Carter doesn't come by to visit the entire week he's stuck in the infirmary. Jack's not angry or surprised, although saying he's disappointed wouldn't be out of the realm of possibility. Still, he understands. His visiting hours are far more limited now than if he'd simply been sick or injured, and sometimes just ten minutes talking to someone (Teal'c, Hammond, Frasier, and once even Jonas Quinn) is enough to start his head pounding and his stomach aching. He's got the strange, fantastic idea that if it was Carter who stepped through the door one afternoon instead of one of the others, both his withdrawal symptoms and the nightmares would vanish like... well, like Daniel had a tendency to these days. But he never gets a chance to test out that theory, because she never comes to visit. It's okay. He understands.
It's not as though he doesn't see her at all. She'll wander through the infirmary at odd times on some other errand, glance surreptitiously in his direction and give him one of those slow, warm, shy smiles if she sees he's watching. Sometimes she comes by when she thinks he's sleeping, and he'll play possum just to prolong the moment, watching her through the fringe of his eyelashes as she lingers in the doorway with her arms crossed and her head slightly bowed. Sometimes she comes by when he's sleeping for real; he can't prove it's her, but he imagines at times that he can smell traces of her soap in the air. Occasionally there's also physical proof of her visit: a glass of cold water on the nightstand if he's been feverish, an extra blanket around his shoulders if he dozed off wracked by chills. Jack wonder if he should feel embarrassed that she's constantly seeing him in this state, but then he remembers that she's seen far worse.
So, no Carter. But that doesn't mean he's lonely, especially when he starts feeling stronger and Frasier lets more people come around. He's been away for a while and there's a lot to catch up on, and any distraction from the memories of the last few days is welcome. Teal'c politely inquires as to his health before launching into a self-satisfied explanation of how they'd gotten Yu to do their dirty work. Hammond stops by to share the latest gossip on Tok'ra politics and look worried when he thinks Jack's attention is elsewhere. Jonas even takes his turn, notebook in hand, telling him all about a sleepy, creepy little Gou'alded town in Oregon and asking Jack if he's hungry at least once every fifteen minutes.
He'd really like it if Carter would come by and stay; he'd really like to hear about this plan they all worked on and ask if anyone taped The Simpsons while he was gone. But he knows that's not going to happen, not yet. They've been through this before, she and him, although it was years ago and the roles were reversed. For the plain and simple fact that it was years ago, what happened then is the established set of rules for now. He hadn't visited her then either, at least not beyond the occasional peek when he was sure she was sleeping, and in fact the first time he had actually seen her, actually spoken with her afterwards had been a kind of an accident. Kind of.
These are the rules.
His parole hearing (as he jokingly refers to it) is Friday. Whatever criteria Frasier uses to judge whether he's a danger to himself or others... well, he passes. She gives him the usual bout of stern warnings and tells him she wants him to stay on the base for another twenty-four hours at a minimum. That's expected as well, and not entirely unwelcome. He has the feeling (and it's just a feeling, because he's trying not to think too hard right now) that just the change from the infirmary to his quarters will be a taxing one. Just thinking about going home, trying to function completely under his own steam, is exhausting.
He actually manages to fight off the mother hens with a few well-placed glares that would make any Gou'ald (Baal included) get down on his snaky knees and beg for mercy. Even as he walks the hallways of the SGC he feels vaguely suspicious of every passing airmen (including those who speak to him, those who give him wary or sympathetic looks, and those who ignore him completely). He harbors the strange notion that Frasier and Teal'c have instructed them to keep constant tabs on him. The funny thing is, of course (and he's not sure if that means funny-weird or funny-haha, but he expects it doesn't matter) that the one person he's not immediately suspicious of is the one person who most certainly has orchestrated this chance meeting just outside his quarters. He almost congratulates her on her excellent timing, but that's against the rules.
So they stare at each other for a moment, and then he realizes that her 'surprised' look when he rounded the corner means that this is his cue. "Carter," he says, as though seeing her here is unexpected, as though he hasn't been anticipating this moment from the first time he saw her in the infirmary. "Fancy meeting you here," he adds, which is as close to rule-breaking as he can imagine at this exact moment.
No slow, warm, shy smiles now. Jack understands that the second Frasier released him they (all of them, but especially them) were thrust back into the real world, a world where fond relief must naturally be replaced by wariness and private comfort. No doubt she has a thousand questions for him, questions she won't ask, questions she'd never ask, and the thought of prompting the queries from her sends a little jolt of fatigue across his shoulders and down his back. "Sir," she says finally, struggling to hang on to the vestiges of normalcy. Her eyes flicker from his face to his feet and back (although so briefly she could have merely been blinking; he knows that's not the case) and she adds, "Heading home?"
He doesn't tell her that (for the time being) this planet is all the home he needs right now, and all the home that he can handle. Too corny. Instead he shrugs and tells her, "Doc wants me to stay here for the time being." Just in case he gets the urge to run off and rescue some other damsel in distress, he thinks, but he doesn't say that either. In fact, his brain is suddenly overloaded with the things he can't and won't say, and finally he has some sympathy for what Carter's going through.
"That's a good idea," is Carter's too-quick reply. She hesitates, then, as though to make up for the hasty quality of her answer. Not surprisingly she turns the topic back to work. "This whole mess with the Tok'ra... I've been trying to get in touch with my Dad, see if we can't smooth things over before they get out of hand." She hasn't been looking at him (has been looking at the floor, the wall next to them, the wall behind him, a spot in the air beside his face, but not him) but now her eyes meet his tentatively. "I guess it's already gotten out of hand," she says, but the expression on her face leads him to believe that she didn't mean to say that aloud.
He gives her an out, although he's not sure if she'll appreciate it or not. Typically blasé, he broaches: "So... Jonas tells me you got snaked, too."
Carter's reaction is swift and severe (Jack anticipates some unhappy moments in Mr. Quinn's near future). She's taken aback by his knowledge of the incident. "He told you about that?" she asks unnecessarily, and before he can answer (duh) she's shaking her head in amused disbelief. "I can't...." she begins to tell the floor, then catches herself and looks back at him. "I've been trying all week to think of some way to bring that up, it's just that..."
Her tone is apologetic. "It's just that you didn't want to play Who Had A Worse Snake Experience," he guesses, biting back the quip about how he's started a new fad.
Finally a smile, but it's terse and fades quickly. "Something like that," she allows, now shifting restlessly from one foot to the other. She's uncomfortable, not with the current conversation, but the one that's coming, the one she knows is inevitable. Again she addresses the spot in the air beside his face. "I should probably be--"
Doesn't let her finish. Can't stand excuses right now. "Wait," he tells her, and as though against her will Carter's eyes slide to meet his. "Listen," he starts again (because he's good at giving orders and not a hell of a lot more), "there's some things I need to say, and... I don't want to say them out here." Plus he was starting to get dizzy. Stupid sarcophagus. "Why don't you come inside for a little bit," he suggests, gesturing to the door.
Carter tenses.
This isn't part of the game plan, part of the rules.
When he 'ran into her' outside her room after she'd sufficiently recovered from Jolinar she certainly hadn't invited him inside. And he definitely hadn't invited himself. Even then they'd known (perhaps subliminally) that those kinds of situations could only lead to trouble. So instead they'd made small talk, light chit-chat, and he'd walked away feeling contented (albeit oddly unsatisfied). Well, things are bound to change in four years, he tells himself, including the fact that he abandoned the 'subliminal' excuse too long ago for it to have any merit here.
He can almost hear Carter thinking. Not the grinding of gears, of course, because if her brain was a machine it would be a supercomputer, everything digitized, optimized, everything-ized, not some big clunky gyrating mechanism. She wants to leave, but she won't; he's taking advantage of her guilt now, and he knows it and hates it, but he also knows it's for the best.
She acquiesces with a small nod of her head.
He opens the door and lets her go first, fighting the urge to glance over his shoulder even though it feels like he's doing something criminal. Simply to prove otherwise (prove to who?) when he follows Carter in, switching on the lights, he leaves the door half-ajar and wonders exactly when he starting having such little faith in himself.
No time to think, to reconsider; the moment is precious in a truly macabre way and he has to take advantage of that, both the preciousness and the morbidity. Acknowledging Carter's presence once more (she's standing in the middle of the room, hands behind her back, apparently waiting some manner of dressing-down... although Lord, he really shouldn't be thinking about that here of all places) he launches into a speech both pre-planned and off the cuff. "I'm not exactly in my right mind right now, for a whole... slew of reasons, so if this sounds weird... just keep that in mind." Deep breath. Look at her, Jack. "But you're never actually going to bring this up on your own, so I guess it's my job to tell you (she's tense, waiting for the blow) that none of this is your fault."
By the glow of the bedside light he can see the color rise in her cheeks, and for a moment he wonders if he misjudged her and what he's said was more insult than absolution. But as the seconds tick by and she says nothing, his confidence returns. After all, he knows that's what she's been thinking because he knows that's what he would be thinking. In many ways they're alike. He watched her while pretending to sleep, saw the pain and contrition in her eyes as she looked in on him from the doorway, he and understands. The silence weighs on them both, and finally she breaks. "I didn't have any right to ask you to do... what I asked. Sir," she says in way of disagreement. "You gave your answer. I shouldn't have pursued it."
His dizziness is increasing. Trying to mask it, he sits on the edge of his bed and motions for her to take the chair (and she does, but only after another supercomputer hesitation). "Would it be better if I was dead?"
Don't ask me that, says her expression, but the words that come out are very different. "Shouldn't I be asking you that?" she wonders, her hands folded tightly on her thighs, her eyes lined with anxiety, the line of her jaw flexing constantly.
Raises his eyebrows. "You mean if I had known ahead of time that this was going to happen, would I have agreed to im--" (stops short, remembering that he was never going to use that word again, and starts over). "Hindsight's a bitch, isn't it?" Carter snorts softly, looks at her hands. "You know, in hindsight, he... Kanan knew that he should have gone back for the girl weeks, months ago. He had the opportunity, he just didn't..." This isn't coming out right. So much for off the cuff. "I don't think he was quite sure why all of a sudden he was... compelled to go rescue her."
Some of the anxiety has softened into remorse. "But you know."
He's not so sure. "Do I?"
Unwavering. "Yes."
Still not sure. "Yeah. I was the angel on Kanan's shoulder. Right. Gave him a guilt trip of such gigantic proportions that he had to just up and run off to save this girl that he..." Stops as he realizes he doesn't sound as sarcastic has he meant to, possibly because he's not being sarcastic at all. No matter how he puts it, how lightly or outlandishly he tries to play it, the both of them know that he's not far off the mark.
"He went back for her," says Carter tiredly, "because of you. But if Kanan hadn't been blended with you, that would never had happened in the first place."
Her words seem far away (maybe because he's closed his eyes, although what sense does that make?). Truth is still first and foremost in his mind, perhaps not a universal truth, but it's a truth that Jack is familiar with on more than one level: the truth of things as Kanan knew them. The recollections rise up and burst in his mind like so many champagne bubbles. "He just knew that he couldn't leave her there... he didn't think that Baal suspected anything but she was still in danger... he couldn't leave someone he loved."
There's that word again. So, so against the rules.
His eyes are still closed, but he thinks he can hear the beginnings of that slow, warm, shy smile in her voice. "'We don't leave our people behind'," she says softly, and he feels some pride that she knows him so well... and some sadness that she's avoiding the heart of the matter.
The effervescent bubbles have all caught in his throat and (swallowing hard against them) he opens his eyes. He can see that she doesn't completely believe him, that the guilt stills weighs on her like an albatross, that it may take a long time before she stops feeling the pangs and that they may never stop. It's okay. He understands. He's the same way (couldn't open his mind and let go of his burdens just because Daniel asked him to, and what's so bad about burdens anyway, isn't it a good thing to keep your feet on the ground?).
"It was more than that," he tells her, even though she knows already (knows that it was love, not loyalty; knows that it was a kidnapping, yet it wasn't; knows he's talking about Kanan and the girl, and he's talking about the two people in this room).
Carter leans back in the chair, her face pinched in such a way that he knows she's biting the inside of her cheeks. No doubt she'll later be reminding herself that when he said these things, he wasn't in his right mind... although funnily enough (and this time it's definitely funny-weird) his mind is more right at this moment than it has been in a very long time.
He doesn't know which question he's about to answer (one he asked, one she asked, one that wasn't asked at all) but the reply is inevitable.
"And I'd do it again."
The End