Two months Later:
"Welcome home, Sam. How did the mission go?" he asks.
"Great. It was a really good one to come back to. Big giant spaceship, in a big giant space race," she says giving him a kiss.
"Did you win?" Jack asks.
"No, things got a little complicated, and we… well, we lived. We stopped the evil guys, it all turned out okay. How is my little baby?"
"Oh, we got to show mommy our new trick," he says, handing the baby to his wife and grabbing a blanket he had sitting in the organized mess that he calls a living room.
"You have to stop calling them 'tricks', Jack, she's not a dog," Sam objects as her husband spreads the blanket across the floor. He takes the baby from her, and places her on her side.
"Is the trick laying there?" Sam teases.
"Wait for it," he says.
Just then Leah flops over on her back.
Sam kneels down to hover over her, "Hey there, baby girl! Nice job. Pretty soon you are going to be able to crawl away from this crazy man who is your father."
Sam scoops her up. "So, Jack, how did you do all by yourself with the baby for four days?"
"They were a little bit long," he confesses.
"I knew it, Jack. You need your job. That's okay. I'm sure that the General will take you back. It's not the first time that you've retired."
"I don't want to go back to working at the Stargate. Actually, I don't want to go back to working at all. More like volunteering. You remember the league that Cassie used to play softball for?"
Sam nods.
"I'd like to be a baseball coach. It would be a little more than an hour a day, four days a week," he says.
"Well, getting out of the house is a pretty important thing for a stay-at-home dad, I would think. I've got no problem with it. We'll just have to find a babysitter."
"Yeah, about that… I have an idea. Just tell me if it is too crazy… but what about my clone?"
She raises her eyebrows in surprise.
"He came and saw me not to long ago. He missed her. I mean, after all, he is basically me. I can't imagine what I would do if I found out that I could never see my daughter again. Carter, it would be good for him to see her for a couple hours a week, and who better to look after our kid than well… me."
"That sounds like a plan," Sam agrees. She pauses, making faces at her little baby girl. "Jack, is it going to be enough?"
Jack nods his head, as he traces a finger lightly across his daughter's head. Sam realizes that this is more about Jack's clone getting to see his daughter than about Jack needing to get out of the house.
-0-
One Week Later
It's just a practice, but they still have an audience… of one. The kid has to be about eight years old, the same as his team. The difference is that this kid is on the other side of the fence. His fingers are clenched around the links of the fence, and his eyes are wide.
"You want to play, kid?" he calls over. The kid has blond hair, long for a boy: long like Charlie's was when he died, long like Daniel's was when he first met him.
The kid doesn't answer at first. Jack walks closer to the boy, and repeats the question.
"My mom says organized sports are a waste of time," the kid says, and looks down bashfully, "She'd never give me the money."
"Tell you what, kid, if ya wanta play, I'll let you play for free," Jacks says. He'll fill out the club membership and pay for the kid himself, but he has a feeling the boy is going to be a lot more open to it if he doesn't know that little detail.
"Yeah?" the kid asks.
Jack nods.
"I'm going deaf," the kid says, quite suddenly.
"I'm sorry to hear that," Jack says.
"So, if I don't answer, that's why. A lotta people think I'm just being a jerk or whatever, but my hearing is already bad."
"Good thing I talk loud, son," Jack says, "Batter up."
-0-
One Month Later:
"Jordan, you know you don't have to clean up," Jack says. He messed up again. He knows that Jordan has to see him or he can't hear him. The kid claims that he doesn't read lips, but it's the only way Jack can explain it. He moves in front of the kid, and repeats his statement.
"I like cleaning," Jordan says. Then he pauses, "Well, I like cleaning when I can actually get something clean."
"What do you mean by that?" Jack prompts carefully.
"Mom lost her job again, and we moved in with Darren. I counted last night and there were twenty-two garbage bags in the kitchen. It's normally my job to take out the trash, but, you know, twenty-two."
Jack's stomach churns at the thought of a little kid feeling responsible for it.
"I'm sorry, kiddo," Jack says.
"I wish I had a camera."
Freaking street urchin, Jack grumbles, he's playing me. "You're way too young for a camera."
"If I had one, I could take pictures of Christy," the kid says.
"And who is Christy?" Jack asks, thinking this little cherub has got to be too young for a crush.
"She's Darren's kid, but she's too little to hit back," Jordan replies.
"Whoa, who is hitting this little kid?" Jack asks.
Jordan is looking down, so Jack taps his chin so he raises his eyes, and then he repeats the question.
"I don't see him do it. But a little kid doesn't get bruises everywhere unless somebody's hurting them, right?" the kid asks softly.
"You're probably right, Jordan, and I am so glad you came to me with this. Has he ever hurt you?"
Jordan shakes his head.
"How old is Christy?"
"I don't know. Little; like three or somethin'," Jordan says.
"Are there any other kids there?" Jack asks.
"Yeah, my big sister Megan. She keeps telling me to keep my trap shut. She says that if I tell anyone what's going on, they are going to take us away from our mother."
"You're absolutely doing the right thing, Jordan, you have to make sure that little girl is safe. I'm going to need last name, address, phone number, okay, honey?"
"I'm scared to go home," the kid whispers.
Right, maybe this isn't a 'fill out a form' kind of thing. "How about you and I go and tell this story together? I won't leave until you're safe."
"'Kay. Megan has pictures of Chrissy's bruises on her camera."
Right, that's why the kid wanted a camera.
-0-
"How dare you!" The shouting echoes in the corridors.
"Mom," Jordan mutters, this apparently being something at least he has no trouble hearing.
"He is my son! Why is he at the police station, telling lies?"
The police officer's vice tries to calm her down, and Jordan looks terrified. The social worker doesn't miss that.
"He's not even in baseball!" Jack hears a shout a few seconds later. Right, that was probably a bad move on his part, enrolling the kid without his parent's permission. It seemed like it would be fine when he thought the kid was just neglected. Now with the mother screaming at a cop he was a whole lot less confident.
-0-
"He'll be put in temporary care," the social worker says.
"Okay, buddy, I'll see you soon," Jack assures him, even though he has no idea if he'll even see the kid again.
"No, you can't go," the kid says gripping him, "You said you weren't going to leave me until I felt safe. I don't feel safe."
He kneels down, "It's okay, Jordan, you and your sister are going to be spending the night at someone's house. Chrissy's going to another person's house; you're all going to be safe."
"Mom is really mad," Jordan says.
"I know, love, but you aren't going to be staying with your mom tonight."
The kid cries, and crumbles into Jack's chest. He looks desperately at the social worker. He wants to take the kid home so bad, but he is pretty sure that is just not the way that it works.
He gets a shake of his head which confirms his fears.
"Jordan," he says. Then he remembers the kid can barely hear. Jesus, it better not be because his mother screams all the time. He pulls away, "Jordan, you are going to be so brave. Right? How many times has your mom moved you?"
"I lost track."
"Okay, kiddo, this is just another move. Only this time, people have looked at the house before. They have made sure there are not twenty-two bags of trash in the kitchen of little kids getting hit, okay?"
Jordan nods.
"Can I give him my home number?" Jack asks the social worker. She nods, and he writes it down on a piece of paper and hands it to the kid.
"You were so strong, Jordan, so brave to tell people what was happening. You are going to be okay."
He wasn't, though. Not yet. In the two months that followed, Jack kept a stack of abuse/neglect forms in his baseball bag. The kid was bounced between mom's house and foster care again and again. She could have the kids back if she moved away from the abusive bastard. She could have them back if she cleaned her house. She could have them back if she took a parenting class.
Quietly, Sam and Jack begin preparing for the family they know might be coming. They buy a bigger house so Megan won't have to share a room with her brother. They get certified as foster parents. Jack continues coaching Jordan. After the practice, he lingers to clean up for twenty minutes, an hour, even two. After a game, Jack takes his whole team out for pizza, and Jack usually takes the boy out for ice cream after.
Sometimes Sam and the baby join them for ice cream.
Jack tries to get Jordan to bring his sister along. They all want to meet the mythical Megan. Each time Jordan replies with a cynical comment from the injured pre-teen in question.
Then the mom disappears for five days. When the food runs out, Megan calls 911, and this time they leave their mother forever.