Jack's mouth is cotton as her face comes into view. "What the hell did you do to me, Doc?"
A nurse -- Lieutenant Barros, he remembers -- brings Jack a cup of ice.
"Not much," Fraiser says. "You would have passed out on your own, but I kept you under to debride those burns a little." She picks up his chart and scribbles on it. "You're lucky you were unconscious."
"Morphine," he mumbles around an ice chip.
"Yes, morphine." Which explains why his leg doesn't hurt for the first time in what feels like weeks. Actually, he can't feel his leg at all, though he can see a lump in the bed -- his brand-new cast. Terrific. "You're also on two antibiotics and a saline drip. And it's no use trying to get me to take the IV out."
Jack coughs, and it doesn't hurt. "Yeah, yeah."
She peers down at him. "You'd obviously be off the mission roster for several months, if I still had that option."
"Good thing you don't, then." He pulls himself up -- God, he hates the tug of an IV on the back of his hand -- and Fraiser helps until he's half-sitting. His head swims, but then it's okay. "Where's Sam?"
"Asleep, and no, I'm not going to wake her. I only convinced her to go a few hours ago."
"Aw, Doc -- "
"You can beg all you want," she says with a familiar, but strained, smile. "You know I won't give in. She'll wake up when she wakes up. Now, want some water?"
*
When Carter appears three hours later, Jack's had lots of water, kept down some soup and crackers from the mess, and wheedled Fraiser into removing the IV. He picks at the band-aid.
Daniel follows on Carter's heels. "You should've called us, Janet," he says. His arm is still in the sling. "How long has he been awake?"
"Long enough for Sam to get some rest."
Daniel complains some more, but looks narrowly at Jack, then at Carter, and follows Janet into her office.
Carter stands by his bed. "Hey," she says. She's had a shower, and she's less green, but her jaw is still tight and her face still tired.
"Hey."
"You look a lot better."
He smiles and reaches for her hand. "So do you."
"They don't know," she says softly, jerking her chin at the office door. "Dad talked General Hammond into keeping the whole thing under wraps for now."
"No Tok'ra state secrets," Jack says. "Right." He'll be just as happy if nobody ever finds out, even their closest friends. And he knows Carter gets that.
General Hammond strides into the infirmary a few minutes later; he glances at the only nurse in the room and she scurries away. Carter straightens her back, but doesn't release Jack's hand.
Hammond stands at the foot of the bed. He looks exhausted, too; he greeted them in the gate room, and Jack's sure he hasn't slept since. "How're you feeling, Jack?"
"Alive," Jack says.
The general chuckles.
"And just so you know, sir? Next time we're saying no."
"So I've been told," Hammond says, with a glance at Carter. "I'm sorry it wasn't the cakewalk Jacob was hoping for."
"So are we, sir," Carter says. Jack turns his head to her, surprised -- it's a little insolent, for Carter -- but the general doesn't seem to mind.
"I spoke with Teal'c this morning," Hammond says. "It'll take some work, but he says he should be able to locate the families of your four Jaffa. He's going to come through himself to collect their belongings, probably the day after tomorrow."
"Good," Carter says. "Thank you."
Jack just nods.
Hammond lowers his voice, though there's nobody around. "Teal'c also said," and here he pauses, "that a rumor is spreading quickly among the Jaffa. Many of them believe that Baal has executed an entire battalion on one of his outposts."
"Oh, my God," Carter says.
"All of 'em?"
"It is only a rumor," the general clarifies, but he sounds more resigned than hopeful. "It's unfortunate, though, if true."
"Unfortunate?"
"Jack, it's not General Hammond's fault."
Jack sighs. "No, of course it isn't. Sorry, sir."
Hammond nods his acknowledgment. "I'll stop by again before I go home," he says. He turns to leave, then looks back. "It's good to see you both looking better."
Carter says thanks, and Jack lets it stand for him, too.
"All of them," he says when they're alone.
"That stabilizer had better be worth it."
Jack opens his mouth to tell her she can't blame herself for Baal's psychosis, but then he realizes that she isn't second-guessing herself, or him. She's just pissed off. "That snaky bastard," he says instead.
Carter's about to say something else, something even angrier, Jack thinks, but Fraiser clicks back into the infirmary and Carter clamps her mouth shut.
Fraiser claims Jack's hand from Carter's, to check his pulse, and shoves a thermometer into his mouth. "Is that really necessary?" he asks, trying to keep the stupid thing under his tongue. Nobody bothers to answer.
Daniel drifts over, too.
"Teal'c's coming in a few days," Carter tells him brightly.
"Hey, that's great. He didn't get to stay long after you guys left."
Then there's silence, except for Janet taking out the thermometer and writing down the numbers. Carter raises an eyebrow at Jack and shifts her gaze, momentarily, to Daniel. Yeah, yeah. "I can't fix this for you, Jack," she said a few weeks ago.
Jack moves his toes, to make sure he still can, and watches the blanket shift. "How's the arm, Daniel?"
Daniel cocks his head, then smirks a little bit at Jack. "Better than your leg."
"Good," Jack says. He feels like a lab specimen. "That's ... good."
"I'm getting some work done, at least," Daniel says slowly. "Turns out dictation is pretty effective."
Janet hands Jack another glass of water. "Geez," he says. "I'm not going near that bedpan again, by the way."
"Sam can help you to the bathroom, then," Janet says. And she continues, all business, "Your fever's down. We'll schedule your first surgery for the burns in a month or so, and I want a specialist to look at that ankle. But you'll be fine, eventually."
Carter nods, soaking up the information. Jack has no problem letting her keep track of the details. "So," he says, "No reason for me to stick around, right? Infection's under control, leg's completely numb, I've had about six gallons of water ... "
"I'm afraid you're going to be my guest overnight, Colonel."
"No," Carter says. "We're going home, Janet."
They are?
Daniel's eyebrows do some gymnastics. Jack waves his mental Go, Carter! flag again. But something strange passes between the current major and the former one. Until recently, Carter shared Fraiser's opinion on military women giving up their careers for men. "Sam, he's still on morphine," Janet says.
"You've lowered the dose, right? And it's not like he'll be driving. Give me something else, pills he can take later. The antibiotics, too."
Oh, Jack is totally staying out of this. From the looks of it, so is Daniel. Jack could swear his friend has backed away a couple steps, though none of them have moved.
Fraiser's mouth draws into a tight line, and she gives a curt nod. She usually gets her way around here. "I want him off that leg, Sam," she says crisply. And her heels echo all the way back to the office.
Daniel shuffles his feet. "Everything okay? I mean, aside from Jack getting himself shot."
"I did not get myself shot!" That earns him a small smile from Daniel, but Carter's mind is elsewhere.
"Everything's fine, Daniel," she says. She licks her lips in thought, looks over her shoulder. "I'll be right back."
Jack has all the sympathy in the galaxy, but he's still glad it's her instead of him. He watches her go. They both watch her go.
Daniel shuffles his feet again. "What was that about?"
"Don't ask me. Female stuff." But Jack knows what's going on between Carter and Fraiser, and he thinks Daniel does, too. Why neither of them wants to admit this, Jack isn't sure.
Hell, Teal'c knows everything. They should just dial up Teal'c and ask him.
This silence is longer. Jack puts down his empty water glass and goes back to picking at his band-aid.
"I, uh, I taped some hockey for you," Daniel says.
What? "You taped hockey?"
"I do know how to use a VCR, Jack."
Huh. "Thanks," Jack says. "That's ... thanks."
"I won't even ruin it by telling you who won."
Jack can't even think of a comeback. Shit, this is crazy. He can't manage a conversation with one of his best friends in the universe. And it's Daniel, for God's sake, who kept Jack from going nuts in that other cell. Daniel doesn't remember that and Jack isn't sure it was real, but Jesus. It's just Daniel.
Jack blows out a puff of air. "So how's the new team?" he asks.
Daniel eyes Jack, then turns away to drag the chair closer to the bed. He doesn't point out that Jack's never asked this before. "They're okay," he says, sitting. "They look up to me. They ask for my opinion." And then, with half a grin, "It's a nice change."
It must be. "No wonder you almost ended up dead."
"They'll get over it."
"Yeah," Jack says. "So it doesn't completely suck?"
Daniel shrugs. "It's different. But it doesn't suck, no." He looks at his feet, and drags his free hand through his hair. "I was a little mad at first, to tell you the truth. But I knew it was childish, so I stopped."
Mad? Daniel was mad? Huh. "Does Sam know that?" Jack asks.
"No. I thought she didn't need another reason to beat herself up."
"Huh," Jack says. "How do you stop being mad?"
"Years of practice," Daniel says dryly.
Jack fakes a frown, and then neither of them speaks for a few seconds. It's not so bad this time.
"Listen," he says, eventually. "I'm obviously going to be laid up for a while, and I doubt you'll be seeing any action soon, either. Why don't you come over on Saturday? We can burn some meat." Jack doesn't know what day it is, but they can work that out later.
Daniel's eyes dart from side to side. "Really?"
"Oh, for crying out loud," Jack grumbles good-naturedly, though he knows that the only times he's seen Daniel since he left the SGC have been when Teal'c or Carter organized it. "Are you coming or not?"
"Sure," Daniel says. "Uh, your house or Sam's?"
Jack's not used to being asked that yet, but he kind of likes it. "I'll have to get back to you on that," he says.
*
Carter returns with the clothes Jack left in her lab over a week ago, helps him dress behind the privacy curtain. And it's strange to leave the infirmary together, strange for her to help him with his crutches in the corridor while SGC personnel walk past, strange to head for the same car.
Strange, but good.
He steadies himself against the cab of his truck while she unlocks the door. He parked next to her Volvo the morning they left; they'll have to come back for it sometime. "You know you're coming home with me, right?" he says.
She raises an amused eyebrow, and helps him into the passenger seat. His crutches get thrown in the back.
"My house," she says. "Need my own shampoo."
Jack doesn't care where they go. But he says, "Maybe I need my own bed."
"You don't." She squeezes his good leg, shuts the door, and walks around to the driver's side.
Jack lets his head fall back, and smiles.
"Don't pass out on me before we get there," she says as she adjusts the mirrors.
"Won't. Promise."
She fights with the seat for a minute. "I mean it, Jack."
"Oh, I know you mean it."
They pull out into daylight, and Jack squints against the setting June sun.
He doesn't pass out on her. He makes it all the way to her bed, where she hands him the remote, gives him a handful of pills that he swallows without question, and just generally fusses, and yeah, it's pretty cool. He'd never say that, of course. What he says is, "Quit hovering over me, Carter!"
She ignores him, and looks around the room. She's already collected just about every pillow in the house, so Jack doesn't think she'll find much. But she spots his spare reading glasses, which have mostly moved in here, and puts them on the nightstand. He's been wearing them a lot more since she informed him once that they made him look hot. "You want something to eat?"
"No." Jack yawns. "Come lie down with me for a minute?"
She hesitates, then shoves some pillows to the floor and stretches out on her side, one palm on Jack's chest. "God, I think maybe I could sleep, too."
Jack weaves his fingers through hers and asks carefully, "We couldn't have done it, could we?"
She doesn't have to ask what he means, but she does think hard before answering. "No," she says finally, and she sounds a lot less sad than he expected. It's as if they were discussing some universal truth, like the Pythagorean theorem. "I don't think we could. For a while, sure. The easy missions would have been easy. The bad missions would have been ..." She untangles her hand from his, gesturing while she searches for the right word.
"Really, really bad?" he offers.
"Really, really bad."
Jack nods. Before, he'd thought maybe they could have balanced work and a relationship, if it hadn't been against the rules and if the choice hadn't been made for them. Now, after a few days in Baal's fortress of fun, not so much.
"All those Jaffa," she says.
Jack brushes a strand of hair from her face. "What'd you say to Janet?"
"Nothing." She pauses, and frowns, and grasps his hand again. "I understand why she thinks I've made the wrong choices."
"I'm not sure she has a right to an opinion on that."
"No, she knows that. But we just don't have as much in common anymore, you know? It's hard."
"It's sad," he says.
"Mmm. Maybe." Another pause. "You and Daniel are the same way, I think. Not so much to talk about now?"
Jack shrugs. "I dunno," he says. "Maybe."
"He doesn't blame us, you know."
"I know." He wiggles his toes. Yep, still working. "I do know that, Sam. And I invited him over this weekend, by the way."
"You did?" she says. "Good. Make me a list and I'll go to the supermarket."
"I can go grocery shopping, Carter. Okay, maybe not alone, but I can go."
"No."
Jack's not sure he heard that right. "No?"
"No. Janet'll kill me if I let you walk, and I agree with her."
"What? I walked all over that --"
"Exactly my point," she says, in that sweet voice that suggests she can make him suffer in a thousand new and interesting ways. "No more."
"Traitor," he says. "Damn that Fraiser."
He expects a laugh, or at least a retort, but instead her face goes shifty.
"Sam?"
She rubs a spiral on his palm with her thumb. "I told Janet I was happy," she says.
She did? Seriously? "Happy," he says. "Except when we're being shot at."
"Except for getting shot at. And when I want to strangle you."
"Oh, of course. Except for then."
"I want to strangle you a lot," she says.
"Right back atcha." Jack's goofy grin is totally because of the morphine. Totally. But he beats it down and says, "Hey, you really going offworld to play with your toy?"
"I don't know," she says. "I've been thinking that I might not."
"Really?" His voice squeaks. How humiliating.
"God knows Valera would kill for it. Or Michaels. And I can supervise them from here."
"Wait, do you know how to delegate?" He knows the answer, of course; she can delegate just fine. It's more fun to tease her, though.
"Oh, very funny."
"'Cause I'd, uh," he says. "I wouldn't mind if you stayed on this planet for a while."
She takes a deep breath, and Jack doesn't know if he's about to get creamed or not. "I," she says. "Yeah. Me too. I think."
Jack nods, thoughtful, and Carter sits up. It's maybe a little too much honesty, for them, at just over three months.
"Well," she says, "I'm hungry, even if you're not."
"And you need your shampoo."
"And I need my shampoo. Shout if you want anything."
"Okay," Jack says through a yawn. "Sam?"
"Jack?"
"You're sure we never have to do that again?"
She bends down to kiss his cheek. "Pretty sure," she says. And then she pads out of the bedroom and down the hall.
Jack's going to check out any second, but he clicks on the TV anyway and flips through a few channels. It's Wednesday, MSNBC informs him. "Hey, Carter?" he shouts.
"What, Jack?" She's already rifling through the refrigerator. He can hear glass clinking on glass and plastic dragging on plastic.
"Tomorrow can we have the makeup sex?"
"We'll see," she calls back.
He can live with that.
***
fin.
Thanks for reading!