DISCLAIMER: Yeah, the SG-1 guys are all property of MGM, World 
Gekko Corp and Double Secret productions. This is all in fun, no 
infringement on copyrights or trademarks was intended. All other 
characters, ideas, etc., herein are copyrighted to the author.
TITLE: THE INTIMACY OF SHADOWS
AUTHOR: Rowan Darkstar
EMAIL: rowan_d1@yahoo.com
RATING: Mature
CATEGORIES: Angst, Sam/Jack
ARCHIVE: Yes, just let me know.

Written for the GateShip Wednesday Shorts "There But For the 
Grace of God" Challenge.


"The Intimacy of Shadows"
by 
Rowan Darkstar (rowan_d1@yahoo.com)


She knows these realities exist, knows in her scientific mind 
that the other paths and convolutions of the course of things are 
progressing somewhere, concurrent to her own.

She also knows such things are not carried on the skin of a man.

Yet she feels it.

She feels it from the moment they find Daniel on the floor and 
help him back through the gate.  A sense of...something.  Like a 
dream half forgotten that still holds her in its grasp.

Captain Samantha Carter stands in her quarters bathroom, washing 
the day off her face, and in the silence around her, the memories 
that aren't memories bloom and move like shadows.  She can't 
delay their grasp.

**"Hey.  Are you shaking?"

Sam shakes her head, hair brushing the line of her jaw, dragging 
across her shoulder.  Her skin is still damp from washing her 
face.  "No...Jack...  I'm fine.  I'm just tired.  Been a long 
day."

"Hey..."  His voice is so soft, it courses beneath her skin like 
warm oil, spreads through her taut and aching muscles.  The 
infinite tenderness in the calloused fingers on her cheek leaves 
her aching and needing in a way Captain Carter has never 
consciously known.  "Sam...tell me."

"I'm all right," Dr. Carter whispers, but there are tears burning 
her eyes.**

Captain Carter stares at her reflection in the mirror in the 
cramped bathroom and grips the sink so tight her knuckles sting.  
She's tired.  She's dreaming.  She's imagining.  This can't be...

**"Come here."

His heavy, strong hand is cupping the back of her neck, and 
they're forehead to forehead, her hair falling across his skin.  
"Tell me.  Did he hurt you?  Dr. Frasier said..."

"He didn't hurt me.  Just...shook me up a little."

"Are you telling me everything?  Did he touch you?  Sam, you're 
not a soldier, you're not supposed to be used to this stuff, you 
were interrogating one of the worst Goa'uld basta--"

"He didn't touch me.  I just...I heard the staff blasts, and I 
didn't know if you were...and then he had a knife to my throat, 
and I'm fine, it just...I'm just a little shaken.  I'm just...I'm 
really glad we're here right now."  Her voice is quivering, and 
her gut is starting to ache as the weight of their day spreads 
through her blood.

She's unbuttoned her blouse, was supposed to be getting ready for 
bed, and Jack slips his hand beneath the silk, seeking the 
intimate contact.  "We're here.  It's all over.  We're okay.  
We're okay."  Her jaw tightens and she nods her head, but Jack's 
hand turns her insistently to meet his gaze, his eyes dark and 
infinite and so so beautiful.  "Hey.  No tough girl act.  You're 
the toughest woman on this base, soldiers included, and we both 
know that.  But you let it go with me, hunh?  Always."  He 
reaches back and snaps the barrette from her hair, and the last 
of her long locks fall across her face.  His lips press to her 
temple, and tears slip down her cheek.**

Sam Carter hasn't cried in front of a man in too long for her to 
remember, not when someone wasn't dying or dead or....  Maybe she 
never has at all.

But she's remembering waking from a trance and landing in Colonel 
O'Neill's arms and the strong hands in her hair and it's getting 
all mixed up with--

**"Sssshhhh... Come on.  Come here."  His arms encircle her, 
holding so tight it almost hurts, her breasts pressed to the flat 
of his chest, face buried in the flushed, tender skin of his 
neck.  Jack has never known his own strength.  And she loves that 
in him.  With all his training, his raw power, he could take 
her down in a second, but she has never felt safer than wrapped 
in his arms.

He moves his hands up her back, over the tight muscles, and she's 
melting against him and never wants to let go.  So many months 
before she let him inside.  So many stolen smiles and gentle 
flirtations, gradually seeing through the hard-shelled Colonel to 
the quiet wonder beneath.  Breaking down walls and kicking 
through barriers until one cold night in the four-poster bed at 
the cabin, he told her out loud about Charlie and he cried across 
her lap like a child, and two days later she showed up on his 
doorstep in tears over a million things she couldn't even 
remember but were all somehow about needing him and letting him 
in to see the little girl who lost her mother and can't quite 
believe her family won't leave her again.

She has this now, and it's still a little foreign, but she knows 
she can never let go and the ring on her finger means a little 
more than it should.

She's shaking.

She pulls back from his embrace, bodies entangled, and when their 
lips meet, she can taste her own tears on his lips.  They don't 
speak much.  There are whispered devotions, quiet comforts, and 
as the clothes fall away and they tumble into their bed, every 
touch is as much an affirmation as it is an act of love.  When 
she nears climax in his arms, it all hits her with her defenses 
shattered and broken, and he knows and he understands without 
being told.  "It's all right, Samantha.  I've got you.  I've got 
you."  And she lets him catch her when she falls.  When she 
collapses in exhaustion and flirts with slumber, she is wrapped 
tight in his arms, skin on skin, and the scent of Jack O'Neill 
grounds her and keeps her safe in her skin.**

Captain Carter sits on the floor of her quarters, her back 
against the wall, knees up to her chest; shaking as the shadows 
round her seem to move.  He's all over her skin.

"Oh, God..."  Her voice is throaty and harsh, and she doesn't 
recognize the sound as her own.

Colonel...*Jack*...O'Neill.  She has to be imagining, but she's 
never thought about...

"Oh, God..."  She can smell him.  She can feel his lips on her 
breasts.  But it's his hand on her ribcage, something in the 
intimacy, the melding, the connection, that has her insides 
scampering like leaves in the wind.

Half an hour, and she's in the almost deserted mess hall sipping 
coffee and trying to read the results of her latest atmospheric 
analysis and pretend the numbers mean something to her frazzled 
brain.

An hour after that and she's tapping gently on the door of 
Daniel's quarters.  He opens the door, bleary-eyed and dressed in 
sweats and a stretched out t-shirt.

"Sam.  Hey, what's going on?"

"Daniel.  God, I'm sorry, didn't mean to wake you, I just--"

"No, no, it's fine, what..."  He waits for a response.

She clears her throat, slips her hands in her pockets and drags 
the toe of her boot against the floor.  "I'm sorry, I just...I 
wanted to ask...  In this...other reality you saw...did I...did 
she...was my hair...longer?"

His eyebrows lift, and she hopes she isn't blushing and her 
stomach washes hot when a flash of skin and lips and breath on 
her neck blurs across the present.

Daniel clears his throat, watching her and squinting like he 
wishes he had grabbed his glasses.  "Um...yeah...yeah, it 
was...," he gestures vaguely toward his neck, "below your 
shoulders, and...pulled back in a...clip or..something..."

She nods.  Doesn't speak.  Then, "Thanks.  Go back to sleep."

"Sam, you okay?"

"I'm fine."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah.  I'm sorry I woke you."

She walks away, feeling Daniel's eyes on her back.

She needs to go home.  She needs to stop thinking.  She needs to 
stop wondering how she'll stand next to Colonel O'Neill at the 
base of the gate ramp at 0900.

She needs to play tough girl.


*****


rowan_d1@yahoo.com