It had been a strange day at the SGC. If General Hammond had been privy to everything that transpired, he would certainly have checked SG1 for the possibility of contamination.

 

Following their latest mission, the team was tired and pretty traumatised, but Colonel O’Neill still didn’t think that excused Major Carter’s constant contradiction of everything he said at the de-briefing session. He felt that his 2IC’s continuous round of corrections – fully supported by Daniel, as though the pair were ganging up on him – had undermined his authority. By the time the meeting ended he was, to put it mildly, royally pissed.

 

As the meeting broke up, O’Neill followed Carter down the stairs.

“Major, a word if you don’t mind.”

Samantha Carter stopped and turned. “Sir?”

The colonel leaned over the railing towards her and hissed, “Carter, what was that all about?”

“Sir? I don’t know what you mean.”

“I mean, Major . . . ” – he looked around to make sure no one was listening – “ . . . was it absolutely necessary to make me look like an idiot?”

Sam’s brow furrowed as she replied somewhat shirtily,  “I think you can manage to do that all by yourself . . . Sir.”

O’Neill straightened, momentarily stunned by the major’s unexpected retort. “That, Major, amounts to insubordination.”

“Fine, so sue me.”

The colonel watched as she took the rest of the stairs at a trot, her clipboard clutched tightly to her chest. He just knew her lips would be pursed in anger.

Determined she wasn’t going to get away with it, O’Neill set off in pursuit. He caught up with Sam at the elevator, where he managed to force back the closing doors, allowing him to step in beside her. The major glared at him from behind her clipboard. The colonel smiled triumphantly.

 

They rode the elevator in silence.

 

When Sam got off at level 19, the colonel knew she was heading for her lab. He followed her down the corridor. Outside the lab, she stopped and turned to confront him.

“Anything I can do for you, Colonel?”

He could tell she was pissed, but then so was he.

“You could try an apology.”

Sam gasped. “An apology? What do I have to apologise for?”

“What do I have to apologise for…Sir.”

“Colonel, you can pull rank all you like, but it doesn’t mean you’re in the right. Now, if you don’t mind, I’ve got work to do.”

“But I do mind, Major . . .  Don’t you think we’ve got something to talk about?”

“Colonel, I’m tired, you’re tired . . . can’t we talk some other time?”

“Oh, that would be . . . when? . . . like never?”

         

Carter turned her back on the colonel’s belligerence and entered her lab. She put the clipboard down on the bench and purposefully switched on her computer. O’Neill watched her from the doorway. He could tell she was grinding her teeth, but then so was he.

          He closed the door, moseyed over to her bench, picked up some odd looking doohickey and started fiddling with it. Sam leaned across the bench and snatched it out of his hand. “Sir! Would you just leave!”

“Don’t worry, Major, this isn’t exactly Welcome City.”

O’Neill had barely made it to the doorway before something hit him on the back of the head. He turned around nursing a quickly growing lump. A hefty volume lay on the floor where it had bounced off his cranium.

Sam stood with her fists clenched, defiance on her face and tears of anger in her eyes. O’Neill rounded the workbench, fully intent on shaking the living daylights out of his 2IC. By the time he’d got there, he’d found that he didn’t want to shake her after all.

Instead, he grabbed her face between his palms and planted a kiss on those gloriously inviting lips.

 

He kissed her so hard she fell back against the bench behind.

 

He went with her.

 

Fully expecting a fight, he was surprised when her hands grasped his head, pulling him in – as if he could get any closer – so he didn’t know who was kissing who any more.

          Just as he’d lost sight of regulations and all that godawful military paraphernalia, the phone rang.

          “Mmmm, leave it Carter,” he muttered, barely taking his lips away from Sam’s mouth.

          “Sir…”

          “Oh, crap!”

 

O’Neill reluctantly pulled away. Carter picked up the phone. He heard only one side of the conversation.

          “Yes, sir, he’s here . . . Yes, sir, I’ll let him know.”

          “Hammond?” he asked, as Sam replaced the phone in its cradle.

          “Huh, huh. He wants you in his office . . . pronto.”

          O’Neill smoothed down his jacket. “Look, Carter, about . . .”

          “Forget it, sir. Nothing happened.”

          “It didn’t . . . ?”

          Sam shook her head.

          “We didn’t just . . . ?”

          “No, sir.”

          “Okaaay  . . . only I’d swear . . .”

          O’Neill walked to the door. One hand on the doorknob he turned.

          “You sure we . . . ?”

          Sam Carter suppressed a smile. “An aberration, Colonel. It won’t happen again.”

          “Oh.” O’Neill’s head jerked up. “An aber . . .?”

          “. . . ration, sir.”

          “Riight.” The colonel scratched the back of his neck.

          “General Hammond, sir?”

          “What?”

          “General Hammond? He’s waiting?”

          “Yeah . . . okay . . .  err . . . Carter? . . . I’ve just that I’ve got this slight problem with my sidearm. . . .”

          Sam Carter burst into a fit of giggles. “Pull your shirt down, sir . . . no one will notice.”

          “Well . . . ya sure know how to dent a guy’s ego!”

          “Sorry, sir.”

          “Never mind . . . it’s done the trick . ”

 

It had been a strange day at the SGC . . .

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