AUTHOR'S NOTE--PLEASE READ: This story is loosely based on one
basic spoiler for 'Threads'. All other 'Threads' storylines do
not apply in this fic (therefore rendering it AU after 'Gemini')
I am largely UNspoiled for 'Threads' (and wish to remain so until
it airs here March 11th). This story is not intended to
accurately fit in with the episode, it only borrows from certain
premises and runs its own way with them.:) I am asking, however,
if you should be so kind as to send feedback my way PLEASE KEEP
THE FEEDBACK SPOILER-FREE FOR 'THREADS'! Thank you so much.:)


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: PLANETARY SHIFTS 3: HEARING
AUTHOR: Rowan Darkstar
EMAIL: rowan_d1@yahoo.com
WEBSITE: http://rowan_d.tripod.com
RATING: (PG)
ARCHIVE: All archives fine as long as you let me know.
CATEGORIES: Angst, Sam/Jack
STATUS: Complete
SPOILERS: 'Threads' (only one--see note above)
SUMMARY: "This visceral magnetism and constant in his life was
something he had never attempted to understand. It simply
existed."


Endless thanks to my betas: Teddy E and Foxcat and annaK for
endless encouragement, and for letting me know when I'm actually
writing three separate stories at once and helping me pull them
neatly apart.:)



PLANETARY SHIFTS 3: HEARING
by
Rowan Darkstar (rowan_d1@yahoo.com)
Copyright (c) 2005


"Crashing on the ground
the silence seems to suffocate
and bury me again
Waiting for a taste
of happiness to lift me free
and carry me away"
--"Yesterday Went Too Soon" by Feeder



Valentine's Day made it all seem...real.

He didn't understand how things fell anymore, and he didn't know
what to do about the yellow tulips. Valentine's Day was never a
big deal around the SGC. Seemed a little out of synch with the
whole Death From Above motif, he supposed. But SG-1 had always
had their own little traditions. Presents were not expected, but
they were not unheard of. Daniel had been known to ply Carter
with Fannie May chocolates, Carter had been known to slip cards
in all their mission binders, and once she had even stuffed a
foofy little teddy bear in Teal'c's gear pack. Just the kinds of
things that happened when your co-workers somehow became your
family when you weren't paying attention.

So the yellow tulips had never seemed out of line. He'd found
out how much she loved them on a mission to an agrarian village
years ago. She had seemed almost shy over her enjoyment of this
simple bit of beauty, standing in a field of wildflowers,
sniffing the tulips, with her P-90 angled out of the way and a
faint blush on her cheeks.

A few months later, when Valentine's Day had rolled around, he'd
made sure a vase of yellow tulips found its way into her lab.
Then it had become a kind of tradition, at least when they found
themselves on Earth for the occasion.

The whole deal had seemed so simple. Until this year, when Jack
O'Neill found himself standing in the local flower shop with a
self-conscious teenaged girl of a clerk staring at him, and he
wondered if he really had any business leaving yellow tulips on
another guy's fiancee's desk.

He'd been halfway home before he realized he should have ordered
something for Kerry.

Must have been a Thursday. Thursdays always confused him.


*****


Sam Carter didn't even realize she was expecting them when she
came to the door of her lab and found the vase of a dozen red
roses on the hallway floor. Roses. Delivered outside her locked
door. She stooped down and lifted the vase, breathing in the
earthy scent. A small pink card was tied to one of the stems.
"Happy Valentine's Day, Sammie. My Beautiful Valentine. Love,
Pete."

A faint smile graced her lips, and she sniffed the roses. They
were truly beautiful, the petals like velvet against her skin.
Such a brilliant contrast to the grey functionality of the SGC.
She slipped her keycard through the lock, returned a smile from a
passing Captain eyeing her flowers, and entered her lab. She
switched on the light and set down the roses on the nearest
table. And realized she'd been expecting something else.

The lab was just as she had left it the night before.


*****


Daniel Jackson was bored. Really really bored with the
research he was currently knee deep in. He loved his work.
Often the most tedious tasks of translation keyed him into a
comfort zone that made the work well worth his time. But he had
been working through the carvings on this stone SG-15 had brought
back for over a week now, and as far as he could tell he was
meticulously laboring to produce an extensive birth and death
record for a village long gone from the universe. Jack insisted
there was a good chance somewhere in those names was the alias of
a Tok'ra operative who might still be alive, and this stone could
hold a clue to his whereabouts. But Daniel highly suspected this
was one giant fabrication to keep him from bugging Jack about
Atlantis for a few days. In short...Daniel was bored and
annoyed, and the two didn't mix well.

So, as was his customary remedy for such a situation, he hauled
his work into Sam's lab and dove back into it there. Because
somehow, it was better to be bored and annoyed in the company of
one's close friend, than to be bored and annoyed alone.

Sam hardly spoke. She was lost in her own work today, oblivious
to his presence. In fact she was tackling her current set of
reactor overload simulations with a fervor normally reserved for
figuring out how to stop the world from blowing up in the next
ten hours. She hadn't looked up from her work more than twice
since he had settled himself into her lab, and lunch hour had
come and gone some time ago.

Daniel found himself eyeing Sam more than he was watching his
fascinating translations.

Her shoulders were tense. He could see it every time she drew a
deep breath and fought to stretch the muscles enough to draw
adequate air. She tilted her neck now and then, rubbed it with
her hand. And as he watched her, he began to notice her hand
moving to stroke absently at her stomach, touch light, just below
the apex of her ribcage.

Daniel gave up the pretense of progress and crossed the room to
take a seat on the stool beside Sam's.

She didn't look up from her work.

He reached over and closed his hand on top of Sam's where it
rested again on her stomach, her thumb gently stroking through
the black cotton of her shirt.

"Does it hurt?" he asked.

Sam turned, startled, eyes not seeing him at first, then seeming
to register his presence and the position they were currently in.
"What?" she stammered.

Daniel squeezed her hand, pressing gently into her abdomen.
"Does it hurt?" he asked again.

She glanced down at their hands, understanding dawning on a
visible wave of embarrassment. "Oh". She gave a timid laugh.
"Oh...no. Not really." He let his hand fall and she did the
same. "It's just..." she glanced away, started her words a few
times before they took, "...tummy's kind of tight." She
wrinkled her nose and shrugged her shoulders, painfully little-
girl in her shyness.

"How come?" He tucked his hands between his knees, feeling like
a school boy perched on his stool.

Sam shrugged again, seemed fascinated by the pen he had set on
the edge of her lab table. "Just...a lot on my plate right now,
I guess," she offered quietly.

He nodded. "Yeah." Then, "Everything okay?"

She bit the inside of her lip, and he realized she'd been doing
that a lot lately. She weighed his question for a moment. Then
she nodded. "Yeah. I'm fine."

"You want to tell me?" he asked.

She drew a long slow breath through her nose. "Don't really feel
like talking right now. I'm sorry..."

"No, don't be. It's okay."

She nodded. She looked concerned she had hurt him. He rubbed
her knee for a moment, then pulled his hand away. "It's okay.
Just...just be sure that you know I'm here if you ever DO want
to..."

"I do know. Thanks, Daniel."

They were quiet for a moment together. And that was okay.
Finally he said, "I want to help, Sam."

She flashed him a sweet Sam-smile. "You are," she said simply.

He didn't want that to be all there was. But he nodded anyway,
and she looked away, and he went back to his translations.


*****


Valentine's Day passed, and Jack tried to be less confused. All
hell was breaking loose in the galaxy and for once he found it a
welcome distraction, even if it still meant working shoulder to
shoulder with Carter at all hours. And somewhere in the middle
of it all, Carter found out he was seeing Kerry. Carter smiled
at him and said that was nice. Really. And he told himself
Carter hadn't looked like she'd had the wind knocked out of her
in a hand-to-hand. He told himself she was just as tired from
work as he was. Nothing she said was out of line. The roses in
her lab were still hanging on. Everything she brought to his
office was brilliant and helped perpetuate the myth that he
really was competent to be running the SGC.

On a Friday the Galaxy finally settled into a status quo for at
least a few hours. And he ordered his entire team to go the hell
home and get some rest and drink their share of beer.

He found Carter in the co-ed portion of the locker room, nearly
ready to head out.

"Carter!" he said, voice bright in greeting, though they had seen
one another less than half an hour before.

"Hey, sir." She gave a hint of a genuine grin and it warmed his
chest. But the sadness that had haunted her eyes for days (or
weeks) was still there. He was having more trouble denying it,
and he was still seeing her sitting on his front porch, crying in
the snow. "Finally heading home?" she asked.

Jack nodded. "Running as fast as I can. Which isn't very fast
at this point, I'm afraid." She responded with a cursory smile.

He was still in his BDUs, but Carter had already changed. She
was dressed in that dark burgundy leather set that made him
forget what he was talking about. A fitted pale blue blouse
flashed him now and then from beneath her open jacket.

She must have brought her bike this week.

Carter took a seat on the locker room bench and pulled one foot
up in front of her, cinching in and tying the laces on her brown
leather ankle boots.

"Big plans for the weekend?" he asked casually, working the lock
on his locker.

She didn't look up. He thought he heard her catch her breath
before she spoke. "Not really, sir. Just going to catch up on
some sleep, I think."

He laughed softly, "All hail to that," gathering his things for a
shower. He really wanted to be clean before he changed into his
street clothes. It had been a while, what with all the chaos...

Carter had showered. He smelled her shampoo.

"You, sir?" she asked, and he'd almost forgotten the question.

"Oh, um..." He shrugged, unfastened his watch and tossed it into
his locker. "No, nothing too special. The usual."

Carter didn't speak.

Jack grabbed his towel and a shaving kit and slammed his locker
door. "Well, have a good weekend, Carter. I'm off to the luxury
showers."

He tossed his towel over his shoulder and started for the door.

Carter's voice was so quiet he almost missed it. "I hate that
you're with her."

Jack missed a step, caught himself with a hand on the door frame.
"What?"

"I hate...that you're with her."

He felt like time stopped in the closed-in space, and the
vibrations of Carter's voice bounced off the walls with all the
hours in time to circle. The tremor beneath her words was
unmistakable and seemed magnified by the extended time. He
hadn't heard such feeling in her voice since she'd told Janet
Daniel had received a lethal dose of radiation.

It scared the hell out of him.

And made him feel he had gotten something back he'd lost too long
ago.

A slow burn spread from Jack's stomach, through his arms and
higher until his throat felt thick. He turned on his heel, boots
squeaking on the tile floor, and stared directly at his flagship
team leader. She was still sitting on the bench, feet on the
floor, shoulders tensed, fingers curled tight around the front
edge of the seat, and her gaze locked intently on some point near
his boots. Her expression was carefully frozen. Only the faint
quiver of her lips as she drew a breath betrayed the strain on
her composure.

Jack set his things on a chair beside the door, straightened up,
and said slowly, "Her or anyone?" His voice was flat.

Carter lifted her gaze to his, tears blurring her clear, sharp
eyes, though she showed no sign of acknowledging them. "Anyone,"
she said.

"Why?" He wanted everything in the world but to be angry. Yet
anger was all he could feel and he didn't want to stop and figure
out why while Carter's words were hot in his ears.

She shook her head. "I can't tell you. And I can't justify
anything. And..." She wrinkled her nose in something like
disgust, though with herself or him or everything he didn't know,
"...I have no right to say a word. I just...hate it. And I
wish...it would stop."

Anger burned his gut and fueled his words. "I'm sorry? You want
me to stop seeing Kerry? Why exactly is that?"

"I told you--"

"No, you said you couldn't tell me." The cold stung. He wanted
to regret it; did, somewhere deep he couldn't feel just yet.

"I told you I couldn't justify it, and I'm not asking you to do
anything, sir, I'm just telling you that's how I feel when--"

"Ya know, you're going to have to give me something more to go on
here, Colonel, than..." He shrugged and held out a hand. He was
being unbelievably cruel. But so many months of quiet and
resentment and it was flaring inside him like gasoline beneath a
match.

Carter struggled for words. And for once, words failed Sam
Carter, Ph.D.. She turned and looked up at him, her wide blue
eyes pleading and speaking to him in silent dissertations as they
had a thousand times before; on the field, over a P-90, on her
knees with a Zat pressed to her head.

"Jack...please..." Her whisper was without all armor.

And it cut through his anger like a razor slash.

"Carter..."

She was reaching out to him as they always had when they truly
needed one another, calling their lifelong bluff. She was asking
him to simply be...them..... Not to turn away. No words.
Nothing acknowledged. Just the simple devotion above all others
that had never failed them.

Every nerve in his body quaked with the need to go to her. This
visceral magnetism and constant in his life was something he had
never attempted to understand. It simply existed. Carter hurt,
and he was there. He needed something and she was a step behind
him, keeping him on his feet. The team all loved one another.
All of them. But he and Carter... Everyone understood there was
a difference.

Anger flared where it should have calmed. "Hey," he barked, and
he caught a flash of the soldier in Carter, the fear and
respectful deference at the reprimanding tone from her superior
officer. "You got engaged."

Carter nodded. "Yes, sir. I did."

"Why?" Losing hold of the General, again.

"What?"

"Why did you get engaged? I mean...I understand you seeing him.
You're human, I'm human, nobody should be alone all the time; I
get that, believe me, and Pete's a great guy. I meant it when I
said I was happy to see you happy, but...why did you agree to
marry him? If you still..."

"For the record, sir? We're...not anymore."

"Not what?"

"Not...engaged."

"There's a ring on your finger that says otherwise, Colonel."

Her eyes reflexively glanced toward the diamond. "Yeah. Well.
Sometimes letting go of something...even when you both know it's
over...isn't so easy for anyone involved."

That he could relate to. It hurt him that she could, too.

Jack took a step closer, watched her with narrowed eyes and his
hands on his hips. "What happened?" He didn't want to ask. He
didn't have a choice. He couldn't keep his voice from sounding
less cold and more empathetic.

Carter didn't move for a long time, and he thought perhaps she
wasn't going to respond. Or maybe she didn't know if he was
asking about her and Pete, or her and him. Then, she said
simply, "Reality." And to be honest, he wasn't sure which
question she'd answered.

"I know you care about him. I've seen you guys together. You're
good together. But if you feel... Why did you say yes, Carter?"

She gave a bitter laugh. Sniffed sharply and brushed at her nose
with the sleeve of her jacket. "I guess it doesn't matter
anymore." Her walls were rising. Bitterness was leaking into
her tone and the naked vulnerability he'd caught a moment ago was
evaporating from view.

"Carter." She looked up and met his gaze. Maybe because he was
her CO. He didn't care. Thing was, she was so damn beautiful
right now. So damn beautiful. "Why?" he asked, certain it was
for the last time.

He stared her down for all he was worth. She had to understand,
this was the moment. She had opened a door, and if they didn't
grasp this now, if they didn't force something to change, they
would sink back into the lies and platitudes that had coated
their lives until they were drowning. There was a limit to the
life of any secret, any charade.

He read her right. Her armor was not thick enough to survive his
determination. He saw his unspoken thoughts hit her like
physical blows, reflecting every hurt back upon him. The hard
set of her jaw gave way and her pale cheeks flushed.

"Because you took the promotion," she whispered.

He was lost. "What?"

"You took the fucking promotion..." Tears rushed her eyes as she
looked away, and there was so much incredulity and a hurt so deep
in her voice she sounded closer to broken than he had ever known.
He couldn't believe what he was hearing. Words spilled from her
trembling lips. "Sir, for all these years, I thought we never
tried to be together, because we couldn't bear to give up what we
had. We couldn't break up SG-1, we couldn't stop going through
the Gate, we couldn't give up the fight we were waging, couldn't
break up all that we had built. And then one day, you got
offered this job you never even wanted..." She choked out a
bitter laugh and held out a hand in front of her for emphasis.
Long Carter-fingers. "How many times have you told us you were
never cut out to be the boss? Not like this, not outside the
field.... And now, apparently, you were ready to let go of SG-1,
of everything we had all held sacred. Which isn't really wrong,
after all this time, but...when you did it? Instead of
even...looking to me...you took this job that didn't mean as much
to you, and yet it still promised to keep us apart." The tears
that had slowed to let her speak, pressed to the forefront and
she was full out crying and looking him solidly in the eye when
she said, "God, Jack, what the hell else was I supposed to think,
but that you didn't feel anything for me anymore? Maybe you
never did..."

Jack didn't speak for the longest time, and Carter's quiet tears
were all that filled the empty locker room. He almost waited too
long, almost missed his window. He couldn't process fast enough.
And she was closing her walls and pulling in by the second.
Running scared. He found his voice before he lost everything he
cared about.

"I took this job, because you were with Pete."

Carter looked up at him like he had grabbed her chin and jerked
it. "What?" Her words were damp.

Jack nodded, and he felt his face genuinely soften for the first
time since he'd entered this room. "Yeah," he breathed, as
though he were near her ear. The image sent an unbidden thrill
through his stomach.

Carter blinked at him. Wide-eyed and innocent Carter. IQ of
just under a thousand and more worldly knowledge than anyone else
on Earth, and she had never lost her innocence.

"Carter...these past few months you've been...happy. And
smiling, and...wearing more lipstick like you did in the
beginning, before life around here beat you down so hard. And
I...I couldn't... Frankly, Carter, I'm gettin' too old to do the
SG-1 thing. My knees hurt and I need my sleep. In a bed. With
air conditioning and heat. So it was either take the job here
where I could be with all the people and the things I care about,
every day, or retire and...NOT be with them." He shrugged,
simply honest. "I stayed."

Carter took a bizarrely long time to process his words. She sat,
breathing carefully, face pale, fingers still gripping the edge
of the bench. Her gaze settled anywhere but on his, eyes
filtering through lightning-quick thoughts. He ventured
cautiously forward and took a seat on the bench beside her, not
so close they might touch if she didn't want to. She didn't
shift away. They were quiet several beats. Then, Carter said
quietly, "Oh, God..." and her little girl voice sounded sick or
scared or both, and she turned to look at him, eyes painfully
open, yet she couldn't speak and finally she looked away. She
was trembling.

Jack reached out a hand and drew gentle circles on her back.
"Hey," he said softly, tenderness finally bleeding into his tone.
Something in him had been released from a relentless pinch-hold.
"Heeeyy. It's all right, Carter. We'll figure it all out."

"You're with her," she whispered.

"No," he said simply. "I'm seeing her. I like her company.
She's a neat lady. You're...well, you're Carter. It's
completely different."

He watched her draw three shallows breaths, chest rising and
falling beneath her pastel blouse. Then a fourth breath. "I
need you." Her words were almost too soft to hear. She hadn't
lifted her gaze from the floor.

"I'm right here." He willed her to hear the sincerity. "I never
went anywhere."

His hand had fallen from her back onto the bench, and he slipped
his fingers around her wrist, remembering too clearly the last
time he had touched her like this, and she had left him alone in
the snow. This time, she loosened her death-grip on the bench
and closed her fingers around his hand.

In all the years, and all the hospital stays, and all the
embraces, and all the crises--they had never held hands like
this. Not like this.

Carter leaned forward, propping an elbow on her knee and lowering
her forehead into her hand. "I'm sorry. I'm tired," she said at
last, voice still small.

"It's okay."

She startled him when she stood up. He moved with her,
instinctively clinging to her hand, unwilling to let go,
following her the few paces to the door.

"I should go," she said softly, not meeting his eyes.

"Carter..."

"No, I...I don't mean to...I just have to do some things. I need
some time to..."

He was nodding, trying to calm her with his presence. That
worked with her sometimes. Just being there, and not letting her
fluster him. "Okay. That's okay. Take whatever you need."

She hadn't let go of his hand. She hadn't looked above his
waist. "Okay," she parroted. And she turned to push at the
door. But he hadn't let go of her hand, and neither had she his,
and he squeezed hard just as she was stepping through the door,
and she swung back and dove into his arms with a force that
almost knocked him off his feet.

He staggered a step catching her weight hard against him, and she
held on so tight he almost couldn't breathe. He wrapped his arms
around her with equal force, one arm crushing the thick leather
of her jacket until he could feel her softness beneath, the other
snaking beneath the heavy material to the silk covering the small
of her back. "Whoa, hey, Carter. It's okay."

"Oh, God," she whispered again, so deeply scared he could hardly
make the voice match with Carter, and her breath was hot on his
ear and making him dizzy. He buried his face in her neck. "It's
okay. It's okay." He loosened his hold just enough to cradle
the back of her head, to work his fingers into her hair.

She was shaking so badly.

"I gotcha," he said softly.

He held on a long time. Neither of them spoke.

When she finally eased away, eyes red and still soft with tears,
lips damp and gently flushed, he had never in his life wanted so
badly to kiss her. But there were security cameras
rolling....story of their lives... And he was still Commanding
Officer of this base. She was a Lieutenant Colonel.

"Sir?"

Sir. He forced himself to meet her gaze. "Yeah?"

"Come over to my house on Sunday, if you can, okay? I'll be
home."

He nodded. "Okay."

She held his gaze a little longer, then simply nodded.

She turned and walked away, and he let her go.

He stood there, with his hands in his pockets, and Carter's tears
still damp on his neck, and the scent of her skin hot in his
nostrils, and it occurred to him that he probably should have
gotten the yellow tulips...

Yeah. The yellow tulips.

*****

rowan_d1@yahoo.com
http://rowan_d.tripod.com/