Category: Sam and Jack romance/angst
Spoilers: Direct for 7.03 Fragile Balance
Content Warnings: Perhaps MiniJack!
Summary: It's the morning after Jonas' leaving party where things got dangerous for Jack and Sam, but now they have a new problem – MiniJack!
Episode – 7.03 Fragile Balance
Walking down the stairs in her house, Sam was preoccupied with her own internal thoughts. The night before, she had been at Jonas Quinn's leaving party and afterwards, she and Jack had shared an incredibly passionate kiss. She had no idea where it could have led them, but it had been Jack that had stopped it. Subsequently, Sam was now apprehensive of what the morning would hold with Jack. Sasha, their live in nanny, had the entire weekend off and there had been plans for Sam, Jack and Daniella to spend the weekend all together as a family. Sam was no longer sure that it was the best course of action anymore.
She wished that she could speak with Janet about the problems, but her friend had made it clear that she did not want to be involved in the tricky non-relationship, especially as it had become even trickier after the events of the night before. Sam still was not sure what had gotten into her. She had barely slept with the thoughts running around and around in her mind. Every once in her while the confusing, troubled thoughts would be replaced with the memories of his hands and his lips and his body in total, Sam was not sure which thoughts had been worse. She had awoken to thoughts that were no clearer than the night before.
It had been her that had instigated the kiss and despite feeling a little bit tipsy, Sam had not been drunk; the drinks had merely given her the confidence to do what she often wanted to do. Even she had to admit that in the cold light of day, it had been a rash decision to make and perhaps not the wisest of moves. All that she needed to do was speak with Jack and agree to forget it happened. They had just managed to fully balance their new work and personal roles so it was not the time for her to upset the scales.
After having awoken, Sam had gone to get Daniella to discover that she was not in her cot so had used the opportunity to get washed and dressed before heading down to find Jack and Daniella. Peering into the lounge, Sam saw Daniella attempting to build a tower out of her building blocks. As she accidentally knocked it down in the building process, Sam heard a voice that she did not recognise.
"Oopsy, try again." Without a second thought, Sam quietly rushed from the room and towards Jack's office. The door was secured by a key pad which Sam knew the code for, rushed into the room and opened the safe with another code. Grabbing out one of the two Zat guns housed within the safe, Sam firmly closed the door and then the door to the office before carefully walking back into her lounge, the Zat pointed towards the intruder. Sam did not like pointing a weapon in the same direction as her child, but at least with a Zat it would do no lasting damage.
Except they had not ever tested the electrical discharge of a Zat on a child as young as Daniella.
"Step away from my daughter!" she said forcefully, seeing the intruder's face fully for the first time. There was something familiar about the teenager sitting on the floor, which made Sam question the weapon in her hands. It did not persuade her to lower the Zat as she was well aware that certain government agencies would do anything to get what they wanted. Ever since she had been kidnapped while pregnant to 'help' Adrian Conrad, her daughter had extra protection. The house was not under constant surveillance, but whenever Sasha was looking after Daniella alone there were military officers watching without her knowledge. Janet performed monthly tests on the little girl and had discovered nothing different in her blood work or system to any other child of her age, but that would not deter other people.
"Sam, what the hell are you doing?" The teenager stood up rather aggressively.
"Step away." She was trying desperately trying to not scare Daniella, but it was clearly not working as the girl began to whimper.
"See you're scaring her."
Narrowing her eyes at the intruder, Sam gritted her teeth and said, "Where's Jack?"
"What? How much did you drink, Sam?" Sam looked at him in confusion.
"Who are you and what are you doing in my house?"
"I'm Jack."
"No, no you're not." His brow furrowed in confusion and he walked over to the nearest mirror with no regard to the weapon pointed at him.
"What the hell?" he yelled upon seeing his own reflection and Daniella began to cry loudly. "Sorry, baby girl." The teenager moved toward Daniella, but Sam reinforced the fact that she had a weapon trained on him.
"Stay away from my daughter."
"Clearly she recognises me, Sam. Don't you?" She started stepping towards Daniella and he did start moving away.
When she reached her daughter, Sam picked her up and turned to the teenager. "Why should I recognise you?"
"Because I'm Jack. Look, you used to be host to Jolinar. You quite like the fact that you're not on SG-1 as much as you were, but you don't like Carpenter taking your place."
"That just shows you've done your homework."
"Last night you kissed me."
"Homework."
"And I didn't follow you to your room, or the other way around." She opened her mouth to speak and in a very Jack-like way, the teenager stopped her, "Ach! No amount of spying or watching would know what happened inside here. Unless, you failed in your area of expertise and someone managed to bug this place." Refusing to believe him fully, but unable to deny the logic, Sam lowered the Zat slightly, but not fully.
"We'll just wait for the Air Force to get here." Gesturing for him to move, Sam pointed him in the direction of the telephone. "Speed dial two."
"I know."
SG – SG – SG
Jack was incredibly frustrated. He was not sure when he had ever been this frustrated before, or this angry. It was one thing to wake up and have Sam point a Zat at him. He understood and as soon as he had looked at his reflection and realised there was something seriously wrong, he had allowed Sam to call whoever she wanted and he had stayed away from Daniella. Thankfully, genetic tests had proved that he was still Jack O'Neill and Sam had allowed him access to Daniella, albeit with a guard which, again, Jack did understand. What frustrated Jack the most was that he was not allowed to do his job despite the fact that he had proven himself to still be a capable colonel. That and the fact that the Asgard had apparently done something wrong in the de-aging process and he was now dying as also more than a tad frustrating.
Colonel Jack O'Neill was now a teenager who was dying and it was all because of the grey-skinned naked little Asgard that had done this to him. All that he wanted to do was end his days by a lake with his daughter. It was the one thing that he was thankful for in everything, Daniella had not noticed anything was wrong. If anything, Daniella was the only person to know instantly that he was still her father. He had no explanation for it.
Jack also had no explanation for how he now found himself sitting by a lake, Daniella giggling in the mud nearby. After the Tok'ra had suggested stasis something had snapped within Jack's mind and at the first available opportunity, he had taken out the SFs guarding him and made his way out of the base. He understood why he had done that and Jack hoped that so would everyone else, including those he had intentionally hurt during his escape. What he could still not explain was the fact that after breaking out of the SGC, his first port of call had not been the lake instead, Jack had snuck into his own home and possibly, technically, kidnapped his own daughter.
Sam was going to kill him, but Jack had managed to get the spare Zat from their safe at home and he knew that even at his younger age, he could protect his daughter.
"Isn't that right, Dani," Jack said out loud, "I'm all you need." In response, Dani giggled and pulled more grass out of the ground. A large commotion near the dirt road that led to the lake, brought Jack's attention and he turned in that direction. A large amount of debris now blocked the road and in response, Jack raised the Zat.
"Jack O'Neill, you sonofa-"
"Ach!" Jack shouted back in retaliation to Sam's yell. "Not in the presence of such innocent ears." Satisfied that it was just SG-1 standing near the fallen debris, Jack lowered the Zat. "I'm not going back there to go in stasis."
"So instead you came up here to die?" Daniel shouted as the three members of SG-1 manoeuvred around the debris towards Jack.
"Clever move with Daniella, you inconsiderate jerk." As the three of them neared him, Jack realised that, with the exception of Daniel, their weapons were still raised. Concern filled him and Jack bent over to pick up his daughter. There was something wrong with the picture.
"I knew you'd find me before I died," he protested. "That's why I didn't put explosives on my trip wire. What's with the weapons?"
"Hand over my daughter."
"Don't you mean our daughter, and, no."
"O'Neill, hand Daniella over or I will be forced to fire."
"T, buddy, what's going on?"
"We've spoken to the Tok'ra, Jack." It had been Sam's idea to call for the Tok'ra, despite the fact that Jacob was still unaware of Daniella's true parentage. Jack had practically begged Sam to not tell him whilst he was a fifteen year old boy. He could not have dealt with Jacob's wrath in his current state. Sooner or later, Jacob was going to find out and Jack did not really want that day to come. "And Sam has something she needs to tell you."
Jack looked at Sam, she seemed worried and really scared. "Jack," she started, "please hand Daniella over."
"Go to mommy," he said to Daniella before putting her down on the ground and watching her toddling over to Sam. Once she was safely in Sam's arms Jack asked, "What's going on?"
"The slight alteration in your DNA, Jack, you're a clone. You're not Colonel O'Neill and…" She could not finish her sentence.
"And you can't trust me." The rational side of his mind understood what she was saying, but the teenage, hormone ridden part wanted to punch something. Jack was not used to these levels of uncontrolled testosterone. "What now?"
"We find the Asgard that did this to… you and get Jack back."
"Gee, thanks, Daniel, forget about me then. I'll just slowly die."
"If we locate the Asgard responsible, O'Neill, we may have an opportunity to rectify the errors within you." Jack hoped that the big guy was right, but all he was worried about at that point in time was that the Asgard may have had an ulterior motive in making a clone and that, underneath, he may have some hidden programming. It scared him that he might have been made to hurt those that he loved.
SG – SG – SG
Sam watched on as Thor used an Asgard console to help and fix the instability in the younger Jack O'Neill's DNA. She knew that she ought to be relieved that the clone had not had any evil plan or unknown programming; it had simply been Jack. When she had further questioned him on kidnapping Daniella, he had argued to her that it was his hormones preventing him from thinking straight and that she did not want to know what other thoughts he could not get out of his mind. Sam did not feel relieved and, turning slightly towards her team-mates, she whispered, "So the Asgard placed a marker in your DNA to prevent any manipulation?"
"Aren't I a lucky boy?" Jack quipped. He still looked slightly dazed and confused.
"It's probably a good thing that no one can alter it, Jack. You're not quite their missing link yet. Would you really want to be?"
"Nah, I like being me."
"Don't you guys get it?" Sam demanded slightly angrier than she had intended.
"Relax, Sam, we're not gonna make you live with two me's."
She rolled her eyes at him. "Jack, ask yourself two questions: One – if you're not quite the missing link, but you are a step forward on the human evolutionary path, what does that make your daughter? Two – when did they put a marker in your DNA? Because if it was before Dani, then she has it, too. We've spent all this time worrying that my having been a host could affect her, but it turns out the Asgard and their experiments may have affected her. And do we really risk telling Thor right now? What if he runs a few experiments?"
"That was more than two questions."
"Jack, be serious."
"Guys, I think we can still trust Thor." Sam glared at Daniel and he backed down. "Ask him as a hypothetical, Jack."
"Personally, the longer we can keep Daniella a secret from the rest of the Universe the better." All Sam could do was shake her head at Jack. It was one thing to worry about her daughter being able to control Goa'uld technology and the different government agencies that may want to use that to their advantage, but it was another to consider that perhaps the Asgard would want her. It was far harder to defend themselves against the Asgard. "Hey, Thor, old buddy."
"O'Neill?" Thor questioned, approaching the group. "Your clone has been stabilised and he will be able to live a perfectly lengthy life."
"Sweet, but on a different note." Jack coughed to clear his throat and Sam tried to hide her eagerness. "You said that you put a marker in my DNA to prevent anything like this happening?"
"That is why the clone was not the correct age, O'Neill. I am sorry to have done such a thing without your permission, but it was done in your best interests."
"True," Jack nodded. "Little question though: if I have a kid will it have it?"
"There is a chance with the human's method of sexual reproduction, however there is always a chance that offspring would not carry that marker."
"What if it did?"
"Unless a mutation were to occur, O'Neill, it would serve the same function as the marker does in yourself – prevention of manipulation."
"What kind of mutation?" Sam suddenly asked, unable to contain her worries any longer.
"The same as with normal DNA. There is very little to worry about, Major Carter, any offspring that O'Neill chooses to have will simply not be able to have their DNA manipulated or have clones created from them." The little grey alien then looked her straight in the eye, as if able to see something in her eyes. "Do not worry." Turning abruptly, Thor headed towards another console and began to move stones around. "I must depart now with my prisoner, but I will send you all back to the SGC."
"Thank you," Daniel said.
"Yeah, thanks!" Both Jacks said as they then turned to each other and the bright beaming light engulfed them. Sam did not want to have to deal with two Jacks; one was bad enough.
SG – SG – SG
"So, you're sure about this?"
The younger Jack nodded, looking across the road to the high school standing there. "It shouldn't be too hard. I might even be called a geek."
"Maybe." There was a silence between the two men that could not have been any more awkward than it was. Jack was sure that his younger self would be okay, but SGC personnel would still be checking in on him from time to time. It was not just going to be the two officers picked to be Jon's, as he now wanted to be called, parents and Jack was sure that Jon realised that.
"Know what the hardest thing's gonna be?"
"Getting over the fact that you're supposed to be dating teenage girls when you're an old man at heart?"
Jon laughed. "The bigger obstacle with dating is that I'm already in love." Jack recoiled at the words spoken out loud. "Don't shy away from it. You can't lie to me."
"Wouldn't try."
"I'm jailbait for the person I love. You're not. And don't," he pre-empted, "use Daniella as an excuse. She knew I was you. She's cleverer than she looks." They both remained in silence, with Jack's mind filled with all that Jon was giving up. It made him incredibly grateful that he was the real deal. "Promise me you'll look after her."
Nodding, Jack knew that he meant both females. "No one will get close to either of them."
Jon began to cross the street, but turned back half way to throw one final comment at Jack. "In a few years, if you haven't got the courage yet, send Sam my way. Or if she ever decides she just wants a younger model that can keep up."
SG – SG – SG
Glancing up, Sam smiled at Jack as he entered the kitchen and poured himself a cup of coffee. She could not fully begin to understand what he was going through. The younger version of him, Jon, had to give up everything that made his life his, and that included his daughter. Those thoughts would continue to haunt Jack, Sam knew, but that did not change the fact that she needed to discuss their recent actions.
"Did you drop him off okay?"
"Yeah. He wants to be a geek."
"Nothing wrong with that." Her cheeks flushed as she felt his eyes on her, studying her intensely.
"Never said there was. I think-"
"Look, Jack-" They both began speaking at the same time; Jack gestured for her to continue. "I wanted to apologise for the other night." The feelings and sensations of that night flooded her entire body, causing her flushed face to burn even hotter. "I'd had a few drinks." She knew that it had not been the alcohol.
"I never wanted to take advantage of you." His voice was quiet, with a hoarseness behind it and Sam found herself wanting to falter.
"You didn't. You couldn't." She heard the sound of his closed fist hit the car in her mind, reminded of the fact that it had been him that had pulled away. "Perhaps alcohol should be off limits."
"Yeah." Jack drank down a few gulps of the coffee and then put the cup down, the slight noise echoed throughout the room. "Hammond pulled me aside earlier, telling me how proud he was of all of us especially the past few days. He said that he'd had reservations about the two of us, what with Dani and everything, but we'd stuck to our words." Laughing bitterly, Jack took another gulp of coffee and Sam felt guilt weigh her down. "We've been walking a bit too close to that line, haven't we?"
"Janet and Cassie came around earlier. Cassie kept Daniella entertained while Janet sat down with me. She apologised for how she's been, but that she doesn't want to be there and pick up the pieces. She said that she can't understand how Daniel can forgive you for the pain I went through. I tried telling her that I've hurt you plenty, too, but she said that doesn't matter when she's my friend and not yours. I can't let her and Daniel pick up any pieces later on." She could no longer continue looking at him, her pain was now too great. They could not continue how they had been any longer. "We have to stick to the line, the barriers." She took a deep breath. "The regulations."
Allowing his eyes to meet hers, she wanted to take it back and run into his arms, but she knew that she had to be stronger than that. Sam could not bring any further complications into his life or into Daniella's. At least if they backed away from each other, their friendship would continue to thrive, ensuring Daniella's happiness. She still hoped that he would say something. Instead he walked out of the kitchen and up the stairs. Shaking her head and any tears that were trying to form, Sam forced herself to get on with something productive, putting the past few weeks far from her mind.
The End!