Fic Repost: Five planets Jack wants to retire to
Written for sg1_five_things prompt 11.10.
1. P3X-774. Peace and quiet, not having to worry about what insane and unstoppable new force would pop up from some backwater planet in the middle of nowhere next, not having to say ‘retired’ and mean ‘but I know you’ll be calling me as it conveniences you.’ Getting to finally lay down his burdens and end the part of his life that was all about being the fastest on the draw, whether he was carrying a gun or not. Blah blah pop-psych, some of it probably even true, but that wasn’t the point.
It was a flying city. That was damn cool, and even after all these years Jack was still a little let down that he hadn’t gotten to see the inside. Plus, how could you not like the Nox?
2. The thing Jack liked about Bra’tac - well, no, there were a lot of things he liked about Bra’tac, but the thing he had grown to appreciate even more over the years was that the man just did not understand old. Jack thought about packing it up and moving to Dakara. More than once. He’d wasted a lot of time, but Bra’tac was a hell of a mentor, if Teal’c was a fair estimate. Yeah, Jack wasn’t as sharp as he used to be, but he didn’t think it was too late to start learning to forget old.
3. Thor had hinted, more than once, that the Ida galaxy could use someone from the good old Milky Way hanging around, shaking things up, shooting off some fantastically stupid ideas. Jack had been, at times, more than a little tempted. The food situation would have been a problem, though.
4. It wasn’t so much a want to retire there, because ‘want’ implied a degree of possibility, so much as a wish. A feeling he woke up with sometimes after hazy red-gold dreams, the smell of the desert lingering long moments after the image had faded away.
He really had wanted it once, had actually come so close to drafting the paperwork to make it happen, in the year Daniel was gone. But it had just been one thing after the other that year. The gate always found some way to draw him back right as Jack was considering walking away from it entirely, until one morning he took the elevator down to 24 and the universe changed.
They lost Abydos and got Daniel back in exchange. It wasn’t a fair trade, but it was a good one, and if he could go back Jack wouldn’t…if he had to do it again…. It happened. Nothing else to say.
Sometimes he still wished, though.
5. When it came right down to it, the only planet Jack really wanted to retire to was Earth. He’d move up to the cabin full time, for a while; bide his time puttering around, get in enough fishing to hold him over, re-learn how to sleep until noon, and then leave it to Cassie as a wedding present, the way his great-grandfather had built it as a wedding gift, his grandmother had passed it to him when he married Sara, the way she’d pass it on to one of her kids. He’d retire officially and then wait for the rest of the team to catch up, because it would never be rest with any one of them still in the field. And then he’d retire for real.
He’d get a house with a big, sunny yard and a swing set and lots of bedrooms. Teal’c would have his own to crash out in for weeks at a time when he was on-world visiting, and Daniel would very slowly take over the study and throw himself into that revised history of human civilization he’d have published posthumously, and Sam and Cameron would bring the baby over on weekends and holidays and long afternoons just because. And that would be enough.
1. P3X-774. Peace and quiet, not having to worry about what insane and unstoppable new force would pop up from some backwater planet in the middle of nowhere next, not having to say ‘retired’ and mean ‘but I know you’ll be calling me as it conveniences you.’ Getting to finally lay down his burdens and end the part of his life that was all about being the fastest on the draw, whether he was carrying a gun or not. Blah blah pop-psych, some of it probably even true, but that wasn’t the point.
It was a flying city. That was damn cool, and even after all these years Jack was still a little let down that he hadn’t gotten to see the inside. Plus, how could you not like the Nox?
2. The thing Jack liked about Bra’tac - well, no, there were a lot of things he liked about Bra’tac, but the thing he had grown to appreciate even more over the years was that the man just did not understand old. Jack thought about packing it up and moving to Dakara. More than once. He’d wasted a lot of time, but Bra’tac was a hell of a mentor, if Teal’c was a fair estimate. Yeah, Jack wasn’t as sharp as he used to be, but he didn’t think it was too late to start learning to forget old.
3. Thor had hinted, more than once, that the Ida galaxy could use someone from the good old Milky Way hanging around, shaking things up, shooting off some fantastically stupid ideas. Jack had been, at times, more than a little tempted. The food situation would have been a problem, though.
4. It wasn’t so much a want to retire there, because ‘want’ implied a degree of possibility, so much as a wish. A feeling he woke up with sometimes after hazy red-gold dreams, the smell of the desert lingering long moments after the image had faded away.
He really had wanted it once, had actually come so close to drafting the paperwork to make it happen, in the year Daniel was gone. But it had just been one thing after the other that year. The gate always found some way to draw him back right as Jack was considering walking away from it entirely, until one morning he took the elevator down to 24 and the universe changed.
They lost Abydos and got Daniel back in exchange. It wasn’t a fair trade, but it was a good one, and if he could go back Jack wouldn’t…if he had to do it again…. It happened. Nothing else to say.
Sometimes he still wished, though.
5. When it came right down to it, the only planet Jack really wanted to retire to was Earth. He’d move up to the cabin full time, for a while; bide his time puttering around, get in enough fishing to hold him over, re-learn how to sleep until noon, and then leave it to Cassie as a wedding present, the way his great-grandfather had built it as a wedding gift, his grandmother had passed it to him when he married Sara, the way she’d pass it on to one of her kids. He’d retire officially and then wait for the rest of the team to catch up, because it would never be rest with any one of them still in the field. And then he’d retire for real.
He’d get a house with a big, sunny yard and a swing set and lots of bedrooms. Teal’c would have his own to crash out in for weeks at a time when he was on-world visiting, and Daniel would very slowly take over the study and throw himself into that revised history of human civilization he’d have published posthumously, and Sam and Cameron would bring the baby over on weekends and holidays and long afternoons just because. And that would be enough.