Make Believe 6: Legacy

Summary: Join the SGC, they said. It would be fun, they said. What they didn't mention was that Captain Trevor Knight would be working with his bitter high school girlfriend, her telekinetic younger brother, and Dr. Jackson's snarky daughter...all while they try to get home from a dig in Giza in 1928 without changing history in the process. Part six of the Make Believe saga by Rose Stetson.

Author's Note: Despite the fact that I had at least two more stories in my head for the O'Neill family, I thought I was through after a ten-year hiatus from Gifts. I felt I had let you all down. But then you asked for more... And the stories I thought I had planned for this series evaporated. They just weren't quite right. And when I was slumped in my original fic, this idea excited and ignited me. So, here's hoping you love the next chapter of the O'Neill family's journey. I sure do. Love and peace to you all. -RS

Chapter One - Sam

It was almost like a normal party, with the clinking of champagne flutes and the sounds of laughter and small talk. Major General Samantha Carter, however, was on edge. Though she tried to mingle like the other original members of SG-1, Lieutenant General Jack O'Neill, Dr. Daniel Jackson, and Teal'c, she couldn't help but let her eyes scan the horizon, searching.

Her husband came up and put one hand on her elbow. "They're just running a little late. That's all."

Sam looked almost guilty as she looked back at Jack. "I'm sorry. It's just that—it's the White House. It's them."

Fifteen years ago, the last time they'd been at the White House, Sam had been shot. Grace and Jacob had been kidnapped. Cassandra had been the target of some kind of sonic attack. Their entire family had been crippled in a matter of minutes, and it had all started by sending the original SG-1 to the White House.

He nodded. "I know, but they're not kids anymore. They'll be here."

She shifted under the weight of her dress blues with all its medals and honors, most of them given to her from work she'd done in the Stargate program. Which, up until last year, had been classified top-secret. Now...

She resisted the urge to bite her cuticle. "I should have insisted they come with us. Should have sent a limo or something."

Jack kissed her temple, and she closed her eyes to savor his nearness. "Carter, don't pretend I don't know about the bodyguard you arranged."

Sam blinked at her husband. "Bodyguard?"

He nodded as he took a sip of his punch. "Yeah, that Knight kid Grace dated in high school. The one who's at the SGC now?"

Sam's stomach clenched. "Oh, you knew about that, did you?"

"My guess is the whole world knows about it given how loudly Grace was squawking on the phone a few minutes ago."

Sam tensed and took a sip of her own punch. What she wouldn't have given for Vala's flask right about now. Just a single drop would help take the edge off her worries. "Does she hate me?"

Jack chewed the inside of his cheek. "Depends on your motivations. Since she thinks you pulled the same thing your dad tried to pull the first time we came to DC together—"

Indignation rose up immediately with the memory. "I would never!"

"Ah!" Jack raised a finger, an amused smile the only evidence that he was asking her as politely as possible to let him finish talking. "If, as she suspects, you're trying to set her up with her ex boyfriend, she's not that happy with you. I tried to explain that this wasn't so much wish fulfillment as it was peace of mind. That even though he's new to your command, he's one of the few people you thought we could trust with her safety."

Sam worried her bottom lip between her teeth. "Did she buy that?"

"Not for a single second."

Sam sighed. "So, you think this is payback?"

Jack shook his head. "Grace might have words for you when she gets here, but no. I don't think she'd do that. Although, Trevor Knight might be in for an earful."

"I don't really care. Not if they're safe."

Jack took her drink and set it on the table. "I think you think too much."

Amusement lifted the corner of her lips. "Oh? And you have a solution to that?"

He tugged her into his arms as the live orchestra began playing something soft and slow, and she closed her eyes as their cheeks rested against one another. "Dance with me, Carter."

She had just started to sway with him when Jack stopped and stepped ever so slightly away from her.

Brow furrowed, Sam looked up for an explanation.

"Excuse me, ma'am. Sir."

Two nervous-looking airmen appeared in view, her Pentagon escorts. "Yes?"

The airmen exchanged glances with each other. "Uh, you're needed on a call."

Sam blinked but followed them to a deserted room, accepting a secured phone line from one of the airmen there. "Cheyenne Mountain?"

Once again, the airmen looked at one another with nervous looks.

"Airmen?" Jack's voice held the same edge of anxiety as Sam's. No small wonder. Nothing has really changed since the last time they'd been here. Grace and Jacob may have been older, but as far as everyone could tell, they both still had powers. In fact, Jacob's intelligence and impulsiveness made him more of a target than ever. Grace's gift had been more subtle than it had in her teenage years... Until she'd taken her first job with a newspaper.

There was every possibility that once again, Grace and Jacob had been kidnapped by scientists bent on protecting the planet from people who had powers.

Sam's anxiety ratcheted up as one of the airmen stepped forward. "It's your daughter's car, ma'am. It's disappeared."

Sam's heart plummeted, and she instinctively gripped her husband's hand. "Disappeared? What do you mean disappeared?"

The airman waved to the phone line. "All due respect, I mean that you should take this call, ma'am."

She exchanged a look with her husband, then nodded. "Put it on speaker, airman."

Jack cleared his throat, and if Sam didn't know him as well as she did, she would have thought he was just as calm and level headed as always. "Then, close the door on your way out."

Part of Sam was grateful that the social media video had caught her daughter's car on video when it vanished. Another part of her groaned. This was the kind of video that went viral not because of the stunt that was originally supposed to be captured, but because of the inadvertent shot.

Fortunately, videos were easily manipulated enough that they could tell people this was a brilliant editing job, and most would believe it. The rest would hear that Hollywood had been doing some kind of stunt for a new film. The Air Force might even put money toward making a film that could be passed off as needing that kind of publicity and call it plausible deniability.

Of course, there would always be the conspiracy theorists, but eventually, they'd move on to a new phenomenon and leave Sam's kids out of it.

For now, Sam would just be grateful that she had some evidence to work from. Some proof that her children hadn't simply vanished from existence.

Sam nodded for Jack to invite the young men back into the room. "Airman, put me through to the George Hammond. See if they caught any radiation or energy pulse at this precise moment from the coordinates of the video. Maybe that will give us more information."

The airman nodded as General Brian Hamburg of the Joint Chiefs met them at the door. "Sam. Jack. You're wanted for pictures."

Sam forced herself to look more enthusiastic than she felt. "We'll be right there."

Jack looked at the airmen again. "Update us every fifteen minutes, okay?"

"What if you're up with the President at that time, sir?"

Jack's face grew hard. "Every fifteen minutes, airman. If the President has a problem with that, she can take it up with me."

Sam shivered beside her husband as the boys, not much older than Jacob himself, just nodded. "Yes, sir."