*peeks out* oh Hi!

Steve: I think you mean 'give me strength'.

mysterious next door neighbors~

bonus:

@drrodneymckayphdphd here we go! Super cute prompt, thank you!

Jaskier has studied astronomy, he knows the constellations, the old songs and myth that made them into being. He knows the brightest star in the sky, he knows of planets and lunar cycles and can point them out on a map, or on rare bright occasions, in the inky blackness above.

That doesn’t mean he won’t ask Geralt to point out the Traveling Star, the guiding light. That doesn’t mean he won’t play dumb until Geralt bodily moves him to stand right in front of the Witcher, back against chest, so that he can follow his line of sight.

yearn dead boy yearn

also

AR-1 enjoying the sun on a day off!

In that AU the city is permanently submerged, except every other Sunday when they need to replenish the oxygen tanks.

I'm having so much fun with Ronon and Teyla in mer!form.

AR-1 enjoying the sun on a day off!

In that AU the city is permanently submerged, except every other Sunday when they need to replenish the oxygen tanks.

I'm having so much fun with Ronon and Teyla in mer!form.

Disclaimer: these are just my opinions. I respect people’s feelings on these characters and ships, and will never harass people for shipping a certain way. I always try to voice my opinions respectfully - the last thing I want to do is offend anyone, so if I’ve messed up here, I sincerely apologize.

Anyway, here goes.

Fist of all, I want to say I adore both of these characters… just not in a relationship with each other. Sure, there are plenty of moments throughout the series where their feelings for one another are evident: they make eyes at each other and share some kisses in other realities/timelines* - little romantic hints and pining are things that fans love to chew on. But ultimately, the Sam Jack relationship doesn’t work for me for a couple reasons:

1) Their actions don’t really convince me that they want to be in a relationship with one another

2) I see Sam as aromantic and see various moments in the series as her slowly figuring this out and coming to terms with it

In the episode Threads, Kerry Johnson suggests Jack should retire in order to be with Sam. She also says that he would be making a big mistake to let rules and regs stand in the way of being with the person you love. It’s clear that Jack cares about Sam, and that she cares about him… so I wondered why neither of them made any changes to be together.

Why doesn’t Jack retire? I mean, it would have been extremely easy to portray him as a retired general in season 9 where he’s no longer on the show regularly, especially with Threads being so close to the end of season 8.  He only pops up now and again as Landry takes over; he could easily have been written in as a non-military consultant or something. Since he doesn’t do this, I can only conclude that, as much as Jack cares about Sam, he doesn’t want to commit to pursuing a relationship with her. Which I am not criticizing him for btw: you can absolutely care about someone without being romantically involved with them.

Same with Sam. She doesn’t change her job to accommodate a relationship. In fact, she moves even farther away to take the job in Atlantis. Again, this is perfectly valid, I’m not criticizing her at all, just pointing out that her actions tell me that she does not want to enter into a long-term romantic partnership with Jack (which I think ties into the next part of this post).

Another major reason I tend not to ship Sam with Jack is that I that I see Sam as being aromantic. In the episode Grace, Sam says, “as long as I'm thinking about you, setting my sights on what I think is unattainable, there's no chance of being hurt by someone else.” I feel like this is her realization that Jack - as the “safe bet” - was a safety net she was using to not get involved in a relationship. I liked the fact that she confronts these feelings head on and, in the end, does let him go and move on. I just wish the “moving on” hadn’t manifested as getting together with Pete (ew ew yuck no); I would have preferred her to realize she can be just as happy without having to fall in love and get married.

In the episode Affinity, she takes these feelings one step further. There’s a scene where she’s talking to Teal’c and Daniel, and she says, “they make you afraid of being alone but at the same time tell you not to settle for anything less than the perfect romantic ideal, like that actually exists anywhere in the real world. Either way you can't win!”

I interpret this as her realizing that love doesn’t always have to be defined in the traditional romantic sense, even though that’s what society expects. I think here she’s realizing that she can still be happy even if she’s “alone” (which I put in quotations because the implication of “alone” is “not in a romantic relationship” rather than actually being by herself). She’s absolutely NOT alone - she has amazing friends who love her as strongly as romantic partners can love one another.

These realizations cause her to dump Pete in Threads and she circles back to Jack, only to find that he has seemingly moved on with Kerry Johnson. At this point, I feel like this ties things up between them and is the true turning point that gets Sam to accept that she’s not going to be in a romantic relationship with Jack. As I said earlier, I honestly think she could have figured that out after Grace without doing the whole Pete thing, but 🤷‍♀️.

Oy this post is long, so I’ll end it there. Sufficed to say, in the end, I don’t see a need to stick Sam in a romantic relationship with anybody. She can love and be loved by Jack just the same without being involved with him in a long term relationship.