None of them had said a word for the past fifteen minutes. There wasn't in a sound in the infirmary but their own breath, and the soft hum of the lights, and the steady, reassuring beep of the monitors. Sam Carter lay in an infirmary bed like some marble replica of herself---her still features drawn, her skin pale and slick-sheened with a thin layer of sweat. Only the occasional faint twitch of her lips, the slow rise and fall of her chest under the thin infirmary blankets, disturbed that illusion.

The monitor screens flickered, striking dull pewter glints off a bent gray head. O'Neill had pulled a chair up alongside the bed for his usual vigil. He'd folded that long, lean body of his into a familiar attitude: shoulders slightly hunched, his elbows braced on his thighs, his hands toying with some small object.

Janet Fraiser wasn't exactly sure when things had changed. At the start, it had been the four of them watching Sam Carter---a miraculously no-longer-lost-in-space, impressively concussed Sam Carter---sleep. So when, exactly, had it become a matter of the rest of them watching Jack O'Neill watch Sam Carter sleep?

Dammit. Janet caught her breath in one sharp sigh.

Daniel looked up from his perch on the next bed over, the reflections of the infirmary lights skittering across his spectacles. He and Janet stared at one another, mouths twisted in identical expressions of wry awareness. Then he looked away, a quick flick of his eyes towards Jack, and up to Teal'c.

Teal'c inclined his head slightly. Rising, the two men began making their way toward the door. O'Neill looked up.

``Headin' out?'' He spoke in a voice one step above a whisper.

``For a while.'' Daniel laid one hand, briefly, on the older man's shoulder. ``You're staying?''

O'Neill nodded, his eyes already drifting back to Carter's face. Daniel sighed, and followed Teal'c out the door.

``Sir?'' Janet, too, kept her voice low. ``She's out of danger now.''

``Good.''

``Sir, you should sleep.''

``Later.''

_When she wakes up, you mean_, Janet thought wearily. _You'll wait until she wakes, and then go._

After seven years, it was no longer a guess, but a certainty, a pattern as familiar and as inevitable as sunrise. She left him to his watching, and found Daniel and Teal'c already waiting in the hall. Daniel held two styrofoam cups of coffee, one of which he passed to her. She accepted it with silent thanks.

How many times now, she wondered, as she sipped the hot liquid. How many times had she encountered these two in the hall outside the infirmary, while Jack kept this vigil?

``I need to check up on Cassie tonight,'' she said without preamble. ``I can't get away to Carrell's before then, so...are the two of you coming by?''

``Indeed.''

``Nine o'clock. Daniel---''

``Make sure one of the flavors is chocolate. I know.''

``Good.''

Daniel sipped his own coffee, eyes tired. ``Having thoughts about locking them in the supply closet again?''

She raised a brow. ``What do you think?''

``I think---nine o'clock.''

Teal'c said nothing, but she knew his thoughts ran along similar lines.

This, too, was part of the dance, as familiar as breathing, as inevitable as sunrise. Because it wasn't at all easy, being the ones who silently watched Jack watch Sam. It wasn't easy, knowing that when she finally woke, he wouldn't so much as touch her hand---even if all five of them knew that was the way it had to be. On days like this, when death had just passed them over for the thousandth time, it was so hard not to tell that tired, hurting man in there to damn the consequences, and wake the woman lying on that bed with a kiss.

Yet Janet knew that when the shadow of death had faded, those consequences would seem too heavy to bear. This was no fairy tale: Prince Charming and Sleeping Beauty were a Colonel and Major in the U.S. Air Force, forever bound and separated by the chain of command. They had shackled themselves to their duty by choice, and out of love, and neither one was the type to swear new vows while the old lay shattered at their feet.

And so Janet and Daniel and Teal'c fought the temptation to play Cupid with ice cream and each other's company.

``Nine o'clock. And don't forget the chocolate.''

Daniel saluted her with his coffee cup. Teal'c inclined his head. With a jerk of her chin, Janet continued down the hall, and they fell into step behind her.