FIC: 1991 (03/11)
TITLE: 1991: Chapter 03
AUTHOR: Starbuck92
CATEGORY: Romance, Angst, Action/Adventure
PAIRINGS: Sam/Jack UST, Sam/Other (in the past)
SPOILERS: Nemesis, Small Victories
SEASON: 4
RATING: R
CONTENT WARNING: Language, minor character death, sexual situations
SUMMARY: Flying and friendship, love and loss - what was Sam Carter’s life like during the Persian Gulf War?
DISCLAIMER: The lovely characters of Stargate SG-1 do not belong to me, and I am making no money off this story. Please do not archive without permission.
Saturday, November 17, 1990
The rising sun peeked over the crest of the majestic, snow-topped Wasatch Mountains, bathing the grounds of Hill AFB in a soothing, orange glow. Light snowfall had sprinkled down to earth the previous night, but the rays of warm sunshine began melting the moisture away bit by bit as day broke. The forecast called for another exceedingly cold but beautiful day, typical weather for mid-November.
On an average Saturday morning, the majority of Hill’s residents would be sound asleep in their quarters, taking advantage of their weekend off to sleep in.
This, however, was no ordinary day.
In spite of the very early hour, personnel scurried every which way across the base. Crates filled with gear were being loaded onto large transport planes, fighter planes were being fueled and examined, and the little snow that remained was being shoveled off the runways in preparation for the 4th and 421st Fighter Squadron’s departure to the Middle East.
Amid the flurry of activity, one lone figure clad in full Air Force dress uniform stood, appraising the men and women who were attending to the morning tasks. He scanned the airfield and smiled as he caught a glimpse of the person he was looking for.
Major General Jacob Carter’s footsteps sounded quietly on the concrete as he walked toward the bundle of blankets beneath the F-16 with the wizard’s wand emblazoned on its tail. He’d spent the past half hour searching for her and wasn’t the least bit surprised to find her out here, leaning against the forward landing gear of her plane.
As he drew closer, his daughter became more visible.
Sam Carter was wearing her heavy flight jacket over civilian clothes, armed with a flashlight, an astrophysics book, and a pencil, scribbling notes on the pages of a notebook at a measured pace. A scarf was wrapped around her neck, but her cheeks and nose shimmered bright pink after remaining exposed to the bitter temperature.
He stopped three feet in front of her, yet she did not look up from her work. The general’s smile widened as he considered using his best drill sergeant voice to capture her attention, but decided against it. He didn’t want to scare the living daylights out of her.
“Sam?”
Carter lifted her head at the sound of his voice, pushing the rim of her military-issued baseball cap up away from her eyes and pulling her scarf down from her mouth.
“Dad,” she said, surprise evident in her voice. “What are you doing here?”
“Looking for you,” General Carter answered. “Have you been out here all night?”
A bewildered expression crossed her face as she took a look around, suddenly realizing it was morning.
Last night, she had joined her friends for a couple of drinks in town, celebrating their final day in the States. Before the party could really swing into action, she had excused herself and retreated back to the base, needing some time alone with her thoughts.
In the end, Carter wound up gathering her thesis material and found herself wrapped up in a couple of blankets beneath her F-16, taking comfort in the books and the proximity of her plane. She had inadvertently stayed out all night, inattentive of the cold and the passing time.
She gave her father a small, self-conscious grin.
“Um, yeah. I guess I have.”
General Carter smiled in return, not finding her behavior unusual at all. His daughter had a knack for losing track of everything when she immersed herself in her work, dedicating her full attention to whatever task she was asked to perform.
“Mind if I join you?”
She pulled back on one side of the blanket she was enveloped in, silently inviting him to sit next to her. He complied, settling himself beside her.
“Nice and toasty,” he commented, marveling at how warm her little study area was despite the chilly weather.
Carter smiled easily, snuggling closer to the father she hadn’t seen in a very long time. The rigorous training schedule her squadron had been on the past few months hadn’t permitted much downtime, as they’d spent almost every day logging countless hours in the sky. The little free time she’d managed to find wasn’t enough to plan a trip to see her father, who was stationed across the country in Washington, D.C.
“So what are you working on?”
“I couldn’t sleep, so I thought I’d review a few things before I left. Last minute notes for my doctoral thesis.”
He nodded, glancing down at the notes she’d written in her notebook. From the expression on his face, he clearly didn’t understand much of the information, but she was happy that he was making an effort to take an interest in something that mattered to her. She usually had a difficult time discussing any issues with her father that didn’t pertain to the Air Force.
“How’s that going?”
Turning her attention back to her book, she shrugged slightly.
“I’ll be done soon enough, I suppose. When I get back from my tour overseas, I’m planning on conducting a couple more experiments that will support my theories. The rest should be a piece of cake.”
Pride shone on the general’s face as he draped an arm around her shoulders, squeezing her closer.
“You’ll be playing up in space in no time, kid.”
She beamed at the praise, giving him one of her dazzling smiles.
“Thanks, Dad.”
Since the age of four, Carter had wanted nothing more than a chance to go into outer space. Watching the Apollo 11 lunar landing with her mother and brother, she was fascinated by the fact that the men on the television set were actually standing on the surface of the moon. She remembered giggling in delight as they began hopping around in the near-zero gravity, thoroughly enjoying herself almost as much as the astronauts themselves appeared to be.
Her father had been away that summer, spending several months on an overseas tour. When he’d returned home that winter, he had brought with him one of the best presents Carter had ever received as a child - a Major Matt Mason astronaut doll. That Christmas morning, father and daughter began mapping out the first plans to make her an astronaut someday, a dream that seemed closer and closer to coming true with each passing year.
“Sam, we’re almost ready to start fueling your --”
Technical Sergeant Lowe stopped short as he appeared from beneath the starboard wing of the F-16, noticing Carter was not alone. Realizing who was sitting with her, he snapped to attention.
“General Carter, sir!”
He rose leisurely to his feet, giving his daughter a hand up.
“At ease, Sergeant.”
“What’s going on, Alan?” Carter asked her chief crewman.
“Ma’am, the fueling crews are nearly finished with Lieutenant Lovell’s fighter, and they will be heading around to fuel yours next,” he reported perfunctorily.
Nodding, she smiled forcefully.
“Thank you, Alan.”
The sergeant saluted and scampered back to the aft section of the fighter plane, watching as the crews completed their work on Lovell’s aircraft. Across the taxiway area, a few more crews were similarly fueling other F-16s from their squadron, as well as the squadron that would be accompanying them.
She studied them for a moment before giving her father a sideway glance.
“I guess I’d better go change and make sure I have everything ready.”
General Carter nodded curtly, his own eyes fixed on his daughter’s airplane. She watched, filled with curiosity, as he ran a hand along the edge of the wing. Her father had been a pilot during the Cold War, and she knew he was pleased that at least one of children had inherited his passion for flying.
A small smile appeared on his face.
“They sure don’t make them like they used to,” he said softly, patting the side of the fuselage. Clearing his throat, he returned his gaze to Carter.
“Come on. I’ll walk you to your quarters.”
She quickly gathered her belongings and fell into step beside him. As they walked to the officers’ quarters, she took her first real look around, fully becoming aware of the activity across the base.
“This makes everything so real,” she murmured.
“What does?”
Carter waved her free hand in an arc, indicating the personnel bustling around Hill.
“Seeing this makes me believe I’m not dreaming. Makes me realize that this is all really happening.”
He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye.
“About that. What do you think of this mission?”
“Major Wells thinks we’re ready --”
Her father unexpectedly stopped and raised his hand, motioning for silence and receiving it from his daughter immediately. His voice was firm when he addressed her.
“I respect Major Wells, Sam. He’s a fine officer. But I asked for your opinion on this operation, not his.”
Casting her gaze to the ground, Carter’s eyebrows lifted slightly as she considered her answer. Jacob Carter did not appreciate those who beat around the bush and sidestepped the crux of an important matter. She had learned long ago that whenever she was dealing with her father, honesty was the best policy.
“When I first heard the rumors that we might be assigned to Desert Shield, I didn’t want to go,” she admitted as they continued walking. “And I certainly don’t approve of my friends’ reasons for wanting to go. They can’t wait to get combat experience, to go in with their guns blazing. All the wrong reasons for this campaign.”
Sighing, she leveled her eyes on his.
“But there are people in the Middle East that have no defense against their enemies, and they need our help. If I can do anything to aid those people, I’m ready and willing to be over there.”
By the time she had finished the one-sided discussion, they were standing outside of her quarters. Pulling her keys out of her pocket, she opened the door, and they strode inside.
The general had remained silent since he had stopped her outside of the building, keeping his comments on her viewpoints to himself as he’d intently listened to what she had to say. Now, he merely studied her room, observing his daughter’s living quarters.
Carter had generally been a tidy person well before joining the military. The quaint little room was kept straight and ordered at all times. The bed was made when she wasn’t sleeping in it, the blinds were regularly dusted, the laundry was folded and stored away, and the carpet was vacuumed once or twice a week.
Her desk, on the other land, looked like a disaster area.
Piles of books and mountains of paper littered the desktop. Her computer was barely visible amid the other junk. Coffee mugs, energy bar wrappers, star maps, and photographs completely obscured the remaining free space.
She meticulously added the books she had used last night to the chaotic workspace, balancing them precariously on another heap of books.
General Carter stared at the mess before slowly tracking his gaze upwards to the young woman who stood behind the desk.
She grinned at her father, presenting him with her best ‘innocent little girl’ look that had melted his heart as long as she could recall. Upon seeing her sparkling blue eyes and dimpled smile, he began chuckling, shaking his head.
“There are some things about you that haven’t changed one bit, Sam.”
Walking over to her bed, he took hold of her packed duffel bag and placed it on the floor, taking a seat on the edge of the mattress. He signaled for her to join him and pulled a piece of paper from his pocket, handing it to her.
“This is where I’ll be stationed. Not too far from where you’ll be, actually, and there’s a number where you can reach me if you need anything.”
Carter carefully placed the paper in the inside pocket of her flight jacket for safekeeping, inquisitively watching as her father retrieved his wallet and delicately removed a small photograph from it. He passed it along to her.
She blinked in surprise as she looked down on it, the images becoming blurry behind the sudden prickle of tears. Her mother and a much younger Samantha smiled up at her from the picture as they held on to each other and an old radio-controlled airplane they had christened “Miss Carter.”
“I found it the other day in a box of old pictures,” her father told her. “I thought you might like to have it.”
She bit her lip, her fingers clutching the edges of the fading photo as the memories swept through her.
The small airplane had been one of her most treasured childhood possessions, a gift from a mother who fully supported her daughter’s dreams of becoming an astronaut. She had frequently spent her time flying it around the various bases she had grown up on, a constant companion she never tired of throughout the many moves.
Great care and conditioning had been placed into the little aircraft for many years, until only two days before her mother’s tragic accident when the plane had unexpectedly stopped working. No matter how much she fiddled with it, dismantling it and putting it back together again, she never got it running again.
It was a harsh premonition of what would become one of the roughest times in her life.
A hand reached out to rest over hers, holding on lightly.
Slowly, Carter raised her tear-filled eyes to look at her father. Even though she had forgiven him long ago for not picking up her mother on that fateful day, their relationship had continued to be strained, vacillating between uneasy acceptance and outright avoidance.
Lately, things had been much better between them. Both father and daughter were working hard on mending the broken pieces back together, learning to lower their defenses and becoming more at ease around each other.
“Your mom is going to be watching over you, kid. Every second of every day while you’re over there. And I’ll just be a phone call away if you need me.”
Swallowing the lump that had lodged itself in her throat, she wiped at her eyes with the back of her hand, remembering the expression her father had instilled in her at a young age.
Big girls don’t cry.
Forcing back the tears, Carter sniffled quietly.
“Thank you.”
Reaching up, he cradled her face with his hands, tilting her head so that they were eye to eye.
“Make me proud, Sam.”
Regaining control of her emotions, she smiled confidently at him, her innate desire to please her father surging through her.
“I’ll do my best, sir.”
The general brushed the unruly bangs from her forehead, affectionately stroking her hair as he once did when she was a child. The smile on her face wavered at the contact, the firm hold she had on her emotions becoming tenuous once again as she looked into her father’s eyes.
Unable to hold back any longer, she launched herself into his waiting arms, hugging him tightly.
“I love you, kid,” he said softly.
Carter squeezed her eyes shut, holding on to her father with all her might.
“I love you, too, Dad.”
Continued in Chapter 4.
AUTHOR: Starbuck92
CATEGORY: Romance, Angst, Action/Adventure
PAIRINGS: Sam/Jack UST, Sam/Other (in the past)
SPOILERS: Nemesis, Small Victories
SEASON: 4
RATING: R
CONTENT WARNING: Language, minor character death, sexual situations
SUMMARY: Flying and friendship, love and loss - what was Sam Carter’s life like during the Persian Gulf War?
DISCLAIMER: The lovely characters of Stargate SG-1 do not belong to me, and I am making no money off this story. Please do not archive without permission.
Saturday, November 17, 1990
The rising sun peeked over the crest of the majestic, snow-topped Wasatch Mountains, bathing the grounds of Hill AFB in a soothing, orange glow. Light snowfall had sprinkled down to earth the previous night, but the rays of warm sunshine began melting the moisture away bit by bit as day broke. The forecast called for another exceedingly cold but beautiful day, typical weather for mid-November.
On an average Saturday morning, the majority of Hill’s residents would be sound asleep in their quarters, taking advantage of their weekend off to sleep in.
This, however, was no ordinary day.
In spite of the very early hour, personnel scurried every which way across the base. Crates filled with gear were being loaded onto large transport planes, fighter planes were being fueled and examined, and the little snow that remained was being shoveled off the runways in preparation for the 4th and 421st Fighter Squadron’s departure to the Middle East.
Amid the flurry of activity, one lone figure clad in full Air Force dress uniform stood, appraising the men and women who were attending to the morning tasks. He scanned the airfield and smiled as he caught a glimpse of the person he was looking for.
Major General Jacob Carter’s footsteps sounded quietly on the concrete as he walked toward the bundle of blankets beneath the F-16 with the wizard’s wand emblazoned on its tail. He’d spent the past half hour searching for her and wasn’t the least bit surprised to find her out here, leaning against the forward landing gear of her plane.
As he drew closer, his daughter became more visible.
Sam Carter was wearing her heavy flight jacket over civilian clothes, armed with a flashlight, an astrophysics book, and a pencil, scribbling notes on the pages of a notebook at a measured pace. A scarf was wrapped around her neck, but her cheeks and nose shimmered bright pink after remaining exposed to the bitter temperature.
He stopped three feet in front of her, yet she did not look up from her work. The general’s smile widened as he considered using his best drill sergeant voice to capture her attention, but decided against it. He didn’t want to scare the living daylights out of her.
“Sam?”
Carter lifted her head at the sound of his voice, pushing the rim of her military-issued baseball cap up away from her eyes and pulling her scarf down from her mouth.
“Dad,” she said, surprise evident in her voice. “What are you doing here?”
“Looking for you,” General Carter answered. “Have you been out here all night?”
A bewildered expression crossed her face as she took a look around, suddenly realizing it was morning.
Last night, she had joined her friends for a couple of drinks in town, celebrating their final day in the States. Before the party could really swing into action, she had excused herself and retreated back to the base, needing some time alone with her thoughts.
In the end, Carter wound up gathering her thesis material and found herself wrapped up in a couple of blankets beneath her F-16, taking comfort in the books and the proximity of her plane. She had inadvertently stayed out all night, inattentive of the cold and the passing time.
She gave her father a small, self-conscious grin.
“Um, yeah. I guess I have.”
General Carter smiled in return, not finding her behavior unusual at all. His daughter had a knack for losing track of everything when she immersed herself in her work, dedicating her full attention to whatever task she was asked to perform.
“Mind if I join you?”
She pulled back on one side of the blanket she was enveloped in, silently inviting him to sit next to her. He complied, settling himself beside her.
“Nice and toasty,” he commented, marveling at how warm her little study area was despite the chilly weather.
Carter smiled easily, snuggling closer to the father she hadn’t seen in a very long time. The rigorous training schedule her squadron had been on the past few months hadn’t permitted much downtime, as they’d spent almost every day logging countless hours in the sky. The little free time she’d managed to find wasn’t enough to plan a trip to see her father, who was stationed across the country in Washington, D.C.
“So what are you working on?”
“I couldn’t sleep, so I thought I’d review a few things before I left. Last minute notes for my doctoral thesis.”
He nodded, glancing down at the notes she’d written in her notebook. From the expression on his face, he clearly didn’t understand much of the information, but she was happy that he was making an effort to take an interest in something that mattered to her. She usually had a difficult time discussing any issues with her father that didn’t pertain to the Air Force.
“How’s that going?”
Turning her attention back to her book, she shrugged slightly.
“I’ll be done soon enough, I suppose. When I get back from my tour overseas, I’m planning on conducting a couple more experiments that will support my theories. The rest should be a piece of cake.”
Pride shone on the general’s face as he draped an arm around her shoulders, squeezing her closer.
“You’ll be playing up in space in no time, kid.”
She beamed at the praise, giving him one of her dazzling smiles.
“Thanks, Dad.”
Since the age of four, Carter had wanted nothing more than a chance to go into outer space. Watching the Apollo 11 lunar landing with her mother and brother, she was fascinated by the fact that the men on the television set were actually standing on the surface of the moon. She remembered giggling in delight as they began hopping around in the near-zero gravity, thoroughly enjoying herself almost as much as the astronauts themselves appeared to be.
Her father had been away that summer, spending several months on an overseas tour. When he’d returned home that winter, he had brought with him one of the best presents Carter had ever received as a child - a Major Matt Mason astronaut doll. That Christmas morning, father and daughter began mapping out the first plans to make her an astronaut someday, a dream that seemed closer and closer to coming true with each passing year.
“Sam, we’re almost ready to start fueling your --”
Technical Sergeant Lowe stopped short as he appeared from beneath the starboard wing of the F-16, noticing Carter was not alone. Realizing who was sitting with her, he snapped to attention.
“General Carter, sir!”
He rose leisurely to his feet, giving his daughter a hand up.
“At ease, Sergeant.”
“What’s going on, Alan?” Carter asked her chief crewman.
“Ma’am, the fueling crews are nearly finished with Lieutenant Lovell’s fighter, and they will be heading around to fuel yours next,” he reported perfunctorily.
Nodding, she smiled forcefully.
“Thank you, Alan.”
The sergeant saluted and scampered back to the aft section of the fighter plane, watching as the crews completed their work on Lovell’s aircraft. Across the taxiway area, a few more crews were similarly fueling other F-16s from their squadron, as well as the squadron that would be accompanying them.
She studied them for a moment before giving her father a sideway glance.
“I guess I’d better go change and make sure I have everything ready.”
General Carter nodded curtly, his own eyes fixed on his daughter’s airplane. She watched, filled with curiosity, as he ran a hand along the edge of the wing. Her father had been a pilot during the Cold War, and she knew he was pleased that at least one of children had inherited his passion for flying.
A small smile appeared on his face.
“They sure don’t make them like they used to,” he said softly, patting the side of the fuselage. Clearing his throat, he returned his gaze to Carter.
“Come on. I’ll walk you to your quarters.”
She quickly gathered her belongings and fell into step beside him. As they walked to the officers’ quarters, she took her first real look around, fully becoming aware of the activity across the base.
“This makes everything so real,” she murmured.
“What does?”
Carter waved her free hand in an arc, indicating the personnel bustling around Hill.
“Seeing this makes me believe I’m not dreaming. Makes me realize that this is all really happening.”
He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye.
“About that. What do you think of this mission?”
“Major Wells thinks we’re ready --”
Her father unexpectedly stopped and raised his hand, motioning for silence and receiving it from his daughter immediately. His voice was firm when he addressed her.
“I respect Major Wells, Sam. He’s a fine officer. But I asked for your opinion on this operation, not his.”
Casting her gaze to the ground, Carter’s eyebrows lifted slightly as she considered her answer. Jacob Carter did not appreciate those who beat around the bush and sidestepped the crux of an important matter. She had learned long ago that whenever she was dealing with her father, honesty was the best policy.
“When I first heard the rumors that we might be assigned to Desert Shield, I didn’t want to go,” she admitted as they continued walking. “And I certainly don’t approve of my friends’ reasons for wanting to go. They can’t wait to get combat experience, to go in with their guns blazing. All the wrong reasons for this campaign.”
Sighing, she leveled her eyes on his.
“But there are people in the Middle East that have no defense against their enemies, and they need our help. If I can do anything to aid those people, I’m ready and willing to be over there.”
By the time she had finished the one-sided discussion, they were standing outside of her quarters. Pulling her keys out of her pocket, she opened the door, and they strode inside.
The general had remained silent since he had stopped her outside of the building, keeping his comments on her viewpoints to himself as he’d intently listened to what she had to say. Now, he merely studied her room, observing his daughter’s living quarters.
Carter had generally been a tidy person well before joining the military. The quaint little room was kept straight and ordered at all times. The bed was made when she wasn’t sleeping in it, the blinds were regularly dusted, the laundry was folded and stored away, and the carpet was vacuumed once or twice a week.
Her desk, on the other land, looked like a disaster area.
Piles of books and mountains of paper littered the desktop. Her computer was barely visible amid the other junk. Coffee mugs, energy bar wrappers, star maps, and photographs completely obscured the remaining free space.
She meticulously added the books she had used last night to the chaotic workspace, balancing them precariously on another heap of books.
General Carter stared at the mess before slowly tracking his gaze upwards to the young woman who stood behind the desk.
She grinned at her father, presenting him with her best ‘innocent little girl’ look that had melted his heart as long as she could recall. Upon seeing her sparkling blue eyes and dimpled smile, he began chuckling, shaking his head.
“There are some things about you that haven’t changed one bit, Sam.”
Walking over to her bed, he took hold of her packed duffel bag and placed it on the floor, taking a seat on the edge of the mattress. He signaled for her to join him and pulled a piece of paper from his pocket, handing it to her.
“This is where I’ll be stationed. Not too far from where you’ll be, actually, and there’s a number where you can reach me if you need anything.”
Carter carefully placed the paper in the inside pocket of her flight jacket for safekeeping, inquisitively watching as her father retrieved his wallet and delicately removed a small photograph from it. He passed it along to her.
She blinked in surprise as she looked down on it, the images becoming blurry behind the sudden prickle of tears. Her mother and a much younger Samantha smiled up at her from the picture as they held on to each other and an old radio-controlled airplane they had christened “Miss Carter.”
“I found it the other day in a box of old pictures,” her father told her. “I thought you might like to have it.”
She bit her lip, her fingers clutching the edges of the fading photo as the memories swept through her.
The small airplane had been one of her most treasured childhood possessions, a gift from a mother who fully supported her daughter’s dreams of becoming an astronaut. She had frequently spent her time flying it around the various bases she had grown up on, a constant companion she never tired of throughout the many moves.
Great care and conditioning had been placed into the little aircraft for many years, until only two days before her mother’s tragic accident when the plane had unexpectedly stopped working. No matter how much she fiddled with it, dismantling it and putting it back together again, she never got it running again.
It was a harsh premonition of what would become one of the roughest times in her life.
A hand reached out to rest over hers, holding on lightly.
Slowly, Carter raised her tear-filled eyes to look at her father. Even though she had forgiven him long ago for not picking up her mother on that fateful day, their relationship had continued to be strained, vacillating between uneasy acceptance and outright avoidance.
Lately, things had been much better between them. Both father and daughter were working hard on mending the broken pieces back together, learning to lower their defenses and becoming more at ease around each other.
“Your mom is going to be watching over you, kid. Every second of every day while you’re over there. And I’ll just be a phone call away if you need me.”
Swallowing the lump that had lodged itself in her throat, she wiped at her eyes with the back of her hand, remembering the expression her father had instilled in her at a young age.
Big girls don’t cry.
Forcing back the tears, Carter sniffled quietly.
“Thank you.”
Reaching up, he cradled her face with his hands, tilting her head so that they were eye to eye.
“Make me proud, Sam.”
Regaining control of her emotions, she smiled confidently at him, her innate desire to please her father surging through her.
“I’ll do my best, sir.”
The general brushed the unruly bangs from her forehead, affectionately stroking her hair as he once did when she was a child. The smile on her face wavered at the contact, the firm hold she had on her emotions becoming tenuous once again as she looked into her father’s eyes.
Unable to hold back any longer, she launched herself into his waiting arms, hugging him tightly.
“I love you, kid,” he said softly.
Carter squeezed her eyes shut, holding on to her father with all her might.
“I love you, too, Dad.”
Continued in Chapter 4.