Title: When the Smell Lingers
Author: Flatkatsi
Email: flatkatsi@optusnet.com.au
Status: Complete
Category: Angst
Pairings: None
Spoilers: None
Season: Any
Sequel/Series Info: Sequel to When the Ash Settles
Rating: PG
Content Warnings: None
File Size: 26kb
Archive: Incoming Wormhole, Jackfic
Summary: Jack is in the infirmary.
Disclaimer: Stargate Sg-1 and its characters are the property of Stargate (II) Productions, Showtime/Viacom, MGM/UA, Double Secret Productions, and Gekko Productions. This story is for entertainment purposes only and no money exchanged hands. No copyright infringement is intended. The original characters, situations, and story are the property of the author. This story may not be posted elsewhere without the consent of the author.
Author’s Note: Thanks again to Ruth, for giving my muse a jumpstart.
There was something about waking up in the infirmary. There was this comforting sense of security - knowing that you are home, but somehow, there was also a sense of fear – not knowing if this time would be the last or if you were going to be given another chance.
And how much of a chance that would be.
Jack knew that he had been given another chance and that he was grateful.
He had barely been conscious of his terror as he lay in the stream and prayed that the flames would pass him by. He had barely been conscious of the walk back towards the gate, or of falling to his knees. But what he did remember, and remember clearly, was the certainty that he would be found.
Now he lay, eyes slitted and watchful. Silent – not by necessity because of the tube in his throat, that had never stopped him before – but because he just wanted to watch without being observed. He didn’t have many opportunities to be the watcher. Usually it was the other way around.
They were all there, as he knew that they would be. Daniel reading, Carter dozing and Teal’c just sitting. They must have taken turns to get showered and changed – he knew the routine, how it worked, he had done it often enough himself.
So he enjoyed himself and just watched.
He wasn’t sure how long it was before he realised that the watcher had become the watched. It may have been from the moment that he had woken. Teal’c inclined his head in a shallow bow, a tiny smile twitching at the corner of his mouth. He didn’t speak, by mutual unspoken consent; they left their comrades undisturbed.
Jack watched the rise and fall of Sam’s chest, an even deep rhythm so easy to take for granted.
That had been taken from him. He remembered gasping for every breath, choking desperately. He felt the tube, uncomfortable in his raw throat.
So easy to take it for granted.
Jack mentally wrote a list of things that he took for granted. It wasn’t a long list. Some of the most important things weren’t on it anymore. Some of the items on it had only been added recently. And he knew that nothing was written in indelible ink.
Trust.
Friendship.
Survival.
Death.
Some of these things he had been taught by the people in this room and they had been hard lessons to learn.
Trust had been the hardest.
Jack knew that he hadn’t truly realised how well he had learnt that lesson until the fire. At no time had he doubted. He had had complete trust.
And he understood that it was that certainty that had kept him alive.
He could still smell the smoke, still feel the heat. The awesome tread of that other thing that he took for granted, that other certainty, death, sounding soft and somehow sweet in his ears. Even now he knew that it would be a simple thing to listen and answer. He was still partially in that hushed and peaceful place, that fine and quiet limbo between giving up and stepping forward. Only a thin thread held him, tightly wound around and around and easily traced back to the three people in this room.
Jack held that thread. The thread could still be easily broken, but he held it firmly.
And he let his eyes shut once more, giving Teal’c a last look, one survivor to another, and he drifted.
He would not be plagued by nightmares. Most of his nightmares were of the times before he learnt what he now took for granted.
The smell of smoke would be with him, a part of him, for a long time yet. It lingered - but it wasn’t a reminder. Jack wasn’t thinking of what might have been, because there was no purpose in that, but thinking of how things were.
Teal’c softly touched the Colonel’s arm, his movement calm and unseen by the others. He felt the gentle beat of the pulse, so light and fragile and he bound his comrade tightly to him with the unseen thread.
