By One’s Own Hand
Jul. 2nd, 2022 01:14 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
stringertheoryTitle: By One’s Own Hand
Rating: PG-13
Fandom: Stargate SG-1
Characters: Samantha Carter, Jack O’Neill
Word Count: 2937
Categories: character study, drama, angst
Spoilers/Warnings: Post-episode story for “Seth” (3.2); spoilers for that episode. Discussion of killing.
Summary: Everyone knows Sam is capable of activating the hand device now. She’s called upon to test it, but isn’t sure whether she succeeds or fails.
Everyone had been thrilled by the news that Sam had been able to use Selmak’s hand device. Most of all the research and development department.
In all their previous experiments with the device that had been recovered from Cimmeria, Sam had been unable to get anything more than a tepid response from her exertions. The R&D team hadn’t bothered trying to hide their disappointment or frustration, and Sam was sure it was because they knew she was holding back. It wasn’t that she didn’t want figure out how the device worked; she just couldn’t fully embrace the fact that she was integral to the process. The device had frightened her, even then, when she only knew what it could do from having been on the receiving end.
She hadn’t been called down to the lab for any tests in months. But now that she had proven that she was capable of controlling the device, even under duress, she had no choice. General Hammond had agreed to loan her to R&D full-time for a week, standing SG-1 down in the meantime. If they could get anything out of the experiments in that time, he felt it was worth the trade off.
So Sam had reluctantly donned the hand device once again. As much as she wasn’t looking forward to using the device, she didn’t actively resist connecting with it. Not intentionally, at least. She understood everyone’s excitement and honestly wished she could share in it. The best she could do was try to produce actual results as quickly as possible and hope that would be enough convince the general to cut short her one-week stint as a guinea pig.
The first day didn’t go well, though. As much as she’d told herself that she was going to give it her all and not hold back, her body refused to cooperate. No matter how hard she focused, nothing happened. Even if the previous reactions she’d managed to generate during testing had been less than impressive, getting nothing at all felt like a major setback. Everyone went home disappointed that day.
But on the second day, she accidentally threw one of the research assistants across the lab.
It was actually the assistant’s fault: they hadn’t been paying attention to what they were doing and had walked right into the device’s path just as Sam finally got it to work. They weren’t hurt, just a little stunned, but Sam was horrified.
Just before it had happened, her vision had narrowed, tunneling in on the lab wall she’d been pointing the device toward. It had felt like time slowed down, just for a second, and the only things she had been aware of were her heart pounding in her chest, the thoughts running through her mind, and the feeling of the device flaring to life, electricity crackling under her skin. In that split second, she’d forgotten where she was, that there were other people around, that what she was doing was dangerous. She’d only felt the desire and the power.
In any other situation, Sam would’ve seen the assistant coming. She would’ve noticed them walking into her path and been able to stop them, or herself, to stop the accident before it occurred. But she’d completely lost herself in the device and that disturbed her even more than the fact that the assistant’s initial befuddlement had rapidly been replaced by raw excitement. What they were doing was dangerous, she was dangerous, and nobody cared but her.
She wanted to stop then but knew there was no way anyone would agree to that. Now that she’d managed to use the device in a controlled setting, she would have to keep going. So she bit her tongue and held her nerve.
On day three, she was able to control the device’s blast with enough precision to throw Siler, who wore head-to-toe protective gear, into a waiting pile of mats. He popped back to his feet as soon as he came to a stop, ready to go again, and Sam tried to make her stomach stop jumping. By the end of the day, having managed to fling Siler across the lab two more times without hurting him, she started to calm down. She hadn’t ever exactly gotten him to go in the direction she’d meant for him to, but he at least always wound up on the mats. Maybe she could do this after all.
That all went to hell on day four.
Knowing that they were on the downhill slope of the time they’d been allotted with her, the R&D team pushed her to try for maximum power. She fought against it, arguing that it was too dangerous, that she could hurt someone or even cause severe damage to the lab, but they’d anticipated her concerns. They led her to a firing range that had been outfitted especially for the test. Sam knew that the walls in this area were made to handle heavy blasts, and the team had set up their equipment so that they would be behind shields and behind her, nowhere near where she would be aiming: at a reinforced and shielded wall, and nothing else.
She was officially out of excuses.
It took her a few tries to be successful. Even knowing that every precaution had been taken, even knowing she was only aiming at bare wall, she still hesitated. She knew what the device could do at full power, and she knew what it felt like, and she didn’t like either. So unintentionally or not, she was blocking herself again.
But as the silence in the room grew more tense with impatience, and as her own frustrations with her fears increased, it finally happened.
She realized it was going to work a fraction of a second before it did, just enough time to brace herself so the recoil didn’t knock her down. The blast hit the shielding on the wall so hard it dented, the metallic thud echoing in the quiet of the room. Sam stood there, trembling, for three full seconds before she fumbled the device off of her hand and dropped it on the nearest table. She managed to get out of the room before she started running.
She almost didn’t make it to the bathroom. She all but fell into the first stall, losing the contents of her stomach even as her knees hit the ground. Once she felt like she could stand again, she flushed the toilet and shakily made her way to the sink, washing out her mouth and splashing cold water on her face.
When she heard the bathroom door open behind her, she jerked upright, trying to appear normal and mentally preparing herself to leave. But she stopped when Colonel O’Neill’s reflection appeared in the mirror. She turned to face him, locking her knees against their quivering.
“Sir.”
“Carter.”
“This is a women’s bathroom, sir.”
“I know.”
She didn’t mention that the bathroom was empty. She wasn’t sure it would matter if it wasn’t. She suspected he already knew it was.
He put his hands in his pockets and leaned against the wall by the paper towel dispenser. “Heard you had some luck with the device today.”
She wondered who had told him, and how they had told him so quickly. She didn’t think she’d been in the bathroom that long.
“Yes, sir.”
“And?”
“And nothing, sir. I was about to head back.”
“What’s going on, Carter?”
“Sir?”
“I get a call that you ran out of the firing range, white as a sheet, and I find you in here looking like you can barely stand up. What’s going on?”
She pushed down the resentment at the thought that he’d been keeping tabs on her. If he had, that was his prerogative as her CO. And maybe he hadn’t. Maybe he was just the person that got notified when someone thought there was something wrong with her. That made as much sense as anything.
She was still angry, though. She hadn’t asked for this, hadn’t asked for any of it, and now everything was being asked of her. And she was angry that it was, angry that no one seemed to care how she felt, angry that she now had to have this conversation. So she took a breath and then another before she answered.
“I just needed a minute, sir. That’s all.”
“Why?”
She ground her teeth together so hard she was surprised he didn’t hear it. She could feel her fingernails digging into her palms and she forced herself to relax her hands. Her knees were still shaky, but her chest felt empty.
“Does it matter, sir?”
He studied her more closely. She didn’t look away.
“Of course it does.”
He said it as if it were the most obvious answer in the world, but they both knew that was a lie. So often it didn’t matter—usually it didn’t matter—so the fact that he was acting like it did broke her a little. She sagged, just enough that her butt hit the countertop and she could lean against it. She braced her hands on her knees and stared at the floor.
“I—I hate using that device.”
“Why?”
She looked up, gaze searching his face, and wondered if there was any way she could explain that he would understand.
“I killed Seth.”
He nodded. “I know. I was there. But you aren’t being asked to kill anyone now.”
Yet, she thought, but she didn’t say it. She thought he heard it anyway.
“You aren’t bothered about having killed a Goa’uld, are you?” His tone was faintly incredulous. He seemed uncomfortable, as if he were contemplating how best to comfort her if that were the case.
She shook her head. “No.”
“You’ve killed before, Carter. We both have. What’s bothering you?”
“It’s different.”
“How?”
She shook her head again but didn’t respond, returning her gaze to the floor. He pushed off the wall to step a bit closer to her. Sam could just see his boots come into her field of vision before he stopped.
“C’mon, Carter, you gotta help me understand. What’s going on with you?”
“What does it feel like when you shoot someone?”
He went very still.
“What do you mean?”
He was dodging the question, and it annoyed her. He was the one who had started this conversation. She lifted her head to glare at him.
“When you shoot someone, what does it feel like, sir?”
It was his turn to avoid her gaze, scuffing the toe of his boot against the floor. “I don’t know, Carter—”
“The gun doesn’t fire on its own, right?”
He looked back up at her. “No.”
“No matter what you think, no matter how hard you might picture firing at someone while you have the gun in your hand, you have to actually pull the trigger, right?”
“Yeah.”
“The hand device is the opposite. The only way to use it is with your thoughts.”
She saw the other shoe drop, could see his expression shift as he realized what she meant.
“Ah.”
She ran a hand through her hair. “And it’s more than that. If it were just that, it wouldn’t be so bad. I mean, it would still be bad, but it’s actually worse.”
“What’s worse?”
“The way it feels.” Her stomach turned again, and she breathed through it. “I think it’s built-in to all the technology the Goa’uld reserve for themselves. It—it feels—” She wasn’t sure she could say it, wasn’t sure she wanted to put it out there.
“What?” His tone was neutral, his gaze curious and understanding.
“Powerful. Exhilarating.” She closed her eyes, unable to look at him for the last word. “Good.”
She heard the rustle of clothing, him shifting his weight from foot to foot, but he didn’t speak. She opened her eyes.
“I’m scared of the hand device and yet when I successfully use it, I feel—” She waved a hand ineffectually.
“High?”
She blinked at him, surprised he’d supplied the exact word she’d been looking for. “Yeah, kind of.”
“Carter—”
“Sir, when I killed Seth, I didn’t even mean to. He raised his own device toward me and I just reacted instinctively. I didn’t think about killing him, I just raised the hand that had the device on it and—”
“Blasted him.”
“I wonder if it’s like that for them. If using the device is instinctive and not something they have to think about the way I do.” She paused, but decided if she were going to be honest, she might as well do it completely. “I almost asked Selmak but I couldn’t. Dad had agreed to go with me to see Mark and I didn’t want to ruin that.”
“We could always send him a message. Or the Tok’ra in general. From the general.”
She knew what he was doing, trying to nudge humor into the conversation. She shook her head.
“It’s fine, sir, I just—I worry, you know? If I could kill Seth without even thinking about it, I could do it again. What if I did it in testing? And what if I got to the point where it was instinctive? Would that make me less or more dangerous?”
“Carter, I don’t know if it makes it better or worse to hear this, but you’re dangerous enough without that damn device.”
He was trying, so she gave him a weak smile. It was the best she could do at the moment.
“Yes, sir.”
“And I get that using it is scary but, it’s not like the general is ever going to arm you with the thing and send you out in the field. We just want to figure out how it works so we can maybe create our own—trigger-enabled—blasters. You aren’t going to hurt anyone with it.”
She nodded and pushed off the counter to stand upright again. Her knees were steady this time. “You’re right, sir. And I know all that. It’s just… uncomfortable to handle the device, that’s all. I can do this. I know every precaution will be taken to ensure no one gets hurt.”
“Except maybe you.”
The words were muttered, and Sam wasn’t quite sure she’d heard what she thought she’d heard. She frowned at him in question, but the colonel shook his head and opened the bathroom door, gesturing for her to go out ahead of him.
“Nothing, Carter. I need to go talk to the general.”
She nodded and started back toward the firing range, but his hand on her arm stopped her, and he pulled her instead toward the elevators with him.
“No more testing today. I told them to use the time to analyze all the data I’m sure they got from this morning’s successful firing.”
She frowned at him, surprised, but nodded. “Okay.”
“It’s just about lunch time,” he said checking his watch. “Why don’t you go pry our beloved archaeologist from his lab. He’s barely left there since we’ve been on stand-down.”
“Yes, sir. I’ll see if we can find Teal’c, too. I haven’t seen him all week.”
“Excellent idea.”
She rode in the elevator with the colonel up to the level where Daniel’s lab was, then waved him off as he continued on his way to General Hammond’s office. Sam did coax Daniel out of his lab, eventually, and they did manage to find Teal’c in his quarters. So when the colonel joined them in the commissary, the entire team was together for the first time since they’d been put on stand-down. Their lunchtime conversation didn’t include any references to the testing Sam had been roped into, and focusing on the other topics calmed the last bit of unsettled emotions she had leftover from the morning’s events.
When Sam showed up at the firing range the next day, the equipment from the previous day’s set-up was gone. She went to the main R&D labs instead, but was told that they wouldn’t be doing any more testing that week. She tried to get an explanation, but was only told that they’d been moved to more urgent projects.
She returned to her own lab and found an email from the general advising SG-1 that their next mission had been scheduled for the following day. She spent the morning reading over the mission files and preparing her own notes for the afternoon briefing.
At the briefing, no one else questioned why their week of stand-down had been shortened by three days. General Hammond didn’t mention it, so Sam didn’t either. But she knew. And so did Colonel O’Neill.
When they were lined up at the base of the Gate ramp the next day, waiting for the dialing sequence to be completed, Sam casually stepped to the colonel’s side. He was looking at the Gate, fiddling with the band of his cap, and she could tell he purposefully hadn’t looked around when she appeared beside him. She followed suit and looked at the Gate instead of him.
“Thank you, sir,” she said, keeping her voice low enough that only he would hear her.
“No idea what you’re talking about, Carter.” But he also kept his voice quiet.
“Of course not, sir. Thank you anyway.”
He looked at her, then, just a quick glance from the corner of his eye. “Any time, Carter.”
She nodded, and he took a breath before pulling on his cap and turning to harass Daniel about the details of the planet they were about to visit.
Rating: PG-13
Fandom: Stargate SG-1
Characters: Samantha Carter, Jack O’Neill
Word Count: 2937
Categories: character study, drama, angst
Spoilers/Warnings: Post-episode story for “Seth” (3.2); spoilers for that episode. Discussion of killing.
Summary: Everyone knows Sam is capable of activating the hand device now. She’s called upon to test it, but isn’t sure whether she succeeds or fails.
Everyone had been thrilled by the news that Sam had been able to use Selmak’s hand device. Most of all the research and development department.
In all their previous experiments with the device that had been recovered from Cimmeria, Sam had been unable to get anything more than a tepid response from her exertions. The R&D team hadn’t bothered trying to hide their disappointment or frustration, and Sam was sure it was because they knew she was holding back. It wasn’t that she didn’t want figure out how the device worked; she just couldn’t fully embrace the fact that she was integral to the process. The device had frightened her, even then, when she only knew what it could do from having been on the receiving end.
She hadn’t been called down to the lab for any tests in months. But now that she had proven that she was capable of controlling the device, even under duress, she had no choice. General Hammond had agreed to loan her to R&D full-time for a week, standing SG-1 down in the meantime. If they could get anything out of the experiments in that time, he felt it was worth the trade off.
So Sam had reluctantly donned the hand device once again. As much as she wasn’t looking forward to using the device, she didn’t actively resist connecting with it. Not intentionally, at least. She understood everyone’s excitement and honestly wished she could share in it. The best she could do was try to produce actual results as quickly as possible and hope that would be enough convince the general to cut short her one-week stint as a guinea pig.
The first day didn’t go well, though. As much as she’d told herself that she was going to give it her all and not hold back, her body refused to cooperate. No matter how hard she focused, nothing happened. Even if the previous reactions she’d managed to generate during testing had been less than impressive, getting nothing at all felt like a major setback. Everyone went home disappointed that day.
But on the second day, she accidentally threw one of the research assistants across the lab.
It was actually the assistant’s fault: they hadn’t been paying attention to what they were doing and had walked right into the device’s path just as Sam finally got it to work. They weren’t hurt, just a little stunned, but Sam was horrified.
Just before it had happened, her vision had narrowed, tunneling in on the lab wall she’d been pointing the device toward. It had felt like time slowed down, just for a second, and the only things she had been aware of were her heart pounding in her chest, the thoughts running through her mind, and the feeling of the device flaring to life, electricity crackling under her skin. In that split second, she’d forgotten where she was, that there were other people around, that what she was doing was dangerous. She’d only felt the desire and the power.
In any other situation, Sam would’ve seen the assistant coming. She would’ve noticed them walking into her path and been able to stop them, or herself, to stop the accident before it occurred. But she’d completely lost herself in the device and that disturbed her even more than the fact that the assistant’s initial befuddlement had rapidly been replaced by raw excitement. What they were doing was dangerous, she was dangerous, and nobody cared but her.
She wanted to stop then but knew there was no way anyone would agree to that. Now that she’d managed to use the device in a controlled setting, she would have to keep going. So she bit her tongue and held her nerve.
On day three, she was able to control the device’s blast with enough precision to throw Siler, who wore head-to-toe protective gear, into a waiting pile of mats. He popped back to his feet as soon as he came to a stop, ready to go again, and Sam tried to make her stomach stop jumping. By the end of the day, having managed to fling Siler across the lab two more times without hurting him, she started to calm down. She hadn’t ever exactly gotten him to go in the direction she’d meant for him to, but he at least always wound up on the mats. Maybe she could do this after all.
That all went to hell on day four.
Knowing that they were on the downhill slope of the time they’d been allotted with her, the R&D team pushed her to try for maximum power. She fought against it, arguing that it was too dangerous, that she could hurt someone or even cause severe damage to the lab, but they’d anticipated her concerns. They led her to a firing range that had been outfitted especially for the test. Sam knew that the walls in this area were made to handle heavy blasts, and the team had set up their equipment so that they would be behind shields and behind her, nowhere near where she would be aiming: at a reinforced and shielded wall, and nothing else.
She was officially out of excuses.
It took her a few tries to be successful. Even knowing that every precaution had been taken, even knowing she was only aiming at bare wall, she still hesitated. She knew what the device could do at full power, and she knew what it felt like, and she didn’t like either. So unintentionally or not, she was blocking herself again.
But as the silence in the room grew more tense with impatience, and as her own frustrations with her fears increased, it finally happened.
She realized it was going to work a fraction of a second before it did, just enough time to brace herself so the recoil didn’t knock her down. The blast hit the shielding on the wall so hard it dented, the metallic thud echoing in the quiet of the room. Sam stood there, trembling, for three full seconds before she fumbled the device off of her hand and dropped it on the nearest table. She managed to get out of the room before she started running.
She almost didn’t make it to the bathroom. She all but fell into the first stall, losing the contents of her stomach even as her knees hit the ground. Once she felt like she could stand again, she flushed the toilet and shakily made her way to the sink, washing out her mouth and splashing cold water on her face.
When she heard the bathroom door open behind her, she jerked upright, trying to appear normal and mentally preparing herself to leave. But she stopped when Colonel O’Neill’s reflection appeared in the mirror. She turned to face him, locking her knees against their quivering.
“Sir.”
“Carter.”
“This is a women’s bathroom, sir.”
“I know.”
She didn’t mention that the bathroom was empty. She wasn’t sure it would matter if it wasn’t. She suspected he already knew it was.
He put his hands in his pockets and leaned against the wall by the paper towel dispenser. “Heard you had some luck with the device today.”
She wondered who had told him, and how they had told him so quickly. She didn’t think she’d been in the bathroom that long.
“Yes, sir.”
“And?”
“And nothing, sir. I was about to head back.”
“What’s going on, Carter?”
“Sir?”
“I get a call that you ran out of the firing range, white as a sheet, and I find you in here looking like you can barely stand up. What’s going on?”
She pushed down the resentment at the thought that he’d been keeping tabs on her. If he had, that was his prerogative as her CO. And maybe he hadn’t. Maybe he was just the person that got notified when someone thought there was something wrong with her. That made as much sense as anything.
She was still angry, though. She hadn’t asked for this, hadn’t asked for any of it, and now everything was being asked of her. And she was angry that it was, angry that no one seemed to care how she felt, angry that she now had to have this conversation. So she took a breath and then another before she answered.
“I just needed a minute, sir. That’s all.”
“Why?”
She ground her teeth together so hard she was surprised he didn’t hear it. She could feel her fingernails digging into her palms and she forced herself to relax her hands. Her knees were still shaky, but her chest felt empty.
“Does it matter, sir?”
He studied her more closely. She didn’t look away.
“Of course it does.”
He said it as if it were the most obvious answer in the world, but they both knew that was a lie. So often it didn’t matter—usually it didn’t matter—so the fact that he was acting like it did broke her a little. She sagged, just enough that her butt hit the countertop and she could lean against it. She braced her hands on her knees and stared at the floor.
“I—I hate using that device.”
“Why?”
She looked up, gaze searching his face, and wondered if there was any way she could explain that he would understand.
“I killed Seth.”
He nodded. “I know. I was there. But you aren’t being asked to kill anyone now.”
Yet, she thought, but she didn’t say it. She thought he heard it anyway.
“You aren’t bothered about having killed a Goa’uld, are you?” His tone was faintly incredulous. He seemed uncomfortable, as if he were contemplating how best to comfort her if that were the case.
She shook her head. “No.”
“You’ve killed before, Carter. We both have. What’s bothering you?”
“It’s different.”
“How?”
She shook her head again but didn’t respond, returning her gaze to the floor. He pushed off the wall to step a bit closer to her. Sam could just see his boots come into her field of vision before he stopped.
“C’mon, Carter, you gotta help me understand. What’s going on with you?”
“What does it feel like when you shoot someone?”
He went very still.
“What do you mean?”
He was dodging the question, and it annoyed her. He was the one who had started this conversation. She lifted her head to glare at him.
“When you shoot someone, what does it feel like, sir?”
It was his turn to avoid her gaze, scuffing the toe of his boot against the floor. “I don’t know, Carter—”
“The gun doesn’t fire on its own, right?”
He looked back up at her. “No.”
“No matter what you think, no matter how hard you might picture firing at someone while you have the gun in your hand, you have to actually pull the trigger, right?”
“Yeah.”
“The hand device is the opposite. The only way to use it is with your thoughts.”
She saw the other shoe drop, could see his expression shift as he realized what she meant.
“Ah.”
She ran a hand through her hair. “And it’s more than that. If it were just that, it wouldn’t be so bad. I mean, it would still be bad, but it’s actually worse.”
“What’s worse?”
“The way it feels.” Her stomach turned again, and she breathed through it. “I think it’s built-in to all the technology the Goa’uld reserve for themselves. It—it feels—” She wasn’t sure she could say it, wasn’t sure she wanted to put it out there.
“What?” His tone was neutral, his gaze curious and understanding.
“Powerful. Exhilarating.” She closed her eyes, unable to look at him for the last word. “Good.”
She heard the rustle of clothing, him shifting his weight from foot to foot, but he didn’t speak. She opened her eyes.
“I’m scared of the hand device and yet when I successfully use it, I feel—” She waved a hand ineffectually.
“High?”
She blinked at him, surprised he’d supplied the exact word she’d been looking for. “Yeah, kind of.”
“Carter—”
“Sir, when I killed Seth, I didn’t even mean to. He raised his own device toward me and I just reacted instinctively. I didn’t think about killing him, I just raised the hand that had the device on it and—”
“Blasted him.”
“I wonder if it’s like that for them. If using the device is instinctive and not something they have to think about the way I do.” She paused, but decided if she were going to be honest, she might as well do it completely. “I almost asked Selmak but I couldn’t. Dad had agreed to go with me to see Mark and I didn’t want to ruin that.”
“We could always send him a message. Or the Tok’ra in general. From the general.”
She knew what he was doing, trying to nudge humor into the conversation. She shook her head.
“It’s fine, sir, I just—I worry, you know? If I could kill Seth without even thinking about it, I could do it again. What if I did it in testing? And what if I got to the point where it was instinctive? Would that make me less or more dangerous?”
“Carter, I don’t know if it makes it better or worse to hear this, but you’re dangerous enough without that damn device.”
He was trying, so she gave him a weak smile. It was the best she could do at the moment.
“Yes, sir.”
“And I get that using it is scary but, it’s not like the general is ever going to arm you with the thing and send you out in the field. We just want to figure out how it works so we can maybe create our own—trigger-enabled—blasters. You aren’t going to hurt anyone with it.”
She nodded and pushed off the counter to stand upright again. Her knees were steady this time. “You’re right, sir. And I know all that. It’s just… uncomfortable to handle the device, that’s all. I can do this. I know every precaution will be taken to ensure no one gets hurt.”
“Except maybe you.”
The words were muttered, and Sam wasn’t quite sure she’d heard what she thought she’d heard. She frowned at him in question, but the colonel shook his head and opened the bathroom door, gesturing for her to go out ahead of him.
“Nothing, Carter. I need to go talk to the general.”
She nodded and started back toward the firing range, but his hand on her arm stopped her, and he pulled her instead toward the elevators with him.
“No more testing today. I told them to use the time to analyze all the data I’m sure they got from this morning’s successful firing.”
She frowned at him, surprised, but nodded. “Okay.”
“It’s just about lunch time,” he said checking his watch. “Why don’t you go pry our beloved archaeologist from his lab. He’s barely left there since we’ve been on stand-down.”
“Yes, sir. I’ll see if we can find Teal’c, too. I haven’t seen him all week.”
“Excellent idea.”
She rode in the elevator with the colonel up to the level where Daniel’s lab was, then waved him off as he continued on his way to General Hammond’s office. Sam did coax Daniel out of his lab, eventually, and they did manage to find Teal’c in his quarters. So when the colonel joined them in the commissary, the entire team was together for the first time since they’d been put on stand-down. Their lunchtime conversation didn’t include any references to the testing Sam had been roped into, and focusing on the other topics calmed the last bit of unsettled emotions she had leftover from the morning’s events.
When Sam showed up at the firing range the next day, the equipment from the previous day’s set-up was gone. She went to the main R&D labs instead, but was told that they wouldn’t be doing any more testing that week. She tried to get an explanation, but was only told that they’d been moved to more urgent projects.
She returned to her own lab and found an email from the general advising SG-1 that their next mission had been scheduled for the following day. She spent the morning reading over the mission files and preparing her own notes for the afternoon briefing.
At the briefing, no one else questioned why their week of stand-down had been shortened by three days. General Hammond didn’t mention it, so Sam didn’t either. But she knew. And so did Colonel O’Neill.
When they were lined up at the base of the Gate ramp the next day, waiting for the dialing sequence to be completed, Sam casually stepped to the colonel’s side. He was looking at the Gate, fiddling with the band of his cap, and she could tell he purposefully hadn’t looked around when she appeared beside him. She followed suit and looked at the Gate instead of him.
“Thank you, sir,” she said, keeping her voice low enough that only he would hear her.
“No idea what you’re talking about, Carter.” But he also kept his voice quiet.
“Of course not, sir. Thank you anyway.”
He looked at her, then, just a quick glance from the corner of his eye. “Any time, Carter.”
She nodded, and he took a breath before pulling on his cap and turning to harass Daniel about the details of the planet they were about to visit.