"Yes, they're both mine."
Jack gave her his best "Pardon me?" look, but she ignored him. Sometimes - not often - she let herself do that. She was a good officer too. She was allowed to make the odd judgement call.
And for her money, they didn't run into matriarchies often enough.
The little woman in the blue patterned blanket looked dubious. She said something that made Daniel cough.
Sam looked at him, obviously waiting for the translation.
Daniel's look was very different from Jack's; his look said "Please don't make me."
"Daniel?" she said, showing no mercy.
"She says, uh, that we both seem very, uh, large and healthy, and wonders why you have two?"
"Please tell her it's because, on my world, I am a very important person."
That Daniel didn't have any trouble with, and Sam didn't know what made her throw in the next comment. She knew she was in a mood. She didn't usually do this to the guys; but then she didn't usually have the chance.
"You can point out to her that I also am very large and very healthy."
This time the look Daniel shot in her direction was narrow-eyed and promised vengeance. Jack interrupted his translation. "Look, find out when this negotiation's gonna get off the ground."
They let Daniel natter on for a while. "Apparently... in the morning. We're waiting for representatives from another tribe."
"Great. I'll leave you to work out the details, Carter, since you're such an important person on your planet. _I_ am going to check out the campsite." Jack strolled away, whistling, doing his best to give the impression of "I don't give a damn what you say about me".
Daniel's face had rearranged itself into an impassive expression when Carter looked back at him. "Too much?" she said sheepishly.
"Not for someone of your importance. And, after all, you are very large and very healthy. That's why you need two."
Inwardly Sam groaned. Daniel would make her pay, she just knew it. The Colonel wouldn't - he wouldn't touch her remarks with a ten-foot pole. But Daniel, there was too much evil behind the baby blue eyes so much like her own. He'd make her pay.
Well, hell with it. They both got so annoying, sometimes because they treated her like a girl, sometimes because they didn't. She couldn't put her finger on it; she just knew that every once in a while, like today, she had the urge to rip off her shirt and garrote both of them with her bra.
Teal'c never made her feel that way. Again, she didn't know why. Probably there were subtle cultural signals that he was sending, or not sending. Whatever it was, she never had the urge to rub mud in his face that she occasionally got from working day in and day out with two apparently adult American males.
Damn it.
***
"What's this stuff?" Jack poked his nose experimentally into the cup.
Their hostess snapped sharply at him.
"Uh, that's only for Sam," Daniel explained mildly.
"Fine, fine, I won't impinge on her gold-plated... tea leaves or whatever the hell that stuff is."
Sam couldn't blame the Colonel from sounding huffy. Truth is, she admitted to herself, he would never do to her what she was doing to him.
But that was because he couldn't. He couldn't make it a joke because it was far too close to the truth in exactly the wrong way. He would never tell anyone on any planet that Carter belonged to him, because they all belonged to him, because he was the commanding officer... and that was exactly why they could never belong to him, not the way the natives usually meant it. Colonel O'Neill avoided even the appearance of impropriety because even the appearance could be far, far too close to the real.
The fact that SG-1 knew each other the way they did, trusted each other the way they did, made it more impossible, not less, for Jack to assume any kind of personal familiarity with any of them.
And maybe that was why she couldn't resist, when the opportunity came up. She could tell herself that she'd said what she'd said in order to appear more authoritative in a matriarchal society where they needed all the authority they could get. But to herself she could admit that if she were really in authority, she could never do what she'd done.
Also, she thought to herself as she sipped whatever they'd given her to drink, she was thinking about it way too hard.
She'd seated Daniel on her right, next to the chief, for translating purposes, and Jack on her left. All the other women around the fire had groups of people sitting around them on their blanket, indicating their clans, but none of them had more than one male of the right age to be a mate unless there was a sister he belonged to. The others were children, elderly parents, or other dependents.
Well, this is my clan, Sam thought as she sipped, and I've got two.
Actually, if Teal'c weren't busy on Chulak with the rebel jaffa, you'd see I've got three. Three of the best-looking human males in this galaxy or any other. I defy you to prove differently.
Thinking guiltily of Shau're and Sara and Dray'ac, Sam wondered if her guys, as she sometimes thought of them, realized that Sam Carter had much more of them than any other woman had - except for the sex. It was a big except, Sam admitted to herself, chewing bread and fruit together. A big except. But except for that, they WERE hers - hers in a way that they would never be anyone else's, except maybe each other's.
Us four, no more, Sam thought to herself as she trimmed a piece off the fruit with her knife. Even if today there's only three.
***
"Where the hell is Sam?"
Jack was pacing, which Jack never did, up and down the lodge they'd been assigned to show deference to them as a visiting clan. Daniel sat calmly by the fire.
Daniel did not know what had Jack so snippy but he had no intention of fueling it. He tried on his best meek tone - the one he knew Jack could always see right through, but he didn't have any other meek tones - and said, "She went up the mountain with the chief right after dinner, and they said they were going to visit the gods. I thought they'd be back by now."
"What a shock. One of us goes wandering off. I'm amazed."
Jack had a point there, Daniel thought, keeping his head down as he cleaned his knife before putting it away for the night. He'd gotten an awful lot of fruit juice on it. Wandering away from the group was something that SG-1 was usually too smart to do, but when it did happen, it was never good.
"You think she's in danger?" he asked, keeping his tone unconcerned.
"The question is, do YOU think she's in danger?" Jack snapped. "You're the translator. Presumably you know at least some of what was said over dinner tonight. My conversation consisted entirely of eyeblinks exchanged with a bug."
"Does it really bother you that much?" Daniel stopped wiping the blade. "Not knowing what's going on?"
"Yes, dammit, it bothers me. It has to bother me. I'm the last to know what's going on, and then I have to figure out a way to keep us all from getting blown up with the least amount of information. That's why I draw the biggest pay."
Daniel was considering making a remark about seniority - and considering NOT making it - when Sam slid through the lodge door.
"You guys waiting up for me?" Her blue eyes blinked slowly and her smile was huge and dazzling.
"No going to bed before the clan leader's here - ma'am." Now that she was back and safe, Jack, air taken out of him, dropped onto his sleeping bag where it was stretched out a comfortable distance from the fire.
"God, it feels amazing to come into this warm room from outdoors, doesn't it? Do you guys know how cold it is outside? It's really cold, I mean crisp, in that way nights get on mountains, you know? Then you come in from the cold into the warmth and mmmmm. Even the smoke smells good."
Regarding her suspiciously Jack waved at Daniel. "Check her pupils."
Figuring he didn't want to get up because his knees were bothering him and didn't want to say so because it embarrassed him, Daniel sprang up, caught Sam by both arms and swung her towards the firelight. She gifted him with another dazzling smile and he smiled back.
"They are so dilated," Daniel said, still smiling right into Sam's face.
"That's because she is so stoned. Dammit, why do I let either of you ever drink or eat anything on any alien planet, ever??? From now on it's MREs or nothing."
"Because sharing food and drink is the commonest form of establishing peaceable contact throughout human cultures," Daniel said mildly, still smiling into Sam's eyes. She looked relaxed, and her eyes twinkled. He would never say it but he liked seeing her this way.
"It's also the commonest way of poisoning your enemy and HEY!"
Jack's voice shot up rather precipitously because Sam had just grasped Daniel's arms and she had started a polka with him, rocking and rotating in circles all around the fire.
Daniel laughed and Sam, God help him, Sam giggled.
"Don't step on a superior officer," Jack grumped. He couldn't decide if it was easier when he got whammied or when they did. It was easier when they got whammied, he figured, because when *he* got whammied, everything went to shit without him.
I'm the lynchpin of this mob, Jack thought with a trace of bittersweetness, watching Daniel and Sam polka around a lodge on an alien world. I'm the sane one. They'd all go nuts if it weren't for me.
Unfortunately, Jack thought as the two polka-ers almost caught Daniel's pants on fire, that's not really reassuring.
"Why don't you take first watch, Daniel, and wake me for second, and hopefully the Major here will be sober enough for third?"
"I'm sober," Sam insisted, just as Daniel spun her around and insisted, "You're NOT."
They're so pretty, Jack thought as he laid his head down, ready to fall instantly asleep as he almost always was, watching golden spinning blue-eyed dolls through his lashes as his eyelids got heavy. Wonder why they don't get together. No reason why they couldn't. Might fuck up the team, but then, might not.
We've been through worse, Jack thought sleepily as he drifted off watching the spinning silent dancers.
***
"You're not really asleep, are you?"
Jack came awake instantly, as he always did.
This was not Daniel shaking him by the shoulder for second watch.
This was Sam, and she was half-naked, and she was crawling into his sleeping bag.
"I WAS," Jack said, instantly more tense and alert than if a gun had been pointed at his head. "What's going on?"
"I'm cold," Carter murmured as she shimmied into the bag.
"You are NOT. Now get the hell out."
"I am SO. Don't be an asshole."
Whoa. Where had she learned that tone? Oh yeah, from him.
When Carter was shimmying into his sleeping bag and sounding like him, things were not good.
"Asshole, Major?"
"Holy Ha -- Put that major thing aside for ten minutes, can't you?" She wiggled up against him inside the warm sleeping bag and Jack immediately wondered when he had last said a rosary. Hail Mary, full of grace --
"It's not something you can put aside, Major. You're a major. I'm a colonel. Plus we work together on a team, remember? And we're on a mission? That's really important? For naquada? And what are you doing?"
"My hands are cold."
"They are NOT - DANIEL! Where are you going?"
The shadowy shape that had been moving toward the door stopped moving. "I was, uh, going to the latrine -"
"You were not! You're both horrible liars! I'm giving you lying lessons when we get home. Carter, stop what you're doing, and Daniel, go back to bed."
"Really, Jack, I was just heading out for some fresh -"
Carter - well, the only word for it was _undulated_ against Jack and the colonel decided he'd about had enough. "Carter! Go back to your own sleeping bag. And Daniel, as for you -"
Daniel, turning back to look at them by the last glow of the banked fire, saw Jack's eyes shooting venomous darts in his direction. Jack's voice was low and dangerous when he said, "So help me God, Daniel, if you leave me alone here I will hunt you down and shoot you."
"Okay, okay, no point in getting so cranky," Daniel muttered and went back to his sleeping bag. "Not that I particularly wanted to hang around and _listen_ while the two of you -"
"Nothing," barked Jack. "The two of us will be doing nothing."
"Funny word for it," mumbled Daniel as he slid back into his sleeping bag.
"Carter, last warning. Get back into your own sleeping bag."
"But Colonel, I really am cold."
"Put more of your clothes back on, for crying out loud."
Even in the near-darkness Daniel could have sworn he almost heard Sam pout.
"It's not the same," she said, and the velvety timbre of her voice made the hairs on the back of Daniel's neck stand up.
"Oh god," and Jack's moan sounded as much like a real prayer as anything else.
There was silence for a minute, then -
"Okay LOOK. You cannot put your hands there."
"Where should I put them, Colonel?"
The fact that she was still calling him Colonel should have been reassuring. Instead Jack found it vaguely disturbing.
"Look, go bug Daniel."
"Oh NO YOU DON'T." Daniel's response was immediate, and loud, from the other side of the fire.
"She's your best friend!"
"YOU'RE my best friend! Or Teal'c. Or - well, she's one of them. She's *your* second in command."
"Exactly!"
"Uh, guys, I am right here," Sam put in, finally sounding a little annoyed. "You're both taking this way too seriously."
"Taking WHAT too seriously?" Daniel wanted to know.
"There's nothing TO be taking seriously! Get out of this sleeping bag!" Jack roared.
"Look, keep doing that and the chief will know I lied about you two being mine," Sam said in tones of such reasonableness that Jack found himself thinking that it was too, too cruel to discover that, even drugged out of her mind, Carter was stone cold logical.
"I'm okay with that," Jack bit out, finally deciding that he was just going to have to get out of his own sleeping bag. Even if it was all warm and comfy. Dammit. "Besides, if we're both yours, there should be no problem with you going and bugging Daniel."
Sam seemed to consider this. "Okay," she said and slithered out.
"Now just ONE minute!"
"Not laughing now, are you, language boy?" Jack muttered as he zipped his own private sleeping bag back up.
"Jack, please!"
As much as Jack wanted to just go back to sleep, there was a real note of panic in Daniel's voice. "Oh come on," he said. "Be a man."
"With you LISTENING?"
"That's not what I -" Oh. Oho. Maybe, Jack realized, I'm in the way. Maybe I need to go shave the horses or something. "... I mean, um, I think I'm going to walk the perimeter."
He could tell by the sounds that Carter had arrived at Daniel's sleeping bag. "What'd you do to the zipper?" she demanded.
"Welded it shut," Daniel said tersely.
"I thought you both liked me," Sam suddenly half wailed, throwing herself down on top of her own sleeping bag and covering her eyes. "I thought... I thought..."
"We do both like you," Jack put in, sitting up.
"We both love you, Sam," Daniel said gently, as always doing so much better a job than Jack when the shit hit the fan and women's tears started to flow. "That's why we're not going to make love with you. Because you wouldn't be like this if you were sober. And you're not going to be happy about it when you're more like yourself."
"But I..." She dropped her hands and her nose was red and tears dripped off it. "I *am* like myself. Really. I don't understand why you can't ... why we can't just... and I'm COLD!"
"Where's her clothes?" Jack was wiggling around in his bag.
"You're asking ME?"
"Okay look, find her shirt and her pants, get 'em on her, and I'll fix the cold thing." Jack unzipped the bag and got out, dog tags flashing in a dying ember of firelight. "We're going to fix it, okay?" he said to Sam, much more gently.
"Yeah, okay, whatever," she said dejectedly.
Daniel got out of his sleeping bag too, and felt more than a little weird about riffling through Sam's bag. But her shirt wasn't hard to find.
"I can't find her pants."
"What?"
"I said I can't find her pants."
"I heard you, I just didn't want to believe it."
"Well do not make me say it again."
"Never mind. Get her shirt on her."
She still wore her Air Force-issued camisole and underwear. Daniel threaded her arms into her shirt while she sat limply.
"I don't feel right," she suddenly announced as Daniel was buttoning up her shirt.
"Are you going to throw up?" he asked with immediate alarm.
"No no, no no no, nothing like that. I feel weird. I feel big, really big, like my skin is big. And hot. I have big hot skin."
"I'm sorry, Sam," Daniel said, and stroked her hair. "You'll feel better soon."
"Mmm, that feels good, keep doing that," she purred, and rubbed her cheek against his hand.
Wow, thought something in the back of Daniel's brain he'd never heard from before. Sam's skin is really soft.
Well of course it is, he told himself, she's a woman.
Hadn't thought about it, really, said the back of Daniel's brain.
Please shut up, Daniel told himself.
"I'm not going to," he said softly, "because now it's time for you to sleep. I think that's the best plan."
"I think it sucks as a plan. No one asked you for a plan." Carter shrugged, grabbed Daniel's hand, and started playing with his fingers.
"Uh, Jack?" Daniel's voice had gone up a few notes in pitch.
"Yeah, yeah, got it."
"Let's go, Major," said Daniel pointedly, helping Carter to her feet and maneuvering her around the fire.
Where Jack was standing next to a... something.
"You want to get in first, or shall I?" said Jack.
"Pardon me?" said Daniel.
"Look, there's two ways this can happen. We can all three get into these sleeping bags I've zipped together, or you can get in with Sam and I'll take yours."
"You have got to be -"
"Those are the only two possible combinations, Daniel. And you know it."
Yes, Daniel knew it. Must be a bitch being a colonel sometimes, Daniel thought to himself, and wondered how much Jack wanted to just get into the bag with Sam himself and be done with it.
"It's really up to you, Daniel," Jack said in a tone much more like his usual one. "And... I wouldn't hold it against you if you were going to let an old man get some sleep by himself."
"Not a chance," Daniel shot back, quietly but vehemently. "What do you take me for? She's non compos mentis."
"Sorry. I take it back. Anyway. Get in, I'll load her up."
He talked about the Major as if she were an artillery shell, Daniel thought dazedly as he slid into the bag. And indeed, Jack wrestled her into the sleeping bag much as he would have loaded a Howitzer.
"All right, kids," Jack muttered as he followed her in. It really was cold, down into the low forties Fahrenheit, and the extra body heat might not suck, if only... "Now for the sleeping part."
"You don't want to stand watches any more?" asked Daniel from behind Sam's hair.
"Daniel, shut up."
"Fine."
There was rustling and sighing as all three of them found positions in which they felt they could sleep, supporting their heads in various ways, but it became obvious fairly quickly - like within about five minutes - that Carter was not asleep.
It became obvious to Jack when her bare smooth leg slid up over his leg and he thanked every God he'd ever heard of except the ones he was sure were Goa'uld that he, at least, had his pants on.
"Uh, Jack?"
Daniel's voice sounded a little strangled.
"Whatever it is, Daniel, save it."
What it was was Sam's warm round buttocks nestled into Daniel's lap.
"It's kind of a problem," he managed to say.
"Tell me about it," Jack hissed back. Sam's leg was rubbing up and down his and the heat of her skin almost burned him.
"Okay LOOK," and he grabbed Sam's hand, determined to ignore the way it was then trapped between his chest and Sam's far more spectacular one. "You can hear me, Major, right?"
"Of course."
"Of course WHAT?"
There was a pause. Then, "Of course, sir."
In the darkness Jack closed his eyes in relief. It *was* still their Carter, no matter how crazy. "Okay then, Major. Your orders are to lie still and go to sleep. Repeat those orders back to me."
"I'm to lie still and go to sleep."
"What was that again?"
"I'm to lie still and go to sleep, SIR." Under her breath Sam muttered "Hardass" which Jack - and Daniel, for that matter - couldn't fail to hear since their heads were all about five inches apart, but he pretended not to hear it anyway.
"Good. Now carry out your orders, Major."
"Yes, sir, whatever," Carter mumbled, her irritation still palpable. But she stopped wiggling.
Still, "What about ME?" squeaked Daniel.
Jack sighed. "Daniel, I'm just about ready to pack it in and decide we'll all three sit up all night till Carter sobers up. Just say the word. I figured you would do better work tomorrow if you got some sleep. And I can't stay up alone with Carter in this condition any more than I can get into a sleeping bag with her."
It had not occurred to Daniel in the slightest that Jack might be thinking of him. Sam, sure, but him? "I'll sleep, Jack."
"Good. Do try."
Balancing his head on his pack, Jack lay on his side with Carter plastered up against his chest. True to her word, she was lying still.
That woman would follow orders if she were dead, Jack thought to himself. He was kind of proud of her, right after the whole wanting to kill her thing.
He couldn't figure out what to do with his --
"What are you still rustling for?" whispered Daniel.
"I can't figure out what to do with the hand she's not lying on," whispered Jack back.
"Ah, the age-old question," whispered Daniel. But his hand came out of the darkness and fastened on to Jack's.
Startled, Jack almost pulled his hand back. But with it in Daniel's, it was okay, suddenly, to leave it draped in the curve of Sam's waist.
He couldn't have allowed himself to do that with just his hand, but somehow, he could do it with Daniel's.
Jack sighed again, aware that his breath stirred Carter's gold hair, but beyond that he saw the glint of one of Daniel's blue eyes. In the warmth of the bag he could smell both of them, and realized, for the first time, how familiar both their scents were; Sam sweet and musky at the same time, Daniel earthy and sharp together.
He could sleep after all.
***
In the morning there were exactly two words said.
Sam said them, and what she said was "Oh God."
She said it right before she slid out of the sleeping bag, apparently powered by antigravity machinery of some sort, and disappeared out of the lines of sight of the two men left behind, one eagle-eyed, one still blinking and bleary.
"She's like lightning," Jack observed as Carter, apparently having located the secret stash of pants, disappeared out of the lodge into the early morning light.
"Uh, yeah, I'm, uh, not," half-stuttered Daniel, wondering where he'd left his glasses in all the bed-shuffling. They were in a military-issue case somewhere, he knew they were okay, he just wished he was looking through them.
"You awake?" Jack said, and Daniel had a blurry impression of Jack's grinning face, hair sticking up every which way, eyes sparkling dark pools of --
Hey. His hand was resting on Jack's chest.
"Yeah, yeah," Daniel said, startled, jumping and then scrubbing his hand over his hair to make it look as if he hadn't just jumped away from Jack as if he burned.
What was that? Daniel thought to himself. I fell asleep last night holding his hand. In the same sleeping bag. Why get nervous about touching him in the morning?
Jack watched Daniel's eyes clear and even focus as Daniel squinted. He must have an amazing array of muscles in his face, Jack thought, to make all those little expressions.
"Glad you got some sleep," Jack said.
"Yes. Thank you."
"Don't mention it."
"And Sam... uh, we don't need to discuss this with Sam, do we?"
Jack's eyebrows rose so far up his forehead Daniel thought they might fly off. "No, I think it'd be best if we also follow the 'don't mention it' policy with Major Carter."
"You won't hear any complaining from me," groaned Daniel as he levered himself up and out.
"That'd be a first," Jack said automatically, noticing the muscles flexing in Daniel's arms as he moved. Did his own arms look like that? Maybe he should work out more often.
"Get up, Jack," and Daniel also staggered for the lodge door.
***
Eighteen hours later, in her own bathroom at her own home, Sam could hardly look herself in the eye.
What had she been *thinking*?
Apparently whatever they'd given her in the cup wasn't for thinking. Still not able to look Daniel in the eye, Sam had nonetheless asked him to find out what the hell they'd drugged her with.
"Well, an aphrodisiac," said Daniel, translating what the chief had said, including the chief's tone that conveyed a precise meaning of "Well, duh."
Sam just blinked at him. He asked more questions, got more answers.
"Apparently," he told her, "the women often drink it before special events, you know, whenever they're getting... stressed."
"The women in this tribe act like I was acting?"
"Well..." Daniel asked another question, got a clarification, looked back at Sam almost apologetically. "You did get a double dose, since after all, uh, you have two."
"I have two." Sam almost whispered, feeling her face go pale.
"And of course you're large and -"
"DON'T - say it."
Thinking back Sam didn't even remember how she'd gotten out of the conversation. Maybe she'd just walked away. She remembered having the fleeting idea that she could just grenade them all, the Colonel and Daniel included, and no one else would ever have to know.
Not that it had been quite that humiliating.
But it had been damn close.
Waving her toothbrush at herself in the mirror of her own bathroom, "You spend too much time thinking about those guys. They're not your guys. Bad major. Stop thinking."
Easier said than done, because who else was she going to think about?
And after all, she was large and healthy.
She then said something to her mirror image that she never, ever said out loud when another human soul could hear her.
"Son of a fucking bitch," she said, but even swearing like a sailor didn't make her feel any better, and she decided to go to bed.
It took her a while to fall asleep. The bedroom seemed hot, even though she had both the windows open, and the sheets felt rough against her skin. She was not the sort of person who tossed and turned in bed, but tonight she did both, restless, her skin feeling as if it were constantly on the edge of itching.
Rolling over she rested her hand under her cheek. Funny, the sheet felt almost fuzzy. Furry, even.
"No, I'm not asleep, Carter," Jack's voice rumbled in her head, vibrating where her cheek lay against his undeniably masculine, furred chest.
"I'm not either," she sighed and his hands slid up her bare back, pulling her closer. All the sensations were delicious, etched in bright colors.
His breath was warm as he nuzzled her ear, his tongue soft where he slipped it along her throat. Her arms slid around his neck and pulled him close but he pulled them away. "I want..." She could feel him all against her as he slid down her body to take one of her nipples in his mouth. It was already painfully hard, and she felt goosepimples and she shivered.
"Oh please," she said and her hands wandered everywhere, the hairy length of muscled thighs, the hard flesh between them.
Mumbling something she couldn't understand Jack sucked hard on one of her nipples, making her cry out in the same instant that he slid two callused fingers inside her.
"I can't wait," she gasped and wound her legs around his hips.
"You don't have to," he said, his eyes holding hers as he guided himself in with fingers slick from her and buried himself in her.
Floating in space, no up or down or sideways for reference, Sam throbbed around him and thought this must be one of the finest sensations the universe had to offer.
"More," she said, and ground herself against him.
She'd lost track of all time and space.
"More," she sobbed as she wrapped her arms around his chest, pulling him close, wanting him never to leave her alone. "More."
"More what?" One of his hands was in her hair, but he wasn't holding her tightly enough.
"More of you," she ordered, hearing the urgent edge to her voice. "More."
And another voice said, "More of me?"
Daniel's voice, lighter, softer, tickled the hair at the back of her neck, and suddenly she noticed - why hadn't she noticed before? - that Daniel, warm, solid Daniel was there, pressing her closer to Jack, holding her tight.
"Oh thank God," shuddered Sam and relaxed into their grip.
Daniel's lips trailed kisses along her shoulders, up the back of her neck, while his hands came around to cup her breasts, the feel of them contrasting with the furry heat of Jack's chest. She could feel his nipples against her back, his smooth skin curving around her even as she clung to the Colonel. "What would you like, Sam?" Daniel's voice whispered.
She'd like more. She had to have it. She opened her eyes and looked into Jack's eyes but to Daniel she said, "Go ahead," and her voice sounded raspy even in her own ears, desperate. "I want it."
"Are you sure?" asked Daniel, stroking a stubbly cheek against her shoulder, because he would be the type of person to double-check, she thought hazily, even as the sensation of Jack sliding in and out of her increased her sense of itchy, aching emptiness.
"Yes, dammit, yes!" she half-shouted at him and immediately felt the smooth tip of warm, omnipresent Daniel, miraculously slippery and soft and hard, pressing gently but inexorably between the cheeks of her ass. Moving her feet she felt Daniel's thigh rubbing against Jack's between her legs.
"Do it, do it, do it," she chanted, amazed at herself - when had she ever wanted this? - and cried out again, feeling herself stretch and open, but it didn't hurt, it was perfect.
That was what she had needed. Now she wasn't empty. Now she wasn't alone.
And now she was filled so tight she could never move again, no one would ever ask her to, and the sensation of her two men holding her between them, holding her up, sliding out of her and then sliding inside, filling her up, suddenly tore her apart from the inside and she came seeing stars, unable to catch her breath, immediately wanting to come again, for this to never stop.
In her sleep, Sam made a little moaning noise and turned over yet again, the covers finally giving up on the bed, as she slept off the last effects of her very-important-person drink.
***
At 7:16 a.m. the sunbeam caught Daniel right in the eye, as it did almost every day, the time varying with tilt of the earth from the sun.
As he did most days, Daniel turned over, realized he wasn't going to get back to sleep, moaned, and stretched his arms over his head.
Squinting, he glared at the window. It *had* a blind. Why didn't the blind prevent the sunlight from waking him up?
Knowing that, just like every other day, he would forget about the inconvenient window as soon as he got up and started moving around, Daniel nonetheless felt a little irritated, not the best way to wake up, and the way he woke up most days.
Groaning, he rolled over and laid his arm over his eyes. His automatic coffee maker would start brewing in half an hour, because he always set it for the time he intended to get up, not the time he did get up.
He curled his toes.
Under the blanket his morning hard-on brushed against the weave. Daniel was aware that many people outfitted their beds with a wide variety of linens, including a bottom sheet, a top sheet, and blankets or comforters over that. Daniel wanted no truck with all that complication. If he was cold, he needed a blanket over him. If he wasn't, he didn't.
And despite the fact that it was chilly outside, it was pretty warm in here.
Plus, Daniel was a warm sleeper.
Tossing back the blanket, Daniel stretched his legs and curled his toes again, feeling the blood surging through his system and pulsing in the end of his dick.
And as he did a lot of mornings, he put down a hand and lazily stroked himself.
The sensation of his dry hand on his own dry skin was vaguely unsatisfying. As he often did, he thought he should put some lotion or something within arm's reach of the bed. As with the blinds, as soon as he got up, he forgot about it, which was why he spent so many mornings with his own dry hand.
Sam wouldn't have been dry, a little voice in the back of his head told him.
"Don't think that," he told himself out loud, even though he continued stroking, rubbing his thumb over the head.
She wouldn't have been, though, he admitted to himself, remembering the way her rear end had fit into his lap. If she'd been as ready as she sounded - as ready as she smelled - she'd have been silky wet to the touch, perfect for - He could just imagine Sam's body sliding up and down the stiff flesh he held in his dry hand. Sam, sliding -
He couldn't think this way about Sam. It was SAM. A world-class physicist - in fact, a galaxy-class physicist - and a great colleague. A great teammate. It was disrespectful.
It was honest.
He didn't want to stop now until he'd finished.
But Sam, he thought to himself, in the half-awake confusion of morning. What would she even say during sex? Would it be something about the interaction of subatomic particles in high-gravity fields? The energy to mass ratio in the average naquada reactor reaction?
Or would it be something like -
"What are you waiting for?" rumbled a voice in his head.
Jack's voice. Not Sam's.
Whoa, thought Daniel, waking up a little more as he noticed his dick was now harder than steel, thrusting through his hand urgently.
What the hell? He'd been fantasizing about Sam. That was bad enough. He was a guy, though, after all, and only human, and Sam's lovely ass had been in his lap just this time yesterday - it was reasonable, it was normal.
"Why the fuck don't you hold still?" said Jack's voice again.
Groaning, Daniel spread his feet, his buttocks clenching. His brain filled in a different image now - Jack's bare chest, the line of his neck down into his shoulders, and his dark eyes looking up at Daniel through his eyelashes.
Eyelashes???? thought Daniel.
But it was working for him, and his hand sped up. Dry or not, he was going to come - not his usual gentle morning orgasm, something a lot fiercer.
What was it his brain was working towards? thought Daniel. I mean, what's next? Jack giving him a blowjob? Jack fucking him senseless?
A brain that Daniel had thought himself relatively well acquainted with suddenly provided him with a stunning full-color 3D image of Jack's hard, masculine body wrapped around his, invading his, and moaning out loud, Daniel suddenly came hard, creamy liquid shooting across his stomach and onto the bed.
Damn, thought Daniel blearily. That never happened. Now he'd have to change the sheet.
I gotta go make the coffeemaker start early, Daniel told himself, wiping his hand on the sheet he was going to change anyway before he staggered naked out of the bed and towards the kitchen. Something weird going on. Need caffeine.
***
Around 11 p.m. Jack adjusted the eyepiece on his favorite telescope.
One day of leave down, another to go, he thought. It had been a good day. He'd fixed a leak under the kitchen sink and watched a good football game.
The thing Jack hated most about the mountain was that it was a mountain and they worked inside it. The air inside was, to say the least, stale. Even with fans blowing it around, it smelled like the inside of a mountain.
Out here, on his roof, Jack had all the low-oxygen air he could want. Clean and crisp and dry, it tickled the inside of his nose. It was better than champagne bubbles, as far as he was concerned.
But then, a lot of things were better than champagne in Jack's book.
Tilting his telescope towards a thumb-sized nebula Jack sighed and leaned back in the gently aged redwood chair. The breeze rustled through the trees right behind his head and he could smell someone's woodsmoke as well as hear some animal trying to get into his bear-proof garbage bin.
It was the sensation of alone-but-not-quite-alone that relaxed Jack most.
If Teal'c or Daniel were here they'd have to talk shop. Neither one of them was all that good at just sitting and shutting up, although you'd think Teal'c would have the edge on it, with all that kel-no-reem practice. The truth was that when he WASN'T kel-no-reeming, Teal'c was always doing something, always reading something, always thinking something, and all too often, he wanted to tell you about it.
And Daniel, Daniel had two settings: ignoring you or talking your ear off.
Sam could be good company if she ever had anything to talk about that didn't involve any equations.
Leaning back, Jack closed his eyes, allowing himself a smile thinking of Sam's behavior night before last and the way she'd reacted in the morning.
Poor Sam. So mortified. God forbid we should remember she's a hot woman.
"No, seriously, God forbid," Jack muttered, shifting a little in his chair and opening one eye. Sky still there. Fine. He closed his eyes again.
God, he adored her. She really was an awesome officer. Another woman wouldn't have followed orders, wouldn't have managed to get a grip. Another woman wouldn't have bothered to be so embarrassed about it in the morning.
Of course Carter would, though. Poor Carter. Carter for whom "Holy Hannah" was the big swear phrase.
Lolling his head back, breathing the non-mountain-recycled air, Jack stuck his hands in the pockets of his leather jacket.
Yeah, trying to feel him up was definitely the most insubordinate thing she'd ever done. Chuckling, he wondered how many commanding officers could say that.
Actually, he thought, making a note, how many COULD say that? How many women were there on the other SG teams? Better talk to Hammond about that in the morning.
Surprising that something like this didn't happen more often, Jack thought sleepily, wondering if there was a way to keep eating and drinking things natives offered but test them first. Some sort of non-intrusive thing they could dip into the drink, or touch after they dipped a finger into the drink - like the anti-rohypnol tests they distributed nowadays. Jack had seen something about it on the news. If colleges had tests like that, SG-1 should definitely have them. Something that would cost a hundred dollars a strip and last forever in boxes of a thousand stored in the armory under a mountain.
Or they could just not eat or drink things they were offered, no matter what Daniel said.
Not that it hadn't been worth it to see Carter cut loose. Something he'd never expected to see, might never see again. Though for Carter cutting loose had involved stripping down to underwear his mother would have worn, and feeling up a tired old colonel.
Was that really as loose as she got? He just couldn't imagine Carter wearing some kinky little outfit, or tying someone up, or even just grabbing someone by the dick and swinging them against the wall and giving them a hard, fast blowjob, the kind where hot, strong lips squeezed all the way down the shaft and the tongue worked all the way up.
Jack shifted again a little more uncomfortably as he felt himself getting hard. Yeah, that was the best kind of blowjob, the kind that involved a strong hand pulling fast and hard and soft pink lips that vibrated against your skin when -
"Mmm," Daniel's voice trembled through his flesh as his mouth locked on the hard, stiff part of Jack.
WHAT?
Shocked, Jack shot up out of the chair, looked around.
What the hell was that?
Had he drifted off?
Dreaming. Must have been dreaming.
Still.
What the hell was THAT?
Hands shaking, Jack dismounted the telescope to take it indoors. He was cold - and, he suddenly realized, his dick in his pants was rock-hard.
Whaddya want? he asked himself. After hours of what was essentially fruitless foreplay from "very important" Carter, then the night spent in the sleeping bag listening to her breathe and holding Daniel's hand...
Y'know, he suddenly thought, midnight's always a good time for a little scotch.
Scotch, then bed.
His own comfy bed, with the TV on the dresser and the drawer full of straight-guy porn.
No matter what weird shit happened through the gate day after day, he always managed to come home to his house, his bed, his straight-guy porn.
Yep. Scotch, bed, perhaps some heterosexual porn. Very heterosexual.
Or maybe it was best not to think about it at all.
Two Scotches later and Jack was lying in bed in his usual sweats and T-shirt, the cheesy music of a videotaped porn movie playing softly in the background while his eyes drifted closed.
Why are they always shaved like that? thought Jack as he felt that airy sensation that always preceded real sleep.
"I'm not," said Daniel, arms crossed over his chest, eyes flicking downward causing Jack's eyes to flick downward too. No, Daniel wasn't. For a smooth-chested guy he had a suitably hairy sack.
"I'm not either," observed Sam, laying back on his bed so the light glinted off her golden curls.
He wanted to make her come, he knew that. He wanted her to break apart, lose control, and he wanted to know he was the one doing it.
That he could picture.
But that was all.
He hated the idea of Sam kneeling, Sam riding, Sam being just the same as all the other women he'd known in his life. Sam wasn't like that. Sam was different.
He didn't want her submitting to him.
Daniel, on the other hand...
"Why aren't you lying down?" he said to the standing Daniel who still had his arms folded as if he were guarding something.
"Why would I?"
Jack groaned. Yeah, Daniel would never just go along. Everything had to be difficult. Everything had to be a question.
Everything had to be an argument.
At least everything important.
"That's not true, Jack," Daniel said, his voice gentle like he had been with Carter. "Not everything's an argument."
And then he was in the bed... but so was Carter... and Jack started to get confused.
"I do want to make love with you, you know," he said to Sam, and she smiled, in a way she'd never smiled at him before. She didn't say anything else. She didn't do anything, either. She didn't move.
Daniel did, though.
"It's okay," Daniel said softly as he ran his hands up the outside of Jack's legs, making him shudder. Where had Carter gone? She'd just been here... where Jack was now...
"Just relax," Daniel said, laying between Jack's thighs, his breath warm. "I'll do everything. Anything you want. You don't have to worry."
"Sam... uh..."
He could picture Daniel's mouth closing over just the tip of him, the full dark pink lips soft and hard at the same time, and he shook.
"Shh," said Daniel, releasing him for a moment. "I've got you now."
The heavy crystal tumbler rolled out of Jack's fingers and onto the floor as he turned over in his sleep, taking the tented covers with him.
***
By elevenish the next morning Jack had just about had enough of gutter cleaning.
It was a hard stinky job and he had to concentrate so as not to fall off the ladder.
Still, by his count, he'd thought of his decidedly peculiar dreams last night as least eighty or ninety times.
"Don't think about the pink elephant in the room," he muttered to himself as he got out of the hot shower, having dislodged all the funky leaf gunk from under his fingernails. He really should get work gloves but they just seemed too --
"Too gay?" he asked his mirror, figuring that work gloves were the least of his problems.
What was the world coming to when a poor overworked Colonel got ambushed in his dreams by some sex-god vision of his team's civilian consultant?
"I mean straight, straight consultant," Jack corrected himself out loud. That was the important part. Even if he'd just discovered some new quirk in his own libido, Daniel was straight and the dreams were pointless, just cruel twists of some hormonal overload that had been brought on by spending the night with those two whackmobiles in that sleeping bag.
"Maybe Carter breathed on me." Jack pulled on clean jeans and a polo.
But he wouldn't ask Frasier to follow up and investigate. Because he knew it wasn't true. There were no drugs in his system. Just some hormones and some Scotch, in some odd proportion that allowed him to imagine... Well, sinfully luscious things that had no bearing on reality.
Just like porn. Nothing like the real world. Nothing at all.
So he had no trouble opening the door. Daniel rang the bell, Jack looked out the peephole and saw Daniel, Jack opened the door. Just like had happened any number of times before. Nothing odd about that.
It *was* a little odd that Daniel, not meeting his eyes, opened the conversation with "Would you actually have preferred it if I had left you and Sam alone? I mean, really?"
"I don't think so. I thought for a second there you might have wanted *me* to take a walk."
"No. Not really."
Not really? thought Jack. What the hell does that mean?
But then Daniel looked up, and his eyes caught Jack's.
And Jack saw the whole conversation they were about to have in the blue reflection.
"No way. No fucking WAY." This was the sum total of Jack's observation.
And Daniel, who had realized at the same moment exactly what Jack had been thinking -- too -- just stared. One of his shyer smiles kept appearing and disappearing. Armed with two Ph.D.'s and the articulation of one who studied words and their structures for a living, Daniel said, "At least it's not just me."
And they stood there for a moment, looking at each other.
Oh well, thought Jack. Might fuck up the team. Might not.
We've been through worse.
"We're not, uh, going to talk about this to Sam, are we?" asked Daniel a little sheepishly, as if he were already looking over his shoulder to see who was watching, as if, Jack realized, he were already wondering who could tell what he wanted to do to Jack.
I can tell, thought Jack.
"Oh no," said Jack, stepping back finally to let Daniel into the house. "No, I think with Major Carter we better continue our 'don't mention it' policy."
"Once again, I'm willing to agree with you," said Daniel as he stepped inside the door.