"If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more." – Emma, Jane Austen

1. PX8-899

"She is extremely beautiful, your Captain Carter."

Jack's in the middle of chewing a piece of the local bread as Kedesh says this. They're sitting side by side in front of the campfire the villagers lit the moment the sun started to fade. Daniel and Teal'c are close by, also eating, but Jack has to follow their host's gaze to find Carter. She's sitting a ways away, on a log set in the ground on the other side of the fire. She's surrounded by a little knot of villagers, and she's busy drawing something in the dust with the aid of a whittled stick. Her audience seems entirely engrossed in whatever it is she's trying to explain. As Jack watches she gesticulates with her free hand, then tips her head back and points to the sky, to the stars pricking the dark velvet firmament overhead, before passing the branch to a young man sitting beside her and indicating the dusty chalkboard at her feet. Constellations, he surmises. She wants to know their words for the groupings of stars they can see in their sky. Her face flickers in the firelight. The shadows dance across her nose and cheekbones, catching in the mussed strands of her blonde hair as she smiles and laughs along with her audience.

As for Kedesh, Jack gives no reply. It was a statement, not a question, after all.

Kedesh, though, turns back to face Jack's silence. "You do not agree?"

Jack sighs internally, swallowing the bread. "It's not the first thing that comes to mind when I think of Carter," he says, reaching for his water bottle.

"No?" says Kedesh. "Then you must have different standards by which you measure beauty on Earth. On Hemai, we celebrate beauty as a great gift from the ancestors. This is not so on your world?"

Jack grimaces, then glances over at the other two male members of SG-1. "Daniel?" he says. "You want to help me out, here?"

"Um, I think what Colonel O'Neill means to say is that by our custom, Captain Carter is not defined by her physical appearance," Daniel begins, frowning a little. "You see, she is a very capable soldier, an extremely well-respected scientist. On our world, these are the achievements for which she is appreciated, more than for her physical appearance. She would still be as valuable to us for these things even if she were less, uh…" Daniel falters and then shrugs, yielding to the inevitable, "…less beautiful than she undoubtedly is."

"Would acknowledging her beauty preclude your appreciation of those achievements?" Kedesh asks, with apparently genuine interest.

"It shouldn't," Daniel tells him. "But in the past it has. In the case of Colonel O'Neill," at this Jack glances up sharply, wondering what Daniel is about to say, "it is part of his orders that he must see Captain Carter solely as a soldier for whom he is responsible, nothing more… or less."

"I see," says Kedesh, turning back to Jack. "I apologise, Colonel O'Neill. I intended no offence with my question."

"None taken," Jack tells him, dropping the last crust of bread back on his plate. "I think it's time we pitched camp. Teal'c, round Carter up, would you?"

Teal'c steps around the fire as Kedesh stands and gives a half-bow of his head. "I will get Jorcar to show you where best to pitch your tents."

"Thanks."

Teal'c reappears with Carter. She's got a little smile on her face and is scrubbing a hand through her hair, eyes alight with something Jack can only categorise as life.

"Made enough friends for one night, Captain?"

The smile turns into one of her best, utterly artless and a mile wide, and he feels it like a sucker punch right in his gut. He looks away and finds himself catching Daniel's eye. The look the archaeologist gives him is speculative, a little too knowing. Jack counters it with one of complete impassivity, until Daniel turns away with what might be – although Jack sincerely hopes it's not – a very small nod.

[TBC]