Finding Calm Waters Chapter 6 and 7

[iwrite4fun]

Sam and Jack go through some old boxes...

Chapter 6

Sam was cleaning her house, something that she only did when she was bored out of her mind or if it absolutely needed done. This time it was the latter. But it giver her a chance to prepare herself before going through the boxes of stuff that her father had left behind in the closet in the spare bedroom along with the one that came from his locker on base. Now she just needed to find the will power to open even one of them.

Before she could do that though, there was knock at the door, something which she wasn’t expecting.

She opened the door to reveal a very uncomfortable Jack O’Neill standing there, rocking back and forth on his feet.

“Why do you want to go?” he asked, forgoing a greeting of any sort.

The suddenness of the question meant Sam needed to collect her thoughts before answering, but she still didn’t have an answer, so she pulled a play out of the Jack O’Neill handbook. “What?” she asked feigning the fact she didn’t understand what he had said.

“Can I come in?” Jack asked, rather than repeat the question, feeling that this was something best discussed behind closed doors rather than out on the front porch where everyone could see.

“Sure,” Sam answered, opening the door wider so that he could slip past her and into the house.

Once Sam had shut the door she led the way to the living room. “Sorry about the boxes,” she said, “But I wasn’t expecting company.”

“You’re not packing are you?” Jack questioned, slightly worried.

Sam smiled and reassured him, “No, not yet if at all. They belonged to Dad.”

“Ah.”

“I haven’t opened them yet,” Sam admitted as she sat down in the same chair she had vacated to open the door.

“Why not?”

Sam shrugged her shoulders. “I guess I’m scared about what might be inside. What if there’s some deep, dark secret inside that he’s been hiding from me forever?”

“Or there might be something in there that reminds you just how much your dad loved you,” Jack countered, “He was a good man Carter. I don’t think you have anything to worry about.”

Sam nodded her head in agreement and then tentatively requested, “Would you help me?”

Jack shock from her request was quickly buried behind his usual impassive face. “On one condition,” he offered.

Sam raised an eyebrow in a Teal’c-like fashion, indicating that he should continue.

“You have to let me order a pizza otherwise I’m liable to waste away to nothing while I assist you,” he explained, ending the statement with a boyish smirk which only made Sam giggle.

“Only if you’ll share,” Sam insisted.

“Deal,” Jack said and proceeded to pull out his cell phone and place the order for a pizza to be delivered. Sam slid out of her chair and plopped down on the floor in front of the first box while he placed the order. Jack soon joined her, groaning just a little bit as he plopped down next to her.

Sam had one hand on the lid of the box but hadn’t moved to open it yet. Jack placed his own hand on an opposite side of the box and together they removed the lid revealing the contents. Three very large binders were inside along with one very large shoe box.

“Photo albums,” Sam explained, pulling the first one out of the box and leafing through it.

Jack caught glimpses of a much younger Jacob Carter, and “Hold on, is that Hammond with hair?” Jack asked.

Sam laughed, “Yeah, him and Dad go way back. He was practically ‘Uncle George’ up until mom died and Dad got transferred. I was surprised when I found out he was the new commanding officer at the SGC, I couldn’t have been happier. I knew that if anyone was going to let me go through the gate, it would be him.”

“I never knew,” Jack admitted.

Sam smiled and shook her head as she absently ran her fingers over a Carter family photo. “You don’t get to be a Major General without rubbing shoulders with the top brass,” Sam claimed, “And our family knew General Hammond’s family slightly better than most, but he never treated me different because of it.” At this point Sam put the album down and pulled another one out of the box, this one had Sam written across the cover.

“I didn’t even know that your dad was in the Air Force, much less knew Hammond until that ceremony in D.C. I’m kinda glad I didn’t,” Jack admitted as he caught a short glimpse of a very awkward looking 10 year old Samantha Carter with what looked to be a baseball glove before Sam quickly turned the page.

“You think you would have treated me different if you had known I was the daughter of a General?” Sam asked curiously as she flipped the pages quickly, bypassing the section she remembered had a bunch of science fair certificates.

“Probably,” Jack confessed. “Too many times I’ve seen people use connections to get somewhere they didn’t deserve and everyone was singing your praises. Offering to arm wrestle me was a gutsy move.”

Sam flashed him a quick smile at that comment but didn’t get the chance to respond as someone knocked on the door.

“Pizza’s here,” Jack declared as he pulled himself up off the floor and retrieved it. Sam went to the kitchen and pulled out a couple of plates and a beer for each of them. They sat at the kitchen table and ate in silence.

“It worked though,” Sam said in between bites. “The arm wrestling thing,” she explained at his confused expression.

“It did,” Jack admitted, “You’ve come a long way from the Captain I first met. I know I never said it, but I hope you know how proud I am of you. You stuck with me for seven years, when you could have had your own team after a few of those. I was selfishly keeping you where I could keep and eye on you.”

“And train me,” Sam added. “You taught me how to command. Regardless of what you may think, I know most every team leader would have given their right arm to be your 2IC. I learned more from you than from any class or professor I ever had.”

Jack looked flabbergasted as her praise, but spoke anyway. “Still, I want you to know how proud I am of you and apologize for being selfish.”

“Sir,” Sam insisted, “Keeping me on your team doesn’t make you selfish, just”

Jack smiled and shook his head. “I wasn’t thinking about you being on my team. That time,” he quickly added seeing her questioning glance as she ate another slice of pizza. “When we went to D.C. the last time for my promotion ceremony, the President was going to promote you at the same time, but I didn’t know that until after I made my case for promoting you. He insisted that I do it back at the SGC. I’m sorry that I robbed you of that experience,” he lamented.

“I’m not,” Sam replied. “The fact you were the one who did it, meant a lot to me. It told me that you trusted me with SG-1 and thought I was ready.”

“There was never any doubt in my mind,” Jack reassured and added with a smile, “Even if you are a General’s daughter.”

Sam smiled and retorted, “You do realize that if you had any children, they’d be General’s kids?” After she said that, she wondered if it was the right thing to say, but Jack’s smile reassured that she was okay.

“D’oh,” he responded which only caused Sam to giggle.

“You done?” she asked, indicating the pizza box which now held only two pieces of pizza.

“Sure,” Jack replied getting up to help her clear off the table.

Once they were done, Sam once again led the way to the living room, where she pulled out the third photo album, this once, unlike the other two, had “Mark” written in pretty penmanship across the front. So Sam just set it down next to the other two, and pulled the shoebox out.

She sat down on the couch next to Jack, close but not too close. She pulled the lid off and set it on the coffee table.

“Wow,” Jack said looking at the items on the inside of the box. Jack could see quite a few pictures, some of them taken recently, others looked to be slightly older, piled on top of newspaper clippings and pages cut out of magazines and newsletters.

Sam picked up the first picture and handed it to Jack.

Jack instantly recognized as being the one from her last promotion ceremony. Someone had snapped the picture while Sam had stood at attention and Jack had changed the insignia on her uniform.

Sam repeated the process for at least 15 pictures, all of which documented different moments from her time at the SGC, mostly pictures of Sam with her team in her dress blues, taken at different awards ceremonies, before she asked, “Where did he get these?”

Jack cleared his throat. “I’m not sure about the older ones, but the most recent ones,” he claimed, going back to the first three pictures, the one from her promotion ceremony, a picture of her with Daniel and Teal’c to document the new SG-1, and finally the one of just her and Jack at the party that had followed the President’s latest visit to the base, “Came from me. I’m guessing that the others came from Hammond.”

Seeing Sam’s questioning glance, Jack explained, “Walter suggested it, and I had him make an extra copy of all of them to give to Jacob. So I figure Hammond did the same thing when he was in charge.”

“Huh. Remind me to thank Walter and General Hammond later for their thoughtfulness,” Sam said.

“Sure,” Jack said and then though about why she said. “Hey! Aren’t you forgetting someone?”

“No,” she said innocently, a little too innocently for Jack’s liking.

“Okay,” Jack said, nodding like he wasn’t hurt at all by her statement.

“Good,” Sam replied, continuing to pull pictures out, with an occasional newspaper clipping thrown in detailing some medal Sam had received. This time, they went through a whole stack, getting to almost the bottom of the stack, dating all the way back to year two of the SGC, before she commented on something she pulled out. “I can’t believe he had this,” she claimed, pulling an entire magazine that had been folded open to an article off of what was now the top of the pile in the shoebox.

Jack recognized it as an article, obviously written by Sam given her picture was at the top of the article. The article had a really long title with a bunch of big words, of which Jack only recognized one of ‘wormhole’. “What’s so significant about this?” he asked, curious.

“This is the first article I published after becoming a member of SG-1,” she explained.

“I didn’t know Dad understood wormhole physics,” Jack joked.

“He didn’t,” Sam corrected him.

“Then,” Jack questioned, spotting the mailing address on the magazine, “Why did he have a subscription to ‘Astrophysics’ Quarterly’?”

Sam grabbed the magazine out of Jack’s hand to verify the name on the address label, and was surprised to see that he hadn’t been pulling her leg. “Hmm. He must have been on the lookout for anything that told him what I was really doing.”

“He never did believe that ‘deep space radar telemetry’ thing did he?” Jack commented.

“Uh-hu,” Sam agreed as she pulled the first picture of her and Jacob out of the shoebox. This one showed the two of them with General Hammond and Jack at the reception for their first ‘we saved the world’ medal.

The last few pictures that she pulled out of the shoebox were of the actual ceremony which had been performed by General Hammond back at the SGC. These pictures had been carefully shot in order to avoid any classified information in the background.

“I never realized that he had all this stuff,” Sam said spreading her arms to indicate the photo albums and the stacks of pictures that now filled the coffee table.

“You sound surprised,” Jack commented.

“Shouldn’t I be?” Sam questioned.

“Not really. Parents tend to keep this kind of stuff,” Jack claimed and after taking a deep breath, quietly added, “I have a box with all of Charlie’s stuff in it. Pictures he drew for me, letters, and a few of his things.”

Sam’s sharp intake of breath told him that his confession had surprised her. “Oh,” she said which was about all Jack expected her to say.

“I haven’t been through it in a long time,” Jack admitted, “So maybe, after we get through these boxes,” Jack suggested, indicating the other two boxes that were sitting on the floor, “You’ll return the favor and help me go through that box.”

Sam rested her head against Jack’s shoulder. “I’d love to. Does this mean you’ll help me sort out the other two boxes?”

“Of course,” Jack assured her as he wrapped an arm around her shoulders. “Technically, someone should have already went through these boxes to make sure there isn’t classified material in them, but”

“But?”

“But since you take classified material home all the time and your house has been cleared for it, we can wait until you’re ready to go through these boxes,” Jack finished.

“Thanks,” Sam whispered, permitting herself to snuggle just a little bit closer to Jack.

“Always,” Jack promised.

Chapter 7

The next morning, Sam woke up in her own bed, with no recollection of how she had gotten there. She remembered spending the evening with the General, no Jack, she corrected herself. The General was the hard, unreadable soldier, Jack was the loving, emotional man that had been her anchor since her father had died.

She looked at the stand beside her bed and noticed a note in Jack’s unmistakable scrawl.

Carter-

You fell asleep on me last night, so I put you to bed. I’ll lock up on my way out and have already turned off your alarm. Come in whenever you wake up or not at all-just call Walter if you’re not.

I know that we didn’t talk about what I originally came over for but something tells me that this was more important. My only advice right now is to give yourself time. Time to deal with Jacob’s death and time to think about what you want to do rather than jumping into a decision. Know this, regardless of what you decide, I’ll always stand behind your decision.

Sleep in Carter, that’s an order.

J. O’Neill

Sam looked at the clock on her bedside which read 9:00, which was significantly later than what she usually slept. She was slightly angry with Jack for shutting off her alarm and deciding she needed to sleep, but relieved at the same time that he was looking out for her. Sam could admit to herself that she needed the sleep. The previous evening had been emotionally draining as she remembered many of the events of her time at the SGC.

The fact that a vacation with Cassie had preceded the recall of those memories, had meant that the vacation had not been as relaxing as what they had originally planned, but the time with Cassie had been necessary. It the rush of events over the past year, Sam realized that she had neglected the young girl, something that her and Jack were going to need to discuss as the girl’s legal guardians.

In the meantime, Sam was going to go for a run, take a shower, and pick-up some lunch to share with her teammates before going into work. But first, she was going to call Jack.

“O’Neill.”

“Sir, I just wanted to let you know that I’ll be in time for lunch today. I’ve got a few things to catch up on in my lab,” Sam stated.

“They could wait,” Jack objected.

“They could,” Sam agreed, “But I need to do something that gets me headed back towards normalcy.”

“And playing with alien doohickeys is the best way to be ‘normal’,” Jack casually added which made Sam smile and work to contain a giggle, which she guessed was his original intent.

“What a strangle life we lead,” Sam observed. “Anyways, I thought you might want to know and maybe inform the guys that I’m bringing lunch in from that Chinese place you and Daniel like so much.”

“I’ll let them know. Call me when you get here,” he ordered before hanging up the phone.

Sam just smiled and went on her much needed run.

It was almost lunchtime when Sam pulled into her reserved parking spot on base. Not quite as good as the General’s spot, but it was better than several of the full bird Colonels simply for the reason she had been there longer-and was the expert on the Stargate. It was much more likely that she would be getting a call in the middle of the night that required her immediate attention than several of the team leaders, and the fact that she was now the leader of SG-1 gave her a little more justification for what had long been her parking spot.

Right now, she was grateful for the fact her spot was so close to the building. Not only did she have her normal amount of paperwork and her laptop, but a couple of additional bags filled with what she hoped would be enough food to feed all of SG-1 and the General, who they really considered to still be a member of the team, even if he didn’t.

Several of the guards at the checkpoints looked like they were going to say something to her, but the scowl on her face stopped them. Sam arrived at Daniel’s lab to find everyone already there, like they had been expecting her.

And they were nice enough to at least take the bags with the food out of her hands as they greeted her.

They cleared some room on one of Daniel’s lab tables and began distributing the food.

“Thanks for bringing lunch Sam,” Daniel said, “I really wasn’t looking forward to whatever was the special of the day.”

“Think of it as my way of saying thank you for being such a wonderful friend and a down payment towards future requests,” Sam responded, waving off his gratitude.

Luckily, no one pushed the issue so it didn’t take long for them to digress to work related conversation.

Once lunch was over, Sam walked to her lab with the General who was carrying several file folders of translations for her, courtesy of Daniel.

“There’s a meeting for all team leaders at 1400,” Jack said as he sat the folders down.

Sam looked at him and gave him the glare. “What would you have done if I hadn’t decided to come in today? Told everyone that I was taking the day off? I need to be there for those meetings. They’re part of my duty as a team leader.”

“Who doesn’t really have a team,” Jack claimed knowing that he was going to upset her, “Which is what I wanted to talk to you about. What do you want to do about SG-1? I can give you pretty much anyone that you want for a new team or let you have free reign of the labs for the time being, only going into the field when you want or need to,” Jack offered.

Sam sighed and realized that there would be no easy way to deal with this and that she shouldn’t be angry with him for not telling her. He had probably known she would come into work unless he ordered her not to and she did need to make a decision. “How soon is Teal’c leaving?” she asked.

“Beginning of the week,” Jack responded as he picked up one of the things lying on her lab table, one of the safe ones, left there specifically for him to play with.

Sam exhaled. “That’s soon.”

“Yeah.”

“Don’t suppose I could put off deciding?” Sam requested.

“Sure, but if you don’t make a decision, Teal’c will leave and you’ll have people lined up at your door and I’ll have a million requests for people to transfer to SG-1,” Jack explained.

“True,” Sam admitted, realizing that he was right. “Guess we say that Daniel and I are going to concentrate on our specialties for the time being, after all, I am going to busy with the new ship here pretty soon. It doesn’t make sense to put together a new team only to have Daniel leaving in six months and me being gone for a lot of that time leading up to that.”

“So I tell them that the team is being put on long term stand down?” Jack confirmed.

“Yes sir,” Sam responded.

“Good, then let’s go to this meeting,” Jack suggested holding the door open for her and then pulling the door to her lab shut behind him.

The meeting went surprisingly well, and Sam had to admit that there were going to be some advantages to being out of the mission rotation, like not having to train the new recruits.

“The next batch of recruits arrives tomorrow,” Jack reminded, “And SG-15 will be doing their training.”

Sighs of relief and triumphant smirks were seen all around the briefing room table as the various team leaders were relieved that it wasn’t their turn.

But the new leader of SG-15 was going to object to this. “Sir, I thought that SG-1 was next on the list for that duty,” Lieutenant Colonel Joe Huey objected.

“They were,” the General admitted.

“Then why isn’t Colonel Carter’s team going to do their part, or is she not feeling up to it and needs to take some vacation time again,” the man reasoned aloud.

It took all of Sam’s control not to respond with some smart remark, and judging by the look on Colonel Reynold’s face, the General’s official 2IC, she wasn’t the only one.

Sam was sure that if an alarm signaling an off world activation hadn’t sounded, she might have still done something that she would later regret.

It seemed the General knew that and with a glance, told her to take care of things in the control room while he continued the briefing. So Sam rushed off to open the iris for an SG team which was returning safe and sound, right on schedule, and with Walter’s help, was able to advise them that their briefing was scheduled at 1600 hours.

By the time she returned to the briefing room, Huey was still throwing her evil looks, but she refused to let them bother her, and instead focused her attention on the General of who was reminding everyone of several changes in policy, including the fact that they were now searching for their fourth new CMO after the death of Janet Fraiser, and he was almost begging the men to be nice to whomever they got next because “the paperwork for all these transfers is killing me,” he claimed, which resulted in chuckles from much of the group.

Dixon was the one who brought real laughter out when he reminded Jack, “This is another case of do as I say and not as I do, General.”

“For cryin’ out loud,” Jack said which brought a few more chuckles from his audience.

The team leaders were starting to pack up their folders, though they had yet to make any real moves to leave, waiting instead for Jack to dismiss them, as they had reached the end of the listed schedule.

“One last thing guys,” Jack said sparing a glance at Sam as he continued. “Teal’c has decided to leave SG-1 and return to the Jaffa.” Whispered conversations began around the table as everyone tried to discuss this news, but Jack interrupted them as he continued speaking, “And Dr. Jackson has already requested to be on the next ship to Atlantis, both of which Colonel Carter and I have approved.”

Again, whispered words could be heard all around the table, and again, Jack continued speaking, “Along those lines, SG-1 has been removed from the mission roster until the fate of the team can be decided as Colonel Carter will be making frequent trips to Area 51 to work on the new ship. For the time being, SG-1 will not, I repeat not, be doing any field work as a team, and for that reason, no effort will be expended to try and find new members for the team, at least until after Dr. Jackson departs. I’m sure I can count on you to pass the message to your teams that requests for transfers to SG-1 will not be accepted or even available and will just be a waste of time.” Jack sent a stare around the table that reinforced his last statement. “Dismissed gentlemen.”

Colonel Huey was the first one out the door, Sam noticed as she stood up and watched the General stroll to his office. She turned to leave, only to have Colonels Reynolds and Dixon fall into step with her.

“Don’t let Huey bother you Sam,” Dixon said, “He’s too new to understand how things work around here.”

“I’m surprised Jack didn’t take his head off,” Reynolds added.

“What did he do?” Sam asked unable to resist the chance to find out.

“Told the man to shut his trap and told him that he was welcome to takeover your projects any time that he wanted, not in that language of course, but that was the gist of it,” Dixon answered.

Sam huffed, “I’m sure that his words were much more colorful than that.”

“They were,” Reynolds assured her. “He also said that you had a private life outside of the SGC that was no concern of his, and if he had a problem with it, Huey should take it up with him in private.”

“Is there something going on besides the normal craziness?” Dixon asked calmly, not really pressuring Sam for an answer as they entered the empty elevator, more just willing to lend an ear.

Normally, Sam wouldn’t say anything, but if there was one person outside of her team that she would talk about this problem with, Dave Dixon would be the man, after all he had children of his own. “Cassie’s been having a really hard time lately,” she admitted.

“Ah. That explains things,” Reynolds stated.

“What?” Sam questioned as the elevator began to slowly move towards the floor her lab was on.

“Normally you do a pretty good job of hiding your emotions and you don’t ever stay away from work for a long time, but ever since you’ve come back from vacation, I could tell something was bothering you,” Dixon explained.

“Any suggestions?” Sam asked, looking at the experience parent for any advice.

The man shook his head and patted Sam on the shoulder, “Yeah, get some regular hours and be home every night for her, but that’s not something that you can control when you work here.”

“Thanks,” she said as she walked out of the elevator, already contemplating the man’s words and starting to think that the transfer to Area 51 was looking better all the time.

It didn’t take long for Sam to forget about her conversation though as she became involved in several reports from other scientists about devices they were working on, and as she began to fiddle with a device of her own.

She didn’t even notice the passage of time until she sensed the General walk into the room and pick up one of the devices she had left sitting on the lab table. She directed her attention away from the simulation she had been running on her computer and to him, before he broke something. She carefully pulled the device out of his hands and replaced it with a yo-you which she kept on hand for times such as these.

“Is there something I can help you with sir?” Sam asked.

Jack paused in his attempt to ‘walk the dog’ and stared at her. “Well, I just want to point out that it is 1800 hours, and you’re still in your lab. I’m sure that you haven’t eaten since lunchtime and you still have several boxes of stuff to unpack at home, which I’m offering to help with since I have a free evening.”

Sam looked at the clock and realized that he was telling the truth about the time, and surveyed her lab, which was much more organized and less crowded than it had been a few hours ago. She didn’t have any pressing projects right now, and she was hungry. “Are you offering to feed me or do I need to cook?” Sam questioned in return as she started working on cleaning up the pile of papers and folders she had finished with and putting them in her out box.

Jack didn’t have to think about letting Sam cook; it was common knowledge that she couldn’t cook. “I’ll pick up something from the deli on the way your to place,” Jack offered. “Meet you in 45 minutes.”

“Deal,” Sam accepted.