[SG1] Lieutenant Colonel Mom 2 (4/?)
Sep. 2nd, 2013 03:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dontwantmebackTitle: Lieutenant Colonel Mom 2 (4/?)
Fandom: Stargate: SG-1
Pairing: None
Rating: G
Warnings: None
Length: 1607 words
Part One
Part Two
Part Three
The entirety of fourth grade could not have been more normal for Cameron and Vala. Their issues levelled out, they were able to talk again and Vala was at a good age where she was just a happy kid who liked to hang out with her friends and go to skating, to bully Cameron into watching movies with princesses and into teaching her to bake cookies like he knew more than how to follow a recipe. They took a trip during her winter vacation and he taught her to ski, or tried to at any rate; Vala didn't really take a shine to it and fairly promptly decided she only liked skating. And a full month of her summer break was spent with her grandparents on the farm, Cameron only there for the first and last weeks and she didn't seem to mind at all.
He saw her perform in her skate-club's end of season thing, Jon sitting beside him and applauding just as enthusiastically, at her demand. And the few times when Cameron and Vala did fall out, fought about something that made no sense to him no matter how hard he tried to understand but was the entirety of her little world, when nothing he could say or do could convince her he wasn't being purposefully cruel, just didn't understand why she was losing her mind, or was too frustrated to want to do anything but send her to her room, Vala spent the night at Jon's. It was a good system. They worked things out the best they could when it was needed, but those times they just needed some space from one another, the kind of space their little apartment just didn't provide, they could get it and Cameron always knew that Vala was safe.
The fifth grade was met with resounding excitement. Now ten, Vala decided she was too cool for princesses, and the doll she had trailed behind her everywhere for years found its way onto a shelf in her room, posed there beside the personal item he'd managed to scrounge up for her when she first turned, some little treasure box, probably from her first childhood, and the SG-1 patch he'd pilfered from her jacket. Cameron finally relented and let her walk home from school, it wasn't far and it let her have more time with her friends, let Cameron have more time with students and trainees, and there was always Jon, or Sam, or Daniel, there to step in if needed.
Her new freedom meant that she didn't show up home on time about once a week, about half those times she was off at a friend's house, occasionally forgot to call and had Cameron concerned about her whereabouts. And sometimes she was mad at Cameron for something or other that happened that morning, or holding a grudge from the day before, and went to Jon's instead.
Spring break had just ended, and it had been a rough go for the two of them. Vala wanted a cell phone, had been asking for months, saying that all her friends had them, she was the only one who didn't, and Cameron kept refusing. She was too young, he said; she didn't need one. Vala declared that he obviously wanted her to be a social outcast, spent most of her break bouncing back and forth between home and Jon's place while the adults made jokes about sharing custody of her and Cameron spent so much time driving back and forth he thought it might have been better if they just moved in down the street from each other or something.
The flitting back and forth when Vala was annoyed by Cameron's refusal on the cell phone front continued when Vala went back to school, and at least three times a week Cameron came home to a message from Jon that she was there. And Cameron would leave her for a few hours, to calm down from whatever mood she was in before he went to get her. There was almost always a message, though, and when there wasn't there was a call not long after he got in, and Cameron never had to worry.
And then, one night in May, the evening after a morning of bickering about the phone thing again that had Vala once again certain that Cameron wanted her to be the only kid at school without one, going to school mad and Cameron going to work frustrated, Cameron got home to no Vala, and no flashing light on the answering machine. Nothing to worry about, he thought, she was probably at Jon's and there would be that call any time now. Except an hour passed, and then another, and Jon didn't call. That was unusual, and so Cameron called instead.
"Hey, she there?" he asked the moment Jon picked up, and there was an overwhelming sense of discomfort, concern, when Jon sounded surprised and confused.
"No. She's not at home?"
"Would I be calling you if she was?"
Jon swore quietly, sighed. "You start at the beginning, I'll start at the end, we'll meet around M."
They didn't need more discussion than that; They hung up and Cameron started calling the homes of Vala's friends, knew Jon was doing the same. No one knew where Vala was, and there was no interrupting call from Jon to say he'd found her. They touched base about an hour later, and the news wasn't good. No one knew where she was and Cameron's concern turned to genuine fear. He almost didn't register that Jon announced he was going to try driving around, see if he couldn't find her. Instead when he hung up, Cameron immediately called the mountain. It was still his first thought, he'd probably never think to call the police first, especially when it came to Vala.
Within another hour there were teams mobilized, and Cameron was left at home with strict orders not to go anywhere. In case Vala came back or in case anything was heard; the apartment acted as a sort of home base. Sam and Daniel came around like they could be some sort of comfort, and Cameron promptly sent them out with the teams, told them he felt better with them out in the field in his place, and he sent Jon out after them when he stopped by too. Cameron wasn't allowed out there looking, even if every ounce of him was yearning to, but he could have the people he trusted most out there being his eyes and ears, sending him messages and keeping him appraised. While all he could do was sit and worry.
He didn't sleep that night, even as it passed midnight, even as the sun rose again. He put in a call to work to say he wouldn't be making it in, his daughter was missing, and his CO was more than understanding. Even offered to put together some teams as well and Cameron had to tell her it was being handled by his old post, but he appreciated the thought; he didn't tell her he appreciated that she didn't ask anything about his old, top-secret post, just accepted it and moved on, told him he was on leave for as long as he needed, to just call when he was ready to come back. He spent all day pacing, jumping on the phone every time it rang, broke a little every time it wasn't news that Vala had been found.
The call finally did come late on the second night, when Cameron was about ready to explode from all the coffee, and the stress, and the fear. Sam's voice on the line just saying they'd found her; she was on her way home. Cameron thought he'd collapse with the relief if he could actually believe it. He waited, on edge, impatient, for someone to bring her back and when the car arrived, when he saw from the window Jon getting out with Vala wrapped around him like a leech, Cameron bolted downstairs to meet them at the door. He took Vala, ruffled and tear-stained but apparently unharmed and whole, and hugged her so tightly she actually squawked in protest.
Still, she clung to him just as tightly, didn't let go until she fell asleep and even then Cameron had to pry her arms loose. He didn't put her to bed, just tucked her up under a blanket on the couch where he could keep an eye on her and took Jon into the kitchen to get the details of what happened, since no one had told him, had wanted him to know.
That Goa'uld, Athena, who always seemed to want Vala, who had kidnapped her before and who they'd lost track of but didn't care enough about to track down, they'd had bigger fish to fry. From what Jon had gathered she was still after whatever she'd been after before, and the fact that Vala was ten-years-old with almost no accessible memories of her life before her new childhood hadn't been a deterrent. It probably should have been, the way the SGC teams had descended on her, Jon explained, and even all the years of memories of Teal'c hadn't prepared the younger man for the consuming rage their friend had apparently exhibited.
"He probably could've taken the whole thing on single-handedly," he told Cameron with almost a smile.
He went home not long after, and Cameron perched on the end of the sofa, watching Vala sleep. It wasn't long before it all caught up with him and he passed out too, sitting right where he was.
Part Five
Fandom: Stargate: SG-1
Pairing: None
Rating: G
Warnings: None
Length: 1607 words
Part One
Part Two
Part Three
The entirety of fourth grade could not have been more normal for Cameron and Vala. Their issues levelled out, they were able to talk again and Vala was at a good age where she was just a happy kid who liked to hang out with her friends and go to skating, to bully Cameron into watching movies with princesses and into teaching her to bake cookies like he knew more than how to follow a recipe. They took a trip during her winter vacation and he taught her to ski, or tried to at any rate; Vala didn't really take a shine to it and fairly promptly decided she only liked skating. And a full month of her summer break was spent with her grandparents on the farm, Cameron only there for the first and last weeks and she didn't seem to mind at all.
He saw her perform in her skate-club's end of season thing, Jon sitting beside him and applauding just as enthusiastically, at her demand. And the few times when Cameron and Vala did fall out, fought about something that made no sense to him no matter how hard he tried to understand but was the entirety of her little world, when nothing he could say or do could convince her he wasn't being purposefully cruel, just didn't understand why she was losing her mind, or was too frustrated to want to do anything but send her to her room, Vala spent the night at Jon's. It was a good system. They worked things out the best they could when it was needed, but those times they just needed some space from one another, the kind of space their little apartment just didn't provide, they could get it and Cameron always knew that Vala was safe.
The fifth grade was met with resounding excitement. Now ten, Vala decided she was too cool for princesses, and the doll she had trailed behind her everywhere for years found its way onto a shelf in her room, posed there beside the personal item he'd managed to scrounge up for her when she first turned, some little treasure box, probably from her first childhood, and the SG-1 patch he'd pilfered from her jacket. Cameron finally relented and let her walk home from school, it wasn't far and it let her have more time with her friends, let Cameron have more time with students and trainees, and there was always Jon, or Sam, or Daniel, there to step in if needed.
Her new freedom meant that she didn't show up home on time about once a week, about half those times she was off at a friend's house, occasionally forgot to call and had Cameron concerned about her whereabouts. And sometimes she was mad at Cameron for something or other that happened that morning, or holding a grudge from the day before, and went to Jon's instead.
Spring break had just ended, and it had been a rough go for the two of them. Vala wanted a cell phone, had been asking for months, saying that all her friends had them, she was the only one who didn't, and Cameron kept refusing. She was too young, he said; she didn't need one. Vala declared that he obviously wanted her to be a social outcast, spent most of her break bouncing back and forth between home and Jon's place while the adults made jokes about sharing custody of her and Cameron spent so much time driving back and forth he thought it might have been better if they just moved in down the street from each other or something.
The flitting back and forth when Vala was annoyed by Cameron's refusal on the cell phone front continued when Vala went back to school, and at least three times a week Cameron came home to a message from Jon that she was there. And Cameron would leave her for a few hours, to calm down from whatever mood she was in before he went to get her. There was almost always a message, though, and when there wasn't there was a call not long after he got in, and Cameron never had to worry.
And then, one night in May, the evening after a morning of bickering about the phone thing again that had Vala once again certain that Cameron wanted her to be the only kid at school without one, going to school mad and Cameron going to work frustrated, Cameron got home to no Vala, and no flashing light on the answering machine. Nothing to worry about, he thought, she was probably at Jon's and there would be that call any time now. Except an hour passed, and then another, and Jon didn't call. That was unusual, and so Cameron called instead.
"Hey, she there?" he asked the moment Jon picked up, and there was an overwhelming sense of discomfort, concern, when Jon sounded surprised and confused.
"No. She's not at home?"
"Would I be calling you if she was?"
Jon swore quietly, sighed. "You start at the beginning, I'll start at the end, we'll meet around M."
They didn't need more discussion than that; They hung up and Cameron started calling the homes of Vala's friends, knew Jon was doing the same. No one knew where Vala was, and there was no interrupting call from Jon to say he'd found her. They touched base about an hour later, and the news wasn't good. No one knew where she was and Cameron's concern turned to genuine fear. He almost didn't register that Jon announced he was going to try driving around, see if he couldn't find her. Instead when he hung up, Cameron immediately called the mountain. It was still his first thought, he'd probably never think to call the police first, especially when it came to Vala.
Within another hour there were teams mobilized, and Cameron was left at home with strict orders not to go anywhere. In case Vala came back or in case anything was heard; the apartment acted as a sort of home base. Sam and Daniel came around like they could be some sort of comfort, and Cameron promptly sent them out with the teams, told them he felt better with them out in the field in his place, and he sent Jon out after them when he stopped by too. Cameron wasn't allowed out there looking, even if every ounce of him was yearning to, but he could have the people he trusted most out there being his eyes and ears, sending him messages and keeping him appraised. While all he could do was sit and worry.
He didn't sleep that night, even as it passed midnight, even as the sun rose again. He put in a call to work to say he wouldn't be making it in, his daughter was missing, and his CO was more than understanding. Even offered to put together some teams as well and Cameron had to tell her it was being handled by his old post, but he appreciated the thought; he didn't tell her he appreciated that she didn't ask anything about his old, top-secret post, just accepted it and moved on, told him he was on leave for as long as he needed, to just call when he was ready to come back. He spent all day pacing, jumping on the phone every time it rang, broke a little every time it wasn't news that Vala had been found.
The call finally did come late on the second night, when Cameron was about ready to explode from all the coffee, and the stress, and the fear. Sam's voice on the line just saying they'd found her; she was on her way home. Cameron thought he'd collapse with the relief if he could actually believe it. He waited, on edge, impatient, for someone to bring her back and when the car arrived, when he saw from the window Jon getting out with Vala wrapped around him like a leech, Cameron bolted downstairs to meet them at the door. He took Vala, ruffled and tear-stained but apparently unharmed and whole, and hugged her so tightly she actually squawked in protest.
Still, she clung to him just as tightly, didn't let go until she fell asleep and even then Cameron had to pry her arms loose. He didn't put her to bed, just tucked her up under a blanket on the couch where he could keep an eye on her and took Jon into the kitchen to get the details of what happened, since no one had told him, had wanted him to know.
That Goa'uld, Athena, who always seemed to want Vala, who had kidnapped her before and who they'd lost track of but didn't care enough about to track down, they'd had bigger fish to fry. From what Jon had gathered she was still after whatever she'd been after before, and the fact that Vala was ten-years-old with almost no accessible memories of her life before her new childhood hadn't been a deterrent. It probably should have been, the way the SGC teams had descended on her, Jon explained, and even all the years of memories of Teal'c hadn't prepared the younger man for the consuming rage their friend had apparently exhibited.
"He probably could've taken the whole thing on single-handedly," he told Cameron with almost a smile.
He went home not long after, and Cameron perched on the end of the sofa, watching Vala sleep. It wasn't long before it all caught up with him and he passed out too, sitting right where he was.
Part Five