"What are you doing here?" Jack asks looking at Sam on the other side of the briefing table from him.
"Isn't this the briefing for SG-1?" she asks with mock surprise.
"Yes, but you're not going through the gate anymore," he says.
"Nothing has changed," she says cryptically.
"I don't know what kind of a conversation you too think you are having, but I am in charge of the team assignment for missions," Hammond says with his booming voice.
"Do the military rules on pregnancy apply to civilians?" Jack asks leveling eyes at the General.
"Samantha?" the General asks.
She holds the sobs in as best she can. She can't believe Jack would do this to her.
"I think a trip the infirmary is in order," the General says softly.
"I'm not sick, sir," she responds firmly, but in a whisper.
"My order stands," he says.
"Sir, I am very grateful for you giving me a job. I regret that this…revelation has jeopardized it."
"Sam," the voice says a few times before she looks him in the eye, "I'm not firing you. There are plenty of jobs around the place that someone as brilliant as you could do. You did not get this job out of pity, and I do not think the less of you for this. I'm just going to protect that little child from the nasty aliens, because I could use another grandbaby."
"Thank you. I'm sorry for making a scene," she says softly.
Then General's professional façade has broken down enough that he has no problem giving her a big hug before she leaves the room. He casts a glare at Jack, "That could have been handled better."
"I didn't think she was going to go through the gate. Not now that she knew about it," Jack defends himself, "I was taken by surprise. I wasn't ready. I didn't meant it to go down like that."
"She knew about the baby since before she moved here," Daniel says in almost a whisper causing all three of the other men on the room to stare at him. "Protecting that little one was actually why she moved here."
"So in her mind we just called her a bad mother. Damn it!" Jack curses in an almost whisper. "I'm the last one on the planet to be questioning someone's parenting skills."
Teal'c stands, and looks at Hammond. Hammond gives him a nod, and he leaves.
-0-
It was Teal'c who came to her. Of course, it was him. She opens her mouth to speak to him, but she doesn't need to. This is Teal'c. He is a man of action, a man of presence. He exists, and that is enough.
Teal'c holds out his arms, and Sam falls into them. Her face is flat against the plane of his chest.
"Your child made a good choice in you as a mother," he says.
"Choice?" she asks.
"It is an old myth from my country, but when I first came to the planet I also thought the Ta'uri was a myth."
"So in this myth the children pick the parents they like the most?" Sam asks.
"No, the parents who will make them the best version of themselves. They are unformed clay in the place above. They choice their molders, and your child made a wise choice indeed."
"That's really pretty, Teal'c, thanks."
-0-
"I'm sorry," Jack says walking into Sam's darkened lab after the mission.
"It's okay. You had a right to tell him," she says.
"I didn't. My kid will spend the rest of her life with a bullet in her arm. I don't get to tell you how to take care of your kid."
"Jonas and I were violent with each other. I thought whatever risks I was doing it was better than that," she says.
The new revelation pains Jack more. He knew that she was scared of Jonas. He didn't realize that she actually believe gate travel was safe compared to being in a house with him. He holds a Bible toward her. "It's Jonas's," he says.
"Jonas and I don't really talk," she says confused to why he is giving her that. He would rather throw the book away then talk to him to give it back.
Jack looks down, "Carter. He's not going to have that back."
"He's still on the planet? If he won't come home they'll keep going after him…" she drifts off when she realizes.
"I'm sorry, Carter," he says again.
"How?" she asks.
"He fell into a wormhole. I practically dared us to kill him. We couldn't though. You know, we couldn't leave the kid fatherless on purpose."
She hadn't even though about what Jonas's death meant for her baby yet. She was still dealing with what it meant for her.
"Do you want a hug, or maybe want to sit down?" he asks.
She shakes her head.
"Do you want me to get Daniel for you?" he asks feeling inadequate.
"I want to stop using a platonic relationship to fill the gaps I'm too scared to fill in with this one. I'm scared of us because of Jonas and me. I think…I think it will take some time to wade through this. But I want to wait through this with you, if you're still in this."
"I'm still in this," he assures her.