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nightspear) wrote2008-11-03 07:58 am
Diplomacy (17/27)
Title: Diplomacy (Table of Contents)
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: Nothing you recognize is mine. I gain nothing of material value from this.
Pairings: Gen
XXXXX
Winter Solstice
XXXXX
22 December 1998; P8A-462; 1100 hrs
A shadow fell over Daniel's book, and he shifted his flashlight to illuminate his notes better. The shadow cleared its throat, and he squinted upward to see Major Ferretti towering over him where he knelt. "Time's up, and it's getting dark," Ferretti said. "We need to head back."
Daniel checked his watch. "Already? I think I could finish this with another few hours, Major."
"This planet's been abandoned for years. No people to meet, so unless the secret to the universe is on that wall, we're due back home in half an hour."
"The secret to the universe might be on it," Daniel pointed out, "but I won't know it unless I finish translating it."
Ferretti shook his head and held out a hand to help him up. "You tell that to the general, Jackson. See what he says."
Sighing, Daniel slid his notes into his pack and accepted Ferretti's hand to pull himself to his feet.
The Stargate was a little over twenty minutes away from the cave they'd found. "Need help with that?" Ferretti asked, nodding at his pack.
"I can handle it." Teal'c had filled a bag with rocks and made him climb the ladder from the 28th to the 11th sublevel, once, for training. Jack had looked horrified, so after that, Teal'c just made him run with weighted packs instead of climbing up shafts with no safety net. Sam had been sympathetic but pointed out that he'd have to pass the physical aptitude and stamina assessment eventually for fulltime off-world status. Daniel had pointed out in return that Jaffa ideas of stamina weren't the same as SERE's. Teal'c had threatened him with more rocks until he stopped complaining.
Ferretti shrugged, then asked, "Any plans for Christmas? Or do you celebrate?"
"Not really," Daniel said in answer to both. "But Robert's worked through Chanukah for the last two years, so he's taking a vacation to stay with his sister for a week. I was considering staying on base to cover for him while he was gone..."
"Aw, seriously?"
"But he told me I didn't have to." Daniel rolled his eyes. Robert didn't even celebrate most of the holidays he'd grown up with; Daniel didn't know what he was supposed to do on a forced vacation during a holiday that he'd only experienced once before. It wasn't as if he could as easily board an airplane and see his own sister.
The thought stole his breath for a second before he shook it out of his head, stumbling on a twig to hide how his step had faltered. "I suppose I'll see what SG-1 is doing," he finished casually.
"All right," Ferretti said. He glanced sideways at Daniel, started to say something, then seemed to change his mind and added, "You know, if they're on a mission or something then, my wife's family's coming over; an extra guest won't hurt. Or you can ask one of these clowns," he added as they approached the Stargate, where the rest of SG-2 was looking bored as they stood guard. "Base'll be pretty quiet around the holidays."
"Oh, I, uh..." Daniel fumbled, self-conscious, not sure if he was imagining the pity in the words from the man who had been there with him--both times--on Abydos. But he suspected that the base wouldn't be much more quiet during Christmas than it was on a regular night-shift, and it wasn't like he minded having the whole base more or less to himself. "Thank you," he said honestly, even though he knew he wouldn't pursue the offer.
"Well," Warren said, clapping Ferretti on the shoulder as they packed their equipment. "It was good serving with you boys."
"You're leaving?" Daniel asked in surprise.
"They need an extra man on SG-3," Warren told him.
"'Bout time," Ferretti said in mock relief. "Go join the other jarheads; too many majors around here, anyway. Now no one'll think he can argue with me just 'cause he's the same rank."
"I'll still argue with you, sir," Casey reassured him.
"Shut up and start dialing, Captain."
"Yeah, about the rest of you guys," Griff added, nodding at Casey and Ferretti. "SG-10 and -12 need some experience on them. I've heard your names come up a couple of times. Am I crazy, or has anyone else heard about that?"
"I have, just in passing," Daniel said. He'd also heard that another major, Coburn, was to take over as leader of one of the more experienced teams as part of the regular shuffling of personnel that helped to keep skills spread evenly. He'd dismissed it as just another rumor at the time, or as something that didn't affect him, but if Warren said he was leaving, and Ferretti and Casey might be as well, then perhaps there was more truth to it than he'd thought.
"Well, they're not gonna take the whole team apart, not this one," Casey said as he hit the third glyph. When Ferretti didn't answer, he looked back and asked, "Are they, sir?"
Ferretti shrugged and said, "Who knows. People get reassigned all the time. It's just rumor until the general tells us otherwise, Captain. The job doesn't change just 'cause your patch says a different number."
Once the wormhole was established, Daniel waited for one of them to lead the way back, but when no one moved, he asked, "Um, are we waiting for something?"
"Griff?" Ferretti said. "Something wrong with your GDO?"
"I don't know, sir," Griff answered, staring at the device on his wrist. "My IDC's not getting a resp...wait. It's been accepted, but I'm getting an alert code, too."
"Jackson, switch on the MALP transmitter," Ferretti ordered as SG-2 swung their weapons around to grip more firmly. "Take cover until we know what's up."
"It's on," Daniel said when he had complied and moved out of their way.
Ferretti leaned over the camera and called, "Stargate Command, this is SG-2. We're receiving an alert; what's your status?"
"Major Ferretti, this is General Hammond," came the familiar voice. "The Mountain is currently under quarantine. Are you in danger where you are?"
They exchanged worried glances. "No, sir, we're fine. What's going on?"
"SG-3 returned carrying what looks like a contagious virus. The 'gate room is currently being decontaminated. Until we're done, we don't want to dial out, in case the microbes can be sent through an outgoing wormhole, and we don't any personnel coming back, in case the situation here worsens."
"Quarantine," Warren muttered, off to the side. "Jesus. Again?"
"Is anyone seriously ill, sir?" said Ferretti. "And is it curable?"
"Only a few people seem to be affected. It seems to die off on its own, but it takes a few days to run its course once someone is infected. SG-3 says that the same thing happened all the time to inhabitants on the planet they were just on with little to no danger of fatality. The symptoms have been mild, so Dr. Fraiser's not worried, but until we're sure, I don't want it getting out of the Mountain or to risk anyone else getting sick."
"That's good to hear, sir," Ferretti said. "Any idea when we'll be able to go back?"
"Dr. Fraiser thinks it'll be at least another week, but check in with us every day. We'll keep you updated. We're preparing some supplies now that will last you the time you're gone, and once we're done with decontamination, we'll send them through."
"A week," Casey muttered, dropping to sit on the steps that led up to the Stargate. "Damn."
"Is there some way our families can be informed that we'll be stuck at work?" Ferretti asked.
"Of course, Major. Standard protocols for extended mission time are in effect. If you have any messages you'd like to send through the wormhole, I will pass them on personally."
Ferretti grimaced unhappily but said, "Thank you, sir. Is there anything we can do from here?"
"Actually," General Hammond said, "if you could relay the message to the other off-world teams before they try to return as well, it would help."
"Not a problem, sir. Jackson, get this down," Ferretti added to them, and Daniel pulled his notebook back out, digging in his pocket for a pen. "Go ahead, General."
"SG-1 is on leave with Teal'c's family in the Land of Light--do you need the coordinates?"
"No, sir, I know the address," Daniel called in the direction of the MALP transmitter as he scribbled 'SG-1, 797' onto his notepad.
"SG-7 is on P2J-651. The address is: Virgo, Andromeda, Centaurus, Monoceros, Sculptor, Sextans."
"Sculptor...Sextans," Daniel murmured, jotting down the glyphs. "Okay. And SG-6?"
"What about the Abydos mining team, sir?" Ferretti asked the general.
"They had just come back to Earth when this started, so we have them here. We just need to tell SG-1 and -7."
"Got it, sir," Ferretti said to the general. "We'll let them know."
"I appreciate that, Major," General Hammond replied with a sigh. "I'm sorry for this mess, especially at this time of year, but we'll let you know as soon as it's safe to come back. Hammond out."
The wormhole disengaged.
"Well, this sucks," Ferretti said succinctly.
Warren snorted in disgust. "We couldn't even pick an exciting planet to get stuck on for the holidays. Nothing to do, no people to talk to...just us and an empty planet."
"Can I go back to finish with the cave wall, then?" Daniel asked, wincing when a few glares found him. "Since we're stuck here, I mean."
"Yeah, sure, why the hell not," Ferretti sighed. "Not like we've got anything better to do. But first, we need to tell SG-1 and -7 about the quarantine. Jackson, dial up the Land of Light. Everyone else, start setting up camp."
XXXXX
22 December 1998; P8A-462; 1500 hrs
"You're done? Really?" Ferretti asked when night had fallen over the cave and Daniel started to pack up.
"Yes. I told you I only needed a few more hours."
"I thought you were just trying to get me to let you stay longer. Anything about the meaning of life?"
"No."
"What did I tell you?"
"It could have been," Daniel said with a sigh, even though he'd known all along it was more likely to be simply the end of a long recital about the virtues of the god Thanatos. Well, his name was--or had been--Thanos, according to the writing, but he was supposed to have been 'born of the dark and the night,' so it was likely that he was the same as the Thanatos of Tau'ri myth. Daniel had been looking mostly at Ancient, Goa'uld, and Egyptian texts recently--once they'd established that he was good at making headway on those, those seemed to be almost exclusively the only ones that landed on his desk. It was refreshing to read something related to Greek mythology for once.
"Anything interesting?" Ferretti asked, not sounding interested so much as bored after watching Daniel copy down the writing over the last hours.
"I'm not sure, actually," he said, panning the camera carefully across the wall once more, just in case he'd missed something that they saw later, back on base. "There was a Goa'uld here named Thanos, but he moved all the people to another planet thousands of years ago. Something about going to a planet with more plentiful mineral resources, because this one was insufficient."
"Mineral resources...meaning naquadah."
"They don't call it that, by name, but I think so. It says Thanos tried to change it to make it better. I think he was experimenting with it; apparently, he tested...the changed mineral on another planet, but 'the people of that world failed him.' And that's why he came to this world and possibly went to others as well."
"'The people failed him' translates to 'he screwed up and killed them?'" Ferretti guessed.
Daniel shook his head. "Maybe. The details are vague, and I have no idea what he actually did."
"But it wasn't here, because there's no naquadah here to speak of."
"No, not here, although this account is interesting, since Thanatos, as a god of death, was sometimes linked to other deities associated with the underworld, including Pluto in the Roman pantheon in a few uncommon sources, and he was also a patron of rare metals. Like naquadah, perhaps. It's a stretch, but..." He shrugged.
Ferretti blinked at him. "But not here," he repeated tolerantly.
"No."
"Does it say where?"
"No."
"Is there a reason we're still sitting in this cave, then?"
Daniel looked over the wall once more to make certain that he hadn't missed anything, then packed away the camera and stood up. "I guess not."
On their way back to the rest of the team, Daniel asked, "General Hammond wouldn't really take everyone off SG-2, would he? You're one of the teams that get most of the...more intense missions. Most of time," he amended when Ferretti snorted and threw a pointed look back at the cave that seemed to be the only interesting feature on this planet. "If any team needs experienced personnel, this one does."
"Warren's transfer is already confirmed," Ferretti said. "Me and Casey, I haven't heard anything official. Hell, you're on base all the time; you've probably heard more than I have. Griff'll stay, I'm guessing, even if the rest of us don't."
"He's still just one person--your junior member," Daniel said. "I don't count," he added when Ferretti grinned at him, "and technically, we both had our first mission with you at the same time."
"If that happens, SG-2 might be running support missions instead of first-contact until everyone's got a little experience under his belt." Ferretti waggled his eyebrows playfully. "Why? You gonna miss us?"
Yes, Daniel found himself thinking with a little surprise. He didn't know these men like he did Robert and everyone on SG-1, and it wasn't as if they were leaving the program entirely; still, SG-2 had been his team more than any other thus far. They worked together easily, and the thought of its ending brought an unexpected bit of melancholy.
That wasn't how SG officers were accustomed to answering such questions, though, and anything but bravado would only bring more teasing--and the perception, however joking, that he wasn't ready for responsibility--so Daniel only shrugged. "It's not like I won't see everyone around base. I'm just wondering."
"You're not the only one. Well, nothing's going to happen until they lift this damn quarantine. So much for plans for the holidays."
"Maybe it'll end in time," Daniel offered.
"Nah, with a disease, they're going to want to be sure. We'll be lucky to make it back before New Year's. Least we're not all Neanderthals this time."
"We weren't actually Neanderthals after the P3X-797 mission, either; it was just--"
"Jackson..."
"Yeah, I know--'shut up.'"
There was a pile of supplies waiting for them when they arrived. "From the SGC, sir," Warren said. "Dr. Rothman sent along a present for you, Jackson."
Daniel followed his flashlight to an ancient world history book and a pile of folders.
"Looks like homework to me," Griff said, smirking from where he was setting up a tent.
"I think it is," Daniel replied ruefully, peeling off a note on top with the words 'Happy winter solstice, geek' scrawled hurriedly on it. He sifted through the papers to find that they were a mix of unfinished translations, samples of practice text from ancient Earth languages he was still learning, and copies of articles from an archaeology journal.
Ferretti watched him look through the small pile. "I don't know about you boys, but when I was in high school, I didn't have to learn about...what's that article say? 'Cultural cross-pollination through Naqada I: a review of the evidence.' Jesus," he laughed. "Don't envy you, Daniel. Dr. Rothman's a harsh taskmaster."
"I bet he's bored and just sitting there thinking up things to do, since he's going to be stuck on base now," Daniel explained, picking up the article and squinting at it.
The corresponding author was listed as Jackson, M., and a quick glance at the rest of them revealed the same or Ballard, C.L., several with them both as co-authors. One was even by Ballard, N.S., from Ancient Mesoamerica--something about skulls carved out of crystal, with a note scribbled in the margin that said, 'This one is a little special; some of the sections are more solid than others. Write up a summary, and include your own analysis of the conclusions drawn.'
Maybe it was a Christmas present after all. Well, partly, anyway--the history book was definitely an unsubtle hint to keep studying, and the translations were part of a backlog of work they had all been struggling with lately.
"At least you've got something to do until we can go back," Ferretti said. "There is nothing to do here. This place doesn't even have trees. What kind of planet doesn't even have a goddamn tree? No wonder everyone abandoned it."
"They have shrubs," Griff offered, indicating the height of low bushes with his hand.
"What the hell were you planning to do with trees, Ferretti?" Warren asked.
"No one happened to bring a deck of cards, did they?" Casey added. "Or a football to toss around? Anything?"
"Is that another sport?" Daniel asked.
"You don't know what football is?" Ferretti said, somewhere between incredulous and horrified. "There is no way you live with O'Neill without knowing what football is."
Between Shifu and the...and after Kheb, it had in fact been months since Daniel had stayed at Jack's house for more than a day at a time, and most days, it felt like they were tiptoeing warily around each other. But while SG-2 might be his sometimes-team, they weren't the whatever-Teal'c-or-Sam-were; he wasn't about to talk to Ferretti about...well, that. Whatever that was.
"I might not have been paying attention if he explained it," Daniel admitted. A thought struck him. "But the quarantine is just for travel to and from Earth, right? We can go other places?"
"Maybe," Ferretti said, sounding wary. "Why?"
"When we called the Land of Light just now, didn't Jack say he was trying to teach Teal'c's son to play baseball?"
"We could join them," Casey picked up. "More company, at least."
"I'd go for that," Griff said. "Better'n sitting around here."
Ferretti hesitated, then decided, "Wait until the morning check-in and see what General Hammond says."
XXXXX
24 December 1998; Land of Light (P3X-797); 2000 hrs
General Hammond was happy to let them join SG-1, especially since it meant there were fewer off-world groups for him to keep track of.
The people of the Land of Light remembered what it had been like to live with an infectious disease, and they were sympathetic as well as welcoming of anyone seeking refuge from one. SG-1 had a room off the temple where they could sleep. SG-2 was shown to another one, and Teal'c was staying with his wife and son, so Daniel joined Jack and Sam in their less-crowded quarters, each of them claiming a separate corner of the room.
"What're you looking at?" Sam asked, glancing at her watch. Nighttime was something of an odd concept here. Sam had tried to explain why the Light side of the planet stayed light and the Dark side dark, but Daniel had given up trying to follow after the second time it didn't make sense. In any case, the skies here darkened only slightly with 'days' spanning just under twenty-eight hours. The dimming set the sleep cycle for most of the inhabitants, but there seemed to be plenty of people awake no matter what part of the cycle it was.
"I'm looking at the bulls," Daniel said, pointing at the fresco he was admiring. "The bull was present in a lot of Minoan art. People on Earth started calling them the 'Minoans,' after the myth of King Minos, because the Minotaur's labyrinth was supposed to be in that region, did you know that?"
She made an absent sound and rearranged her already-tidy bedroll. Drey'auc had offered to let Sam stay with her, since the other SGC personnel were all men, but Sam had been much more uncomfortable about kicking Teal'c out of Drey'auc's house than she was about sleeping with coworkers like she often did in the field, anyway.
"Is everything okay?" Daniel asked, watching her unnecessary fussing.
"Oh, I was just wondering if it's snowing back home."
"It will probably be snowing for weeks after we get back," Daniel pointed out. "There was snow for a long time, last year."
"Yeah, I know," she said. "It's easy to forget that it's winter back home when it's all...grass and sunshine out there." She waved toward the doorway, where Daniel knew Jack was probably still in the clearing, trying to show Rya'c that the point was to throw the baseball accurately, not just hard enough to injure. Jaffa began to grow into their strength after their prim'ta ceremony, and Jack was in turns encouraging and wary around Rya'c when the boy was holding a projectile.
It was easy to forget that, while everyone Daniel knew on Earth was within a few minutes' walk or a Stargate call away, the others had families and had made plans that they were missing because of the quarantine. Robert was probably glowering at some hapless artifact on base because he couldn't get to his sister in Chicago, Ferretti had a wife and children, and Sam...
"General Hammond said he'd call everyone's families to let them know what's happening," Daniel said. If they were friends, General Hammond must know how to reach General Carter, even if Sam hadn't asked him to do it. Even though Sam probably hadn't, out of some sense of pride or propriety or some such. "So...if you were planning on seeing your father or something, he knows you're stuck at work. I'm sure he'd understand."
She looked quickly at him. "Yeah," she said again. "No, we hadn't made plans or anything. It's funny--I was actually thinking about my brother."
There was a dull thud of pain in his chest. Daniel pushed it away. This conversation was about Sam's brother, whom she'd mentioned before, he remembered, but it had been over a year ago and never again after that. "Your brother?" he said in question.
"Yeah. Older brother." Sam smiled down at her hands. "Mark. He's got a couple of kids, too. Haven't spoken to him and the family in...well, years, since his youngest was just a baby."
"That's so odd," Daniel said, moving away from the fresco and fetching his own bedroll, somewhat less neatly folded than Sam's had been.
"What is?"
"Not speaking with a brother for years. No, it's just," he amended when she stiffened, "it's different in Nagada. There are a few thousand people there, but close enough together that we see everyone all the time. It must be hard to stay in close contact in America. I mean, when you changed jobs to join the Stargate program, you traveled farther in a few hours than I ever have on Abydos in my whole life. I can't imagine it."
He couldn't quite decipher what the look on her face meant. "Maybe," she said at last, and Daniel remembered belatedly that it should be easy in America on Earth, with long-distance communication technology like telephones, and that if she hadn't spoken to her brother in a while, it had been by conscious choice on someone's part. "Anyway. I called him a while back but he wasn't home, so... I'm just thinking."
Daniel sat with his back to the bulls in the fresco. "I miss my brother, too," he admitted quietly, not sure whether he meant Skaara or Shifu, but the ache sharpened and widened until he couldn't meet Sam's eyes. He reminded himself that he'd survived losing Skaara once, and Sha'uri and his parents, and that surely the events of the last few months would sink into him and settle into his bones, too, and it would be just a part of life. Everyone here had lost someone, and he was older now and had seen more. Soon his breath would stop catching in his throat every time he thought of his kin. It had to. He regretted speaking at all when he saw her expression soften into apology out of the corner of his eye.
"I miss Chulak," Rya'c's voice said from behind them, and Daniel turned, wondering how he had failed to hear Jack walk in with three Jaffa in tow.
"As do I, my son," Drey'auc said, a hand on Rya'c's shoulder.
Jack opened his mouth, and Daniel almost expected him to add something to the list, because he certainly had a few he could have added, but he only said, "You are one depressing lot of people. Come on, poker game--I promised I'd teach Teal'c. I don't have any chips, but I brought the cards."
"You brought playing cards off-world, sir?" Sam asked.
"The chess board didn't fit in my pocket," Jack said seriously.
It took a bit of extra effort to answer Jack's unspoken command to be cheerful. Rya'c was there, Daniel told himself, and Rya'c was a young boy who had been driven from his home. "I think I'll watch," he said lightly, holding up the papers Robert had sent through. "Or read."
"Come on," Jack wheedled. "The more the merrier."
"I'll join in if it gets boring," he promised, knowing it would be pointless to try to win a game based on bluffing if Teal'c was playing. He was fairly certain Teal'c's stony expression would frustrate Jack enough that 'boring' wouldn't be a problem.
XXXXX
He looked up when Jack, disgruntled, threw down another hand. "Okay," Jack said, "next time we get some personal time, we're going fishing."
Daniel bit his lip but didn't look up from what he was reading. Then, Teal'c commented, "I am not familiar with that recreational activity," so Daniel widened his eyes at the Jaffa and shook his head as discretely as he could while Jack wasn't looking.
Too late, apparently, because Jack said firmly, "Then I'll have to take you next chance we get, T. There's this beautiful lake in Minnesota...Daniel, you and Carter can come along, if you can manage to leave your offices for more than a few hours at a time." He said the last casually, but with a sharp glance at Daniel.
"Not a fan of fishing, Daniel?" Sam said with a traitorous smile. Daniel scowled at her.
"What's not to like?" Jack said indignantly.
"I didn't say anything," Daniel said.
"What do you do in Tau'ri fishing?" Rya'c asked.
"You dip a string into the water and wait for a fish to try to eat it," Daniel explained. "Basically, it's a way to catch fish."
"And you do this for entertainment?" Drey'auc asked doubtfully.
"That's...not...Daniel, that's not all it is," Jack said, sounding appalled. "It's an art. It's...it's a philosophy. It's much more than what he made it sound like. And it's not about catching fish."
"No, it's really not," Daniel said under his breath. Kelno'reem was more exciting than fishing in a lake with no fish in it.
Jack gave him a look. "At least I'm not sitting over there muttering to myself in Greek."
"It's not Greek," Daniel said. "It's Mandarin."
"Ah," Jack said sarcastically. "That makes more sense. And since when do you speak Chinese?"
"I don't, really--I'm just getting a feel for the sound structure. All the translators try to learn bits of other languages when we can. And languages like Chinese have roots stretching far back in Earth's history, so there are likely parallels on other planets. We do that with unfamiliar ancient languages, too. We can't account for phonetic drift, or even know the way some of these languages sounded on Earth, but any point of reference can be useful if we hear them off-world."
Jack snorted. "He thinks fishing is boring," he told Rya'c, who pretended he hadn't just been sneaking a look at Jack's newly dealt hand.
"We did not use strings to trap the fish on Chulak," Rya'c said, craning his neck up to see Jack's face. "We used bowls and networks of ropes."
"Abydons use nets, as well," Daniel added. "It's much more efficient."
Jack shook his head in despair.
"Do you concede defeat, O'Neill?" Teal'c asked, still focused intently on his cards.
"No," Jack said defensively. Rya'c snickered. "Yeah, I guess," he amended and threw down that hand, too.
When Rya'c eventually started to yawn, Teal'c lay down his cards as well, saying, "Perhaps we should retire."
"Good night," Sam said as the three Jaffa stood to leave, then peeked out at the still-shining sun outside. "Well, not...night, but...you know."
"Indeed, Captain Carter," Teal'c said, smiling at her. She smiled back, and Daniel thought maybe she had another brother, even if he wasn't named Carter. Then Teal'c turned his smile onto Daniel as well, and even as he returned it, he remembered with a sharp pang that no friend or teacher or brother-in-arms, however close, could replace another. And the English 'brother' or 'sister' were terms that were at once too much and not enough. Skaara and Sha'uri would never understand what he had been through in the last year and he would never understand what they had been through; Jack and Sam and Teal'c would never be the people who had raised him and grown up beside him. Having another family didn't lessen the loss of a first. Sometimes Daniel wondered if he was destined to keep finding them only to lose them again and again.
When the Jaffa were at the doorway, Drey'auc paused, nodding to her family to go on. Teal'c looked reluctant, but Rya'c tugged at his arm, pointing at something, and he acquiesced.
When Teal'c had led Rya'c away, Drey'auc turned back to say, "I hear that there are other planets now on which the Jaffa are no longer loyal to the Goa'uld."
Daniel put down the paper in his hands to listen to what they would say. Jack exchanged a glance with Sam, who said, "There are two that we know of with rebel factions and possibly others we haven't heard about yet."
Drey'auc nodded. "I am grateful for your help in sending my son and me to this planet. The people here have been kind. But I would like my son to grow among our own people."
"Ah...yeah," Jack said. "But it's pretty dangerous out there. The rebel camps are always prime targets, and just being tied to Teal'c's name is a risk. Apophis is looking for you and Rya'c, you know, to get to Teal'c."
"I understand. Teal'c has warned me of the danger, as well."
"And he's okay with it?"
Drey'auc drew herself up tall. "Teal'c is my husband. He is not my sovereign."
"I know that," Jack said. "But you've gotta think of your son's safety, too."
"Rya'c is the last in a long line of First Primes. Bra'tac has already begun my son's training, and it will not be long before Rya'c starts to wonder why we remain here while a war rages around us. It is for him that I ask this."
Jack looked at her for a long moment, as if weighing her words. "Does Bra'tac come here a lot?"
"More frequently than Teal'c," she answered. Daniel tried not to wince. He could guess how Teal'c felt about that.
"We could give you the names of the planets, but the best thing would be to talk to Bra'tac. He knows the situation on those planets better than we do. But I'd advise staying away from Chulak. It's pretty volatile there, and even Bra'tac doesn't dare to go back yet."
Drey'auc looked as if she wanted to press harder for information, then finally nodded. "As he has been teaching my son, it would be best for him to say when Rya'c is ready to see the face of the uprising. I will ask him when next he returns. Good night, Tau'ri."
Jack looked thoughtful when only he, Sam, and Daniel remained in the room, but he quickly gathered the poker cards and shuffled them idly, seemingly without any intention of redistributing them. Sam watched uncertainly, then finally said, "So. It looks like Drey'auc and Rya'c might be moving on sometime soon."
"Teal'c won't be happy," Daniel commented.
"Well, I get that the Jaffa society is primarily dominated by men, Daniel," Sam said, "but she's right that the two of them should decide for themselves if they want to live with their own people."
"Ah, that's not the point, Carter," Jack said, abandoning the cards and stretching. "You heard her. She's more likely to listen to Bra'tac's advice than Teal'c's."
"I don't see Teal'c being resentful of Bra'tac," she countered. "And you have to admit--Bra'tac's been around a lot more than he has. I'm not saying that's Teal'c's fault, exactly, but..."
"That's the point, Sam," Daniel said. "Usually, the chal'ti training falls to either the father or the First Prime, and Teal'c is both but doesn't have that choice with Rya'c. It's not about Master Bra'tac; it's about not being able to see his son much."
"And the danger thing, obviously," Jack added. "That doesn't help."
Sam grimaced. "I know. But I don't think he's going to be able to stop them."
Jack dragged his bedroll against a wall. "You're probably right, Captain. That's why I told her to ask Bra'tac--at least he'll have an idea of what passes for safe these days. Just remind me not to practice boxing with Teal'c in the next few months."
Daniel snorted, but he agreed silently and wondered if he could avoid training sessions with Teal'c by getting assigned to some team--maybe SG-2, since they'd be short a man without Major Warren--the next few times they went out until Teal'c was convinced his wife and son were relatively safely settled somewhere. And then that made him think of what Griff had mentioned about rumors, so he asked, "Have you heard about the SG-2 reassignments?"
"You mean Major Warren?" Sam said, settling against another wall. "SG-5, wasn't it? or -3?"
"SG-3," Daniel said. "But people have been talking about putting more men on SG-10 and -12; they haven't gone out on a mission since the planet search for the Nasyans, and I saw that they just got put onto the bottom of the exploration rotation now, so..."
"Hank Boyd is going to lead -10, at least for now," Jack told him. "But they are all new and could use a medic with off-world experience, so I think Casey'll get tapped to join them. Ferretti could get command of -12."
"All of SG-2 is getting reassigned, except Captain Griff?"
"It happens," Jack said. "You just haven't seen it much, because SG-1 and -2 haven't been rearranged since we first started."
That was true. Daniel didn't understand how the general decided which teams to keep whole, fostering closeness and intimate understanding among the members, and which to rearrange often, allowing for fresh input and redistribution of experience. SG-1 was the only exception so far: they had gained enough of a reputation off-world--individually and as a team--that the three of them together made enough of an impact that it was well worth keep them together. "What about Robert and me? Do we still take training missions with both of you?"
"You guys've been in pretty high demand with the research and diplomatic teams," Jack said, "so I'm not sure how valid it is to say you're training with just Units 1 and 2 anymore. And...I see you haven't heard about Dr. Rothman's assignment."
"What?" Daniel closed his book, rising on his knees and leaning forward. "Where? Or...what?"
"SG-11. Not for a few months, I'd say, but once they're finished picking everyone out and the military portion of the team gets used to each other, he'll probably join them as their permanent archaeologist."
"I...can't believe he didn't tell me," Daniel said, unsure whether to feel hurt or annoyed.
Jack shrugged. "He might not even know yet. But SG-11's going to be an archaeological team now, and he's been looking to go out on more research missions, so the general will probably ask him to join them."
Daniel held up a finger. "Wait, wait, but...SG-11 is mostly an engineering team, running second-line support..." He saw Sam grimace out of the corner of his eye, and when he turned back to Jack, the man's expression had become stiff and hard. A little nervously, he added, "Right?"
"They were on P89-534," Sam said. "And they're overdue to return to base."
"How long overdue?"
"Going on a month now," Jack said quietly. "It's one of Apophis's planets. They've been declared missing in action."
Daniel sat back down. "Oh."
He tried to remember when he'd last seen Captain Conner around base, or if he remembered hearing about P89-534. And then he remembered that SG-3 had been sent there, and he hadn't paid much attention because they had come back empty-handed, with Colonel Makepeace angry and snappish for days afterward. Now he realized they must have been the search-and-rescue team, and the fact that they'd come back with nothing--and no one--was enough to know what had happened.
"Oh," he said again, more quietly.
Ferretti appeared at the door, grinning. "Hey, which one of you has been telling Teal'c's kid about Christmas?"
"Um," Daniel said, slowly redirecting his attention. "I didn't really... Why?"
The laugh that followed seemed out of place after just realizing that a team of men was missing, probably forever, but Ferretti, unaware of the conversation he had interrupted, didn't pause. "Should've known it'd be you, Daniel," he teased, already heading away, toward the clearing where Daniel and Rya'c had both pretended yesterday not to understand the rules of baseball, just to annoy Jack. "C'mon, before Tuplo starts getting nervous."
"Nervous about what?" Sam asked, sounding wary and coming to her feet.
"The tree," Ferretti called back, not slowing.
"You didn't," Jack said to Daniel.
"What?" Daniel said, honestly bewildered. "I didn't do anything."
"I'm sure," he answered, standing and starting after Ferretti. "Who's coming?"
"I haven't seen many fir trees around here," Sam mused as she and Daniel followed.
When they arrived at the clearing, SG-2 was cheering something on. Daniel had to peer around them to see Teal'c standing before a...well. It wasn't a fir tree, anyway--Daniel knew that much. Rya'c stood on Teal'c's shoulders in what seemed a very precarious way. "Um..." Daniel said, flicking a glance at Drey'auc, who looked somewhere between amused and alarmed. "Are you sure that's...uh...not dangerous?"
"I am ensuring Rya'c's safety, Daniel Jackson," Teal'c said without turning, his strong hands gripping his son's legs.
"Almost there, father," Rya'c said, straining to rise higher on his toes. Daniel looked up to where Rya'c was stretching his arm as high as it would go, just in time to see him hang Jack's baseball cap on the highest bough he could reach.
SG-2 cheered loudly as Jack reached up to his head, as if only then realizing his cap wasn't there anymore.
"Daniel," Jack said, eying the tree, the lower branches studded unevenly with makeshift ornaments of flat stones and trinkets strung with strips of cloth--one hung by a shoelace, and Daniel caught sight of Casey cursing good-naturedly as he checked his left boot--"just what have you been telling him about Christmas trees?"
"Nothing," Daniel protested, then amended, "Well, I didn't say anything about hats."
"I couldn't find a pentagram," Rya'c said as Teal'c set him back down. "But I wanted to put something on top."
"I think it's beautiful, Rya'c," Sam told him, though her face was red and Daniel suspected she was trying not to laugh.
"I almost put the baseball glove on top," Rya'c told Jack seriously, holding up the mitt, "but then I wouldn't be able to play baseball. It is my favorite game."
Something flitted across Jack's face, and he took the mitt to place it on Rya'c's head. "Well, there you go. It's my favorite, too," he said, even though Daniel had seen him watch sports at home on the television, but never baseball and very specifically never baseball. Rya'c peered up at him from under the glove-turned-hat until Drey'auc took it off and smoothed his hair.
Daniel heard an artificial-sounding click next to him, and he turned to see Sam lowering her digital camera. "Hey, Captain, give me a copy of that when we get home, will you?" Ferretti said. "You can't tell it's not from Earth."
"It's very likely that this exact species of tree doesn't exist on Earth," Sam warned.
"The rest of us can't tell, anyway. Be nice to have something not utterly classified for once."
Technically, they weren't allowed to keep off-world photos for personal purposes, even photographs of trees decorated with rocks, but no one ever complained about innocuous photos tacked to office walls. "Yeah," Sam said. "I was going to show it to Cassandra, actually. Poor girl--her first Christmas with us, and Janet and I can't go see her. I'll bet Janet's going crazy."
Daniel felt his smile freeze.
"Yeah, how's the kid doing?" someone asked. "My daughter was such a handful at that age, you can't imagine."
"Oh, I can imagine, sir," Sam said fervently, grinning fondly. "I'm just grateful I never had to deal with her as an infant. But it still is an alien planet for her, and I just didn't want her to be scared or lonely. You know what it's like, Daniel, right? Holidays and all."
"Right," Daniel heard himself say. He listened to the rest of them laugh and trade stories about children and family traditions and holidays, and he wondered how scared Skaara and Sha'uri were on their own alien planets, whether Shifu was old enough to understand fear of where he was. He wondered if they even knew people were looking for them, or if they'd stopped hoping that they would ever be found and saved.
He had a sudden, irrational thought that, if he closed his eyes and stood still and quiet enough, they would all appear, because the winter solstice was a time of rebirth and renewal of light and new beginnings, and...
Daniel opened his eyes. Sha'uri was still gone, Shifu had been taken somewhere else, Skaara was nowhere to be found, they were stuck off-world, and now something was squeezing his lungs so hard that he couldn't breathe.
He backed away unsteadily and slipped out of the clearing while Jack was assuring Sam that he was sure Cassie would be fine.
XXXXX
Jack was the first one to make his way back to their quarters, his steps deliberately audible instead of the silent way he walked when he chose to. "Whatcha reading?" he asked casually. Daniel almost said, 'déjà vu,' because Jack said that to him all the time, but he didn't want to put in the extra effort needed for sarcasm.
"Just an article," Daniel said, not looking up. He refocused on the paper in his hands, only to realize he hadn't really been reading it and had no idea what it was about. He wasn't about to admit that so easily, though, so he added, "From the Journal of Egyptian Archaeology."
"What's it about?"
"Egyptian archaeology, Jack."
"Yeah, got that. What about it?"
Giving up, he sighed and let the article flutter to the floor. "Something. Probably."
"Now," Jack said, "that is what happens when you read too much. Your brain turns into mush."
"The brain is pretty mush-like to begin with. Some funeral rituals involve the--"
"Aht!" Jack gave him a disgusted look. "Thanks. Don't need the image."
Daniel considered picking the paper back up and actually reading it seriously this time, because he really had no idea what it was about, and he had come in here originally with every intention of reading it. Instead, he asked, "Is everyone still there? With the...uh, the tree."
Jack shrugged. "Drey'auc's trying to convince Rya'c to go to bed."
"Good luck," Daniel said, thinking of how loudly alert Shifu often became--had become--whenever anyone tried to make him sleep. Then he very pointedly stopped thinking about it, because it wasn't the same thing at all, yi shay, not when Rya'c was almost thirteen years old by Chulak's calendar while Shifu had only been born four Earth months and a week ago.
"That's what I said," Jack said, looking as if he were remembering how it felt, too, but not because of Shifu. "Anyway, like I told Carter, I didn't bring your Christmas presents."
Daniel gave him a look. "You didn't have Christmas presents for us," he said with a fair degree of confidence. There was no way he'd had time for that.
Jack looked startled, then chagrined. "Yeah, that's what Carter said."
He pushed up his glasses, only to find he wasn't wearing them. Maybe that was why he hadn't been able to read the article. Jack noticed but didn't say anything. "Could you sit down?" he said to cover for the lack of anything else to say. "So I don't have to keep looking up at you."
"So," Jack said, lowering himself to the floor.
"So," Daniel parroted.
"You know..."
"What?"
Jack hesitated, then said, awkward and blunt, "Are you...okay? After everything with Shifu?"
Daniel felt his shoulders stiffen.
"I know you miss him. And it's, you know...it's okay. Normal."
Bending his legs, Daniel leaned back against the wall. "It's not like I've ever had a conversation with him. It's not like I know him. Knew him. I--we only had him for a couple of months."
"He's your little brother," Jack said mildly. "You spent practically every minute of those months with him."
"I don't even know what kind of person he is; I mean, how can I possibly miss a person if I never even really knew anything about...about his personality, or what he--"
"He's your brother, Daniel."
Daniel swallowed and looked down. "For a few hours, on Kheb, I thought...I don't know."
"Yeah." Jack fiddled restlessly with a canteen, not like he was trying to take a drink, really, but just unscrewing the cap and closing it again, over and over. "You said it yourself," he said finally, "that he's safe now."
"That's not enough," Daniel said, and he was surprised it hear himself say it, to realize that it hadn't been just about Shifu; it had been selfish, and about himself, too. "I wanted to keep him, which is ridiculous." He pulled his knees to himself and held on. "I thought if I could protect him, it would mean I could keep him, too. How stupid is... I can't take care of a baby! I wouldn't know where to start; I don't even really want to. I can't imagine why I would have thought that."
When he looked up again, Jack was staring at him, his hands completely still now. "Daniel."
"And, uh." He coughed and dropped his eyes to escape the pity-confusion-hurt in Jack's face. "And Sha'uri would have whipped me herself if I kept her son from safety just because I wanted to--"
"Ah," Jack interrupted.
"'Ah?'" Daniel repeated. "Ah, what?"
"I know what you're thinking."
"So what am I thinking?"
"Why don't you tell me?"
Daniel sighed, thumping his head lightly against the wall. "I don't want to play right now, Jack."
"I'm not...trying to turn this into a game," Jack said.
"You don't understand," he said without knowing why he was saying it, because it wasn't like Daniel understood, either, so in all honesty, it was quite possible that Jack understood better than he did.
Jack visibly bit back a sharp retort and said, "Well, then, you'll have to help me out here."
He chewed on his lip, for once not attempting to drown the last few days--weeks--in piles of work. He thought carefully over what he'd done and what had happened and what the consequences were and would be. "If we find Sha'uri again--"
"When," Jack corrected without pausing to think.
"When we find her," Daniel amended, grateful for that confidence, "she will want to know what happened to her son. She never said exactly what she wanted us to do with him, and everyone kept saying that it might not have been her instructions, since Amaunet was there the whole time, and I don't think it was a trick, Jack, I really don't. But what if I misunderstood something...something Sha'uri said, or maybe something about the temple at Kheb, and when she finds out what I did--"
"You did the right thing," Jack said.
Relief burst within him so suddenly that it was a few moments before he could speak again. "Are you sure?" In the short pause that followed, he knew it wasn't a fair question, because now Jack had to decide between what he really thought and what he thought Daniel wanted to hear. "You don't have to answer that, Jack."
"Well, I'm sure," Jack said. Daniel looked up sharply, but Jack's eyes told what his face and tone didn't, and there was no lie there.
He blew out a slow breath. "Okay."
"Yeah? Okay?"
"I don't know," he admitted. "You were right. At Kheb. I was...so wrong. I shouldn't have just...accepted everything so easily."
"Ah...look," Jack said. "My job is to be paranoid. That's not your job. You...look for possibilities. That's how it works."
"I just thought it would..." Daniel started, then huffed. "You know, Sam was afraid from the start I would get attached."
"She can be pretty dumb about some things for someone so smart," Jack said.
"Maybe she was right."
"That's not what I meant. Carter's never had a kid of her own to take care of. Anyone could've warned you, but it wouldn't've changed anything."
He almost answered that he could have listened to Sam when she'd told him not to get too close, listened to Janet when she'd assured him that the medical staff would take over complete care of the baby if he wanted to have some space, listened to Teal'c when he'd said that he worried about what it meant to be the human child of two Goa'uld. He could have listened, like the guardian of at the temple of Kheb had tried to tell him again and again, but the trees in their arrogance had ignored the wind as it whispered wisdom to them.
But if he had known all along that he wouldn't be able to keep Shifu--that they couldn't even bring him back to Abydos, where Daniel could visit him sometimes--wasn't it all the more important that he'd spent as much time with his little brother as possible?
"Good point," Jack said gruffly, making Daniel realize that he'd said the last part aloud.
And then he felt worse, because it must be much harder for Jack than it was for him--Jack knew what it was to lose his son, after years of being with him and growing close. It wasn't the same with Shifu. Daniel had barely known Shifu at all, and he might not be lost at all, not completely, not the way Charlie was. "I'm sorry."
"For what?"
He shook his head. Jack didn't press him, so he dropped his chin onto his knees to watch the never-ending daylight outside. "Jack?"
Jack had picked up one of Daniel's textbooks and didn't even seem to notice that his hands were idly flipping the cover open and shut, each flip accompanied by a soft whoosh of wind that rustled the pages. "Daniel?"
Daniel took a breath and said to the floor, "What do you think about Oma Desala?" The rustling stopped. "And you don't have to...I mean, what do you really think about her?"
"Is this why you've been working so hard on Ancient recently?" Jack asked.
He shrugged one shoulder. "Kheb's address was from the Ancient database. The writing on the walls from the temple...I thought, for a minute, that it looked like Ancient, but now I'm not so sure, because I haven't found anything like it since. If she was really Mother Nature, someone must have encountered her as the being Oma Desala, right, and there would be records?"
Jack folded his hands behind his head and leaned back against the wall. "May...be."
"And...maybe not?" Daniel heard in the unspoken words.
"And maybe not. Who knows."
"Do you...think we'll ever see them..." He stopped and cleared his throat. "You think we'll see her and Shifu again?"
Wrinkling his nose, Jack shifted in his place, so Daniel knew he was hesitating, trying to find a kind way to phrase whatever he was thinking. "I think," he said finally, carefully, "it's out of our hands now. I think if Oma Desala wants us to see them again, she'll find a way to make it happen."
Daniel nodded in acceptance, sighing.
"Stop sighing."
"Jack."
"It's Christmas, Daniel. You can't keep... Just stop thinking for once. For one day, huh? Like that thing with the..." Jack jerked a thumb toward the clearing where they'd just been. "What was that?"
"What was what?"
"A pentagram? You told Rya'c we put pentagrams on top of our trees?"
Daniel suppressed another sigh, because he knew what Jack was doing, knew it was a clumsy attempt to make him stop dwelling on things they couldn't change. When he didn't answer at first, Jack started to look something between uncertain and discouraged, so he finally played along and said, "I've seen pictures of Christmas trees with five-pointed polygons on top as symbolic representations of stars. I drew one, and Rya'c asked, and I told him it was called a pentagram."
"It's not a pentagram," Jack said.
"Actually, sir," Sam said as she walked in, pulling a curtain to block sunlight that would otherwise keep them awake the whole not-really-night, "technically, it is, in its simplest form, if you draw it the right way."
"It's a star, Carter."
"That's only a symbolic representation of a star," Daniel repeated. "It makes much more sense to call it a pentagram if it's drawn with five lines."
"Why?" Jack asked.
"Because the word 'pentagram' means 'five lines.'"
Jack sighed.
"Don't sigh, Jack."
"Go to bed, Daniel."
Sam laughed.
"You too, Carter. Don't make me make that an order."
"Yes, sir. Merry Christmas to you, too."
Daniel crawled into his bedroll and spent the first minutes listening to them breathe around him.
For a moment, it almost felt like nighttime on Abydos, with people sleeping nearby on their pallets, knowing he was surrounded by people who would protect, if needed, but never, ever hurt. Then he saw Jack's eyes still open and watching him from his corner, and Daniel turned away to stare at the wall. Still thinking about their conversation, he felt his arms try to curl around someone who wasn't there--Shifu, perhaps, or his mother or his protector big brother--and he hugged his knees to his chest instead. When his vision began to blur, he squeezed his eyes shut and pulled his blanket over his head.
He woke again some indeterminate amount of time later, his sleeve damp where his cheek had pressed into it. Sam had moved away from her corner at some point, and her feet were now close enough to be touching the bottom of his bedroll. Jack was closer, too, close enough to touch if he reached out enough, and still awake, still watching him, still guarding. Daniel met his gaze.
"Go back to sleep," Jack said.
Instead of quieting, Daniel blurted in a whisper, "It's been over a year."
Jack rubbed the back of his neck. "You mean...since..."
Daniel pulled himself out of his blankets and shuffled over to sit shoulder to shoulder, so they could talk without waking Sam. "Since everything. It feels like...so long, and..."
"And like just yesterday," Jack finished, because he knew without having to hear it.
Daniel nodded and almost wished it was cold like it would be back in Colorado, just for an excuse to inch closer for warmth. Jack pressed a solid shoulder against his, anyway. "I don't usually think about...about all of that all the time anymore."
"Well, you can't."
"It's gotten better. But--" Daniel stopped.
"But," Jack agreed. He took a breath and ventured, awkwardly, "You've been kind of...down. Recently." Daniel couldn't move. He wasn't sure if he was embarrassed to be having this conversation with Jack or relieved, so he didn't answer. "You've gotta...stop thinking sometimes."
"It's just, after Kheb, I kept...I can't stop thinking about it, and thinking maybe I could've done something different. If I'd been faster on Klorel's hatak, or not as...as indecisive when we found Sha'uri on Abydos, or even the first time you came to Abydos, if we'd been more prepared, and--"
"Daniel," Jack said softly. "No. Don't. Don't do that."
"Jack, how do you..." he started. He didn't finish.
Over a year since Abydos. A month since Kheb. It had been much longer since Jack had lost his son, lost friends in combat, lost over and over. Something prickled behind his eyes at the overwhelming thought that, one day, it would be that long for Daniel, too.
Jack was silent for a long time, and Daniel started to think he might have overstepped one boundary too many. "I learned to forget," Jack said at last. "Sometimes."
"I don't want to forget," he whispered.
"I know. Trust me. You won't." A hand brushed gently over his head. "Go to sleep, Daniel."
Daniel bit his lip, nodded, but didn't move immediately. He looked across the room and saw that Sam's eyes were open, too, snapping shut when she saw him see her. With another nod, he levered himself away from the wall and slipped back under his blankets. He stared at the bulls rearing fiercely in the fresco on the wall until he fell asleep, thinking, Taurus, Tauri, Tau'ri.
From the next chapter ("Hosts, Part I"):
"It wasn't just a dream, sir," Carter said, looking more tired now that he was close enough to see. "As I've stated before, it was a memory. I saw Jolinar--and the other Tok'ra--escaping from something or someone. I think they were under attack, and they were going to some other planet."
no subject
Very hard for Teal'c and co - the recognition of what he's lost, in terms of Ry'ac. And seeing SG-2 move on would be hard for Daniel, I think. Kind of a what now? Especially with Rothman getting permanently assigned...
A very nice little breather before we meet the Tok'ra. Onwards!