Warning: strange connections of imagery sometimes prompt ficlets.
Title: Pansies, orchids and snapdragons.
Fandom: SG1
Pairing: Sam/Jack
Rating: Mature.
Spoilers: 'In the Line of Duty' and hints at Atlantis
Summary: Selecting the perfect flower isn't easy, it requires careful thought and knowledge of individual preferences. Someone elses dream could be Carter's nightmare.
The small spray of pansies sat on Sam’s desk, their cheerful petals a splash of colour amidst the manila files and starch papers. She smiled at them fondly, these tiny plants.
Some might think it a strange gift, expecting to see instead a more traditional flower; perhaps roses, although the cliché alone was enough of a reason to negate that option. Lilies reminded her of her Mother’s funeral, a mourning flower, striking but solitary.
He alone knew the reason why she couldn’t have orchids in the house.
No matter how much she might once have loved them they were a present that left a sour aftertaste. It was a lesson he’d learnt the hard way, years ago. A moment in their personal history that remained regrettably unforgettable; it was then that he’d had the unsettling experience of witnessing her nightmares on base, seeing the bad dreams grip her for the very first time.
And his well meant gift of the orchid plant had pleased Sam at first. She’d placed it on the small side table next to her bed in the infirmary, her finger brushing the thick glossy leaves, gaze fixed on the flower, her blue eyes more alert than they’d been since before...the snake.
But in sleep, in the depths of her subconscious, the beautiful white orchid petals became threatening, took on the spiny structure of a symbiote’s barbed frill, the pink veined bell a snapping head intent on burrowing its way down her throat. All hissing, and flashing eyes and a long thin stalk tail. Weaving and winding and choking her, ripping and possessing her. Veiny petals spreading out, lodging against her windpipe. Trapping her beneath layers and layers of dirt and wrapping roots around her movement. Her control.
Jack had been there to see her horrified eyes as she’d woken, screaming, and before he could stop her she’d instinctively reached out and hurtled the flower across the room. The sounds of the plant pot smashing against concrete a sharp prelude to the tremors which shook her as he wrapped her in his arms and murmured softly in her ear, it’s okay, it’s okay, it's gone, sorry, I’m sorry.
So…orchids were a no.
But it was okay, because even now, with her here in Atlantis surrounded by seas and technology...and strange plants that were a little too worryingly phallic to be named after McKay, even here in this galaxy far far away, he’d managed to gift her with the perfect flower. The yellow and purple pansies…with their tiny faces, small, sunlike spheres, a simple splash of color amidst the sea of paperwork.
As if she was still in her lab, trying to work, whilst he gurned at her brightly through her magnifying glass.
Just ostentatious enough to catch her eye and provoke a smile.
Fandom: SG1
Pairing: Sam/Jack
Rating: Mature.
Spoilers: 'In the Line of Duty' and hints at Atlantis
Summary: Selecting the perfect flower isn't easy, it requires careful thought and knowledge of individual preferences. Someone elses dream could be Carter's nightmare.
The small spray of pansies sat on Sam’s desk, their cheerful petals a splash of colour amidst the manila files and starch papers. She smiled at them fondly, these tiny plants.
Some might think it a strange gift, expecting to see instead a more traditional flower; perhaps roses, although the cliché alone was enough of a reason to negate that option. Lilies reminded her of her Mother’s funeral, a mourning flower, striking but solitary.
He alone knew the reason why she couldn’t have orchids in the house.
No matter how much she might once have loved them they were a present that left a sour aftertaste. It was a lesson he’d learnt the hard way, years ago. A moment in their personal history that remained regrettably unforgettable; it was then that he’d had the unsettling experience of witnessing her nightmares on base, seeing the bad dreams grip her for the very first time.
And his well meant gift of the orchid plant had pleased Sam at first. She’d placed it on the small side table next to her bed in the infirmary, her finger brushing the thick glossy leaves, gaze fixed on the flower, her blue eyes more alert than they’d been since before...the snake.
But in sleep, in the depths of her subconscious, the beautiful white orchid petals became threatening, took on the spiny structure of a symbiote’s barbed frill, the pink veined bell a snapping head intent on burrowing its way down her throat. All hissing, and flashing eyes and a long thin stalk tail. Weaving and winding and choking her, ripping and possessing her. Veiny petals spreading out, lodging against her windpipe. Trapping her beneath layers and layers of dirt and wrapping roots around her movement. Her control.
Jack had been there to see her horrified eyes as she’d woken, screaming, and before he could stop her she’d instinctively reached out and hurtled the flower across the room. The sounds of the plant pot smashing against concrete a sharp prelude to the tremors which shook her as he wrapped her in his arms and murmured softly in her ear, it’s okay, it’s okay, it's gone, sorry, I’m sorry.
So…orchids were a no.
But it was okay, because even now, with her here in Atlantis surrounded by seas and technology...and strange plants that were a little too worryingly phallic to be named after McKay, even here in this galaxy far far away, he’d managed to gift her with the perfect flower. The yellow and purple pansies…with their tiny faces, small, sunlike spheres, a simple splash of color amidst the sea of paperwork.
As if she was still in her lab, trying to work, whilst he gurned at her brightly through her magnifying glass.
Just ostentatious enough to catch her eye and provoke a smile.