ignorance, she knew from what she could access of his service record that he was not as thick as he pretended to be, but she was grateful for his clowning about, and she gave him a small smile every time he looked at her, knowing that he was trying to cheer her up.
The men left late, Daniel and Teal'c were headed back to the base, the Colonel home, which was not very far from where she lived. She noticed a strange car on the street as she said goodbye, she glanced out of the window a minute later and saw her father at the wheel as he passed her house.
He was spying on her!
Next morning she reported to General Hammond about her fathers suspicion, and assured him there was no foundation for the charges. Hammond had already been contacted, and had dismissed his accusations, he had also set the record straight that HE had sent Jack to her house, mainly because of Jacob!
She was not totally sure her father would leave it at that, but as nothing was going on, she had nothing to hide, and nothing to be afraid of! Though the box with the ribbon rattled away and a small voice escaped saying that nothing was going, but she wouldn't mind if that changed.
They were due to leave for a recon of a planet that seemed to have a decent technological development, the mission was only for 1 day so she didn't bother telling her father she was leaving.
Teal'c was stung by a huge bug on the planet, and in the following 48 hours she was so rushed that she gave her personal and family life little attention. When things calmed down she tried to contact her father at the number he had left her, to be told he had checked out.
She once more wished she did not feel as if everything she did was not enough, she was sure if Mark had joined the AF he would not have had this pressure, and yet she was cleverer than Mark, she did everything she could to be perfect, and still she fell short.
She threw a book that was resting on her desk across the room, narrowly missing her CO as he entered the room.
"Carter I'm shocked!" he said bending down and picking up the now battered copy of he defining work on astrophysics. "Is it vicious?" he asked pretending to examine it closely.
She giggled slightly, even when things were black he could lighten her mood, she sighed and told him it was nothing to worry about, he said "dad?" and she nodded. He dropped the subject, for which she was grateful.
Janet came to her later that afternoon, asking if she would be willing to try something. On and off, ever since her experience with Jolinar, Sam had reported dreams, not nightmares all the time, but snatches of memory that she knew did not belong to her. Janet, it seemed had been doing a bit of research and was wanting to try something.
The year previous she had been put under hypnosis by Mackenzie to retrieve a memory, Janet had an idea that they could try the same method and see if she could remember anything else.
She reluctantly dragged the much opened box labelled Jolinar from its corner and agreed, she was amazed when she retrieved a 'gate address, she asked for and received permission for a mission to the address, and as she was gearing up she received a message with a local phone number on it, her father!
She called before setting off, again he brushed off her concerns and she became angry when she found out that General Hammond had known he had taken an apartment, when she didn't.
She swallowed the insult, as usual and decided to focus on the mission. However things did not go as planned, in the end her father saved the day by volunteering to join the ranks of the Tok'ra, she had saved his life, but now she had to wonder… had she done it at the cost of his soul?