Title: Five Time Sam Wanted To Resign From The Air Force.
Author: rolleson
Fandom: Stargate SG-1
Rating: PG
Character/Pairing: Sam!fic, Sam/Pete
Spoilers: Up to Season Eight, Heroes.
Category Angst.
Warnings: None really.
Summery: The title says it all.
Notes: Written for a sg1_five_things prompt.



Five time Sam wanted to resign from the Air Force.

1.Because Mark hated her.

She almost quit the Air Force before she had even joined. Mark was at college and had she called to tell him she ‘d finally decided what to do after graduating. Go straight to the academy.

He’d hung up on her.

She’d called back a couple of times, more confused than anything because he hadn’t said a word before slamming the phone down on her, and she wasn’t sure if he was angry or disappointed or what. There had been no answer though, the phone just rang and she became bored of the irritating sound quickly and had learnt the number off by heart.

In the middle of the night, the phone rang and she was out of bed and down the stairs before she could even register the cold on her feet, fearing bad news about her father who was away somewhere unknown to her.

She was relieved at first, to hear her brothers voice, until he began shouting down the phone at her. No greeting, no apology for hanging up on her, he went straight into a rant about the Air Force and their parents and she didn’t catch the majority of his words. He was angry, anger like she hadn’t seen since her mother had died. Anger that had never been directed at her before.

There was a moment of silence that told her he’d asked her a question. When she didn’t answer right away he repeated the question.

“Did he talk you into it?”

The he in question did not need naming.

“No, dad doesn’t even know yet.” She yelled back, not intimidated by her brothers anger. “I told you first.”

“Who then? Some jump start at the Careers fair who recognised your name? Uncle George?”

“No, and no. It was my decision, this is my decision.”

“It’s the wrong decision.”

“How can you know that? This is what I want to do Mark, you hate the Air Force because you hate dad.”

“Because mom died Sam!”

“I haven’t forgotten,” she screamed at him, “but she would want me to do what I want.”

“She wouldn’t want to join the Air Force.”

“How do you know that?” She was calmer now, one outburst and she was done.

“How can you be so sure?”

“That’s your argument?!” She couldn’t believe her elder brother. “Grow up Mark!” She slammed the phone down and went back to bed.

Neither picked up the phone again for another five years.

2. Because she was the best at everything

It was fun at first, exciting too, beating every record in the academy by large margins. Various names for sports, simulations and marksmanship were replaced by her own. Every trophy was hers, and she couldn’t help but smile at the cabinets, full of golden shining statues, her name engraved on the bottom of them all.

Being top of every class came easy, she worked hard at it, everything was perfect but she knew that A grades would’ve come if she’d spent less time in the library and more in bed. Or in the mess.

Not that she regretted it, looking back years later, but being the best at absolutely everything had severe downfalls.

With successes came jealousy. The girls shunned her, bitched about her behind her back, bumped into her as they walked past her, sometimes almost causing her to lose balance. Knocking her into people who pushed back, into walls and doors.

With success came bruises.

The guys were verbal. The boys came up with the most ignorant names, unfunny rhymes and stupid little songs that drifted to her consciousness in the mess, the hallway, the classroom, when she was jogging or sleeping. Years later she could still hear them singing when it was silent even if she didn’t remember all the words.

“....so good at everything,
except for getting a fuck,
but that’s okay
McGill told me she’s a lousy suck...”

She didn’t even know who McGill was, someone they’d made up no doubt, because she hadn’t been involved with anyone since joining the academy. She had left behind a string of boyfriends at a string of high schools over the last couple of years and had had a few offers, propositions too, by cadets who weren’t intimidated by who her father was because of their own fathers, or because they liked the thrill of it. The names and songs chased most of those away by the end of her first year though.

Success meant she was lonely and miserable at the academy for a long while.

3. Because of Jolinar.

She had died a couple of times, her heart stopping for a few moments or a few minutes when she had crashed or been shot. She’d come close to dying even more times, lying unconscious, body broken into bits, blood lost in pints, breathing by artificial means.

She had felt Jolinar’s death like nothing else.

Her own deaths or close calls, those severe injuries that had taken weeks to truly recover from, she hadn’t really been aware of. She had been unconscious, unaware of her heart stopping, her lungs stilling, the way her blood had slowed. She had simply woken, come too, to learn that she had lived through more life threatening injuries.

With Jolinar it was different. She had been unconscious but she still felt every last moment of Jolinar’s life. Remembered it all when she regained consciousness. She wasn’t sure how the symbiotes physiology worked but she could feel the resignation, the defeat. She knew, as Jolinar did, that Sam would only live if she died. She felt everything run through her body, her mind. From the moment Jolinar decided to sacrifice herself, to the moment the symbiote had dissolved into her blood stream.

She felt the last moments in rhythm with her own heartbeat. Felt Jolinars life end as a double of her own continuing life. One, two, three, one, two, three, one, two, one, and then she was gone, drifting away into nothing and for a moment Sam thought she was dying along with the Tok’ra.

She was still breathing though and she felt the symbiote become part of her, a deep part of her being and it hurt, hurt more than any injury she had suffered herself.

4. Because her best friend died.

Daniel dying hit her harder than she expected, or liked to admit.

He had become her best friend over the years, someone who was always there for her, no matter what problems of his own he had to deal with. No matter how busy, or tried, or overly wired, Daniel was the one she could turn to at 3am when she was getting frustrated with an experiment or was feeling the after effects of a bad mission.

He didn’t always have the advice to give but Sam didn’t always want that. She just wanted to talk and talk until she could either resolve the problem herself or sleep.

When she had first met him, during that first year, she had thought there was something more between them, or at least the potential for more. If he hadn’t been married, if he hadn’t just lost his wife, she knew things could be very different.

Strangely, she was more attracted top him now, than she was then.

Sitting with him as he lay dying was more than she could take, and she cried. She hated to cry in public. Daniel wanted to die, wanted to go, wanted to ascend. It hurt a little, and when he was gone she had to bottle it up and carry on again.

She wasn’t sure she could.

5. Because he asked her to.

While she only considered it for a few moments, she considered it all the same.

After Janet’s memorial she had retreated to her house with Pete and Cassie in tow, to clear her head, grieve, whatever she needed, whatever Cassie needed. To get away from the very place that had taken another friend from her. Even if Daniel had retuned, she still felt his death sometimes, and now Janet was gone, dead and no ascension, no chance of her ever returning.

Cassie was asleep in her spare room, while she was curled up next to Pete, his arms around her, holding her tight. He ran his hands up and down her back, and listened to her hiccups as she let everything out. Aside from the few tears at the service, he knew she had held back for a long time, lying with Cassie like this for long hours until the girl had settled.

Now Pete was waiting for Sam to settle.

He was willing to wait for her all night, holding her to him, kissing her hair, kissing her tears away, whatever it took until she too was calm.

When the hiccups resided, her breathing slowing and his shirt drying, he asked her if she had ever considered quitting the air force for a safer life. He asked her if she would quit the Air Force. He had to ask, he loved the idea of a house, two kids, a dog and Sam Carter all to himself.

No was the answer that he was expecting, and the answer he received, but the momentary hesitation left him with a little hope.