Thank you for your reviews!

Unfortunately there is no way to insert Daniel talking to Sam into this fic, because it would upset the structure of the fic. Besides, the woman has just too much on her plate at the moment.

This is a much longer part, I actually glued two together, so I can get the rest of it posted sooner.

Please keep the reviews coming, for only that way I know what you think of it.

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It would definitely be the best way of solving the problem of seeing Carter every day, what with him being in DC and she in Colorado.

This way he could also do more for the programme than staying at the SGC, besides the fact that this way he would prevent another Bauer taking Hammond's place. Not to mention he would be the one to choose the new CO of SGC.

As genuinely helpful as Kerry had tried to be, even in her own heartache, he knew retiring was out of the question. Kerry was a good, gentle and caring person and he cherished every minute he'd spent with her. She deserved so much better than him, but for some reason she wanted him.

Even if there was a chance for him and Carter to be together, if he even still wanted her, he knew he shouldn't be the one to give up the Air Force.

His job was important, by taking this promotion it would become even more important.

Currently he was the leader of the whole facility, he looked after the staff's backs. The sole fact that he was their CO infused SG every team member with confidence and a feeling of safety, for they knew that if they went MIA he'd make every effort to find and rescue them, he would not leave them behind. They knew that with him in command, they would not be left behind, betrayed, and thus their job performance and morale was overall much higher than it would've been with anyone else behind the helm. He was also a very charismatic personality, the personnel adored him and would gladly follow him to hell and back, because they knew he'd go there with them, for them, himself. As a former team leader he was also intimately familiar with the stresses and details of their jobs, he knew the problems, the issues and the causes. He recognized any problems immediately and was thus able to solve them quicker and more efficiently than anyone else. As good as Reynolds was, if Jack retired, Reynolds would still not be promoted to General and put in command, because he hadn't been in his rank long enough. This would mean someone else, an outsider, possible implant, would be put in charge.

By taking the offered promotion Jack would become the leader of everything to do with secret space operations, except for the NASA (oh, how he looked forward to the day the programme would come out and the NASA geeks and jocks would find out that their equipment and barely-space-worthy vehicles were relics of the past and completely obsolete... He could already imagine the looks on their faces...), namely the SGC, Atlantis, Nellis AFB (aka Area 51 aka Dreamland aka Groom Lake facility), Area S4 in Utah (the place where most of the research into space vehicles now went to after they'd had to close over half of the underground facility at Area 51 after a huge toxic spill), US space fleet and every other command linked to the SGC. He would in fact become the most powerful man in the country. Well, except for Haines, who was the Commander-in-Chief...

On the other hand Carter was just another team leader among 25 others. It had been a year since she'd operated in any significant capacity as a scientist, which is where she truly shined and where her talent was, while her job as a team leader now could be done by anyone else just as competently. Carter was a scientist, not a true soldier like Jack was and not even his grooming her could make her a pure soldier because she was and always would be a scientist and thus a bureaucrat first, so when she'd taken command the nature of the team had changed. She could resign from her place as a team leader and would be immediately replaced by someone as competent as she. If Carter would want to use her talents fully she would become a scientist full-time and to do work as a scientist at the SGC one does not need to be military, so it was clear who should be the one to resign if they'd think about it logically, IF Sam broke up with Pete and Jack gave her a chance. Yet the thing was, Jack knew that Carter would NEVER give up the Air Force, not even for him. After all, had she ever been willing to, wouldn't she have done so already? Especially since she had always known that she was in control of their relationship, the one deciding how far it would and would not go.

He was fully honest with himself that he'd been a pussy, having given a woman his balls and let her have complete control over their relationship and thus his private live. Not anymore though, he'd taken his balls back, put them back to where they belonged. He was now making decisions about his own life, he wasn't letting anyone else do it anymore.

All those alternate realities that he'd taken as a sign of them being meant to be together were in fact a warning for them NOT to get together... he'd namely died in both realities they knew of. And Earth was invaded and ravaged both times.

Hell of a reference for a relationship, huh?

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As much as it hurt to admit it, after having thrown away so many good years of his life waiting for her, he and Carter would never get together.

It had taken him yet another guy she made eyes at and then got it on with, to make him realize that.

Yet the saddest thing of all was the fact that he HAD found a woman who was a good match for him, but had squandered it all away on a smoke of a dream, on an illusion, on the dust of faeries, just because he hadn't gotten over Carter by then yet.

With Kerry he had really struck gold, he knew that now. Just gold? Not just gold. Platinum, diamonds, naquada!

With the way she'd handled her boyfriend's issues and love for another woman she had proven maturity of the highest order, and not just the emotional maturity.

She had proven she was a warm, caring and loving woman, who, even though he'd broken her heart, still loved and valued him so much that she'd tried to help him get together with the woman who held his heart, the only way she knew how: with advice. She hadn't reacted with rage nor anger nor lashed out in hate. Neither had she reacted jealousy like Carter had done the day she'd seen Kerry in Jack's office or all those other times women showed interest in him. Not even when Carter had suddenly shown up during off-duty, private hours in Jack's backyard, obviously not for anything job related, had Kerry reacted with jealousy or suspicion, but had acted as the perfect, welcoming host as she had the right to, living with Jack.

Instead, Kerry had reached out with caring, warmth and love and tried to suggest a way with which he could be happy. With another woman. Such love and selflessness astounded him every time he thought of it.

She was a giving, loving and kind person, in bed a generous lover, and, to make the pie even sweeter, she was highly intelligent and extremely physically attractive. And, something especially uncommon for a CIA agent, and Jack had plenty experience with them, she was honest, fair, open and a good person. He hoped, for her own good, that she'd leave the Agency soon, before they corrupted her and destroyed the good in her. The Agency is to good people what rust is to metal. The Kerry he knew would not survive long in the Agency, either she'd quit or be irreversably changed, by them erasing all those good qualities in her, thus no longer be Kerry. And Jack liked who she was, he adored the good in her and would never want her to change.

True, she was young, at 28 over 10 years younger than Carter, which too must have bugged Carter like hell, Jack realized, since women are sensitive to their ex-es getting together with women younger than they are, and Carter was now almost 40, showing it obviously.

He'd also been surprised by just how easy his and Kerry's relationship had been from the start, how they'd clicked on an emotional as well as the physical level and on the general level of living together.

That was what had surprised him. Kerry had, without either of them noticing since they'd been constantly together off-duty anyway, moved in with Jack a couple of weeks after they'd gotten together and it had all been so easy.

He himself had been shocked by how effortlessly he had switched back into the "married" man's persona, or more accurately, into the man living with a woman. He had automatically stopped drinking milk from the bottle, was putting the toilet seat down without being prompted and even squeezed the tooth paste from the end instead of the middle. Meanwhile Kerry respected the honor spot of his Simpons DVDs, his hockey sticks and that he, as any other living breathing male, possessed a couple of videocassettes of porn. Well, she did respect that, she just made those videos redundant with her passion, imagination, willingness to experiment, nimbleness and love for him.

It was amazing how quickly he had adjusted back to having someone else in his house, not just someone, but a woman, it was as if his years of bachelorhood had disappeared.

It was like they were soulmates, they'd simply clicked.

More than that, they'd clicked so well and so immediately that just within days it had been as if they'd been married for decades, they were just so in tune and had worked out so many agreements and arrangements without even having to work them out with discussions in those days.

It had plainly shown him what he'd been missing for the last 8 years and what he didn't have to miss anymore since he had it again.

And the best of all: Kerry knew ALL about what he did for a living, she knew everything about his job, he didn't have to hide anything, their relationship wasn't based on lies, nor on hiding, they had no secrets, they were completely open and could easily ask the other when they came home "How was your day?" and tell truthfully. Kerry had come to the knowledge of the SGC honestly, well as honestly as anyone employed by the CIA can, which admittedly isn't a very good reference, and it was definitely not by running illegal background checks, stalking Jack, abusing her powers, pulling favors and then get approved to know only after having seen things she shouldn't have in the first place and had almost gotten others killed in the process, botching a stakeot with a stupid, negligent move.

Yes, Kerry really was the right one for him, but until now he'd just been too stupid and too blind to realize it.

Not anymore, though, now he knew what he'd had and what he wanted, which was exactly what he'd had, and was prepared to do everything it took to get it back and have it for as long as he lived.

Look out, world, Jack O'Neill was on a mission!

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