Title: Being Jack O’Neill

Author: Karen (Kent)

Email: a_non_entity@hotmail.com

Status: Complete

Category: Jack angst (of course! <G>)

Pairings: Nope

Spoilers: Oodles; too many to list, sorry

Season: Everything up to the end of Season Five is fair game. Set immediately before Meridian

Sequel/Series Info: None

CONTENT LEVEL: 13+

Content Warnings: Occasional reference to torture

Summary: Ummmm . . . Jack’s life, my way. And Daniel gets to see it. So, not startlingly original, but there you go! I don’t think I’ve gone against anything established in canon concerning Jack’s life, as of today 28/10/04, although you may not like my interpretations, additions, ideas etc. But, hey, it’s fiction. And I’m just playing! <BG>

Disclaimer: I don’t own them. Sadly. No infringement of copyright is intended. I made no money from this, and am not rich enough to sue.

File Size (kb): 450kb

Archive: Jackfic, others please ask first

Author’s Notes:

This is for my best friend, Helen. Because if she hadn’t insisted, a long while ago now, that I really *must* watch this fab programme she liked, then none of this would exist. Thanks, Helen. And yes, you were right, the lead guy was *just* my cup of tea!! <G>

This fic has been lurking in the wings for a *very* long time, and started as a response to a Word Of The Month challenge on Frondfic. *Yes*, *that* long!! However, if I give in to Compulsive Re-Writing Syndrome anymore, I’ll go NUTS. So . . .

Thanks beyond measuring go to Judy and Sidney, who helped me so much with the whole project and gave encouragement when I really, really needed it. And to Flora, who was there at the start. Their betaing skills are second to none. Thank you all from the bottom of my heart.

Any mistakes that remain are entirely mine.

Being Jack O’Neill

Set immediately before Meridian.

Unashamedly Jack and Daniel friendship.

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“A man’s character is his fate.” Heraclitus

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Part 1

When your best friend is lying in the infirmary curled into the tightest ball of pain, arms wrapped around his body to prevent himself screaming in agony, his knuckles bone white and his face creased with an anguish you cannot even begin to comprehend, you will do anything - *anything* - to help.

Even if you know that what you do might mean sacrificing that very friendship.

Because, if it means that your friend will recover, and be able to go on with his life, then that will be reward enough.

Even though you know he might hate you for what you did.

*******

Daniel Jackson placed his hand on Jack O’Neill’s arm. He could feel the muscles corded in ropes of savage tension and the quivering spasms of continual pain, that flowed through them like an electric current.

Continuing to rest his hand against his friend’s arm, Daniel looked at everyone else in the room. Sam Carter had her arms hugged across her chest, and her hands were continuously kneading her uniform sleeves just above the elbows. Teal’c stood tall, seemingly impassive, but Daniel knew better. The big man’s eyes never left Jack’s figure and his eyebrows, usually so straight across his brow unless raised quizzically, were slightly pinched. It was only a marginal imbalance, but Daniel was so attuned to his friend’s expressions that he could easily read the inverse amount of concern for O’Neill displayed by the tiny alteration in the Jaffa’s features.

But neither Sam nor Teal’c made the decisions around the SGC, and so it wasn’t to them that Daniel spoke.

‘We have to go back. We have to ask them to help. They must know what is causing this. They have to be able to help in some way!’ Daniel knew his eyes begged General Hammond to agree with him. ‘It’s all a result of something they did to Jack when they talked to him alone. It has to be. There’s no other explanation. We have to go back!’

Hammond listened, but Daniel knew there was no forcing the General to do anything he felt was rushed or ill-considered. He had concerns to weigh in balance beyond those of mere loyalty and friendship.

‘I’m not so sure that they can be responsible. You said yourselves they seemed reclusive; unwilling to talk or to communicate very much at all. They surely wouldn’t have done anything that was going to require us to make a return visit,’ Hammond said slowly. But he looked worriedly at his second-in-command who was clearly in terrible and, at present, wholly inexplicable pain.

‘But,’ Jackson pressured, sensing that the General might be weakening, ‘they did eventually communicate with Jack. Alone. And when they’d finished they seemed even more distant and unwilling to discuss anything further. They just insisted that we left, and that they wanted no more contact with us.’

Daniel was beseeching Hammond. He couldn’t help it. Jack was his friend, and was suffering terribly. It was as black and white as that, and the grey uncertainties of military protocol seemed senseless in the face of those stone-hard facts. But, as a civilian in the military-run Stargate Command, Daniel had come up against this slippery conundrum before. And the results had not always been to his liking.

‘Something that happened during those talks *must* be the cause of . . . this.’ Daniel gestured desperately towards his friend. ‘Nothing else explains it. It’s the only thing that happened to Jack that was different from anything that happened to the rest of us. And he *was* a little groggy when he came back from the talks.’ Daniel was aware his voice was rising, but he was powerless to control his overflowing emotions. ‘None of us thought anything of it at the time. But he’s just been getting steadily worse. Look, General! Look at him! You can’t leave him like this! We have to do something.’ He knew he was pleading, but couldn’t stop himself.

Surely Hammond wouldn’t leave Jack to suffer like this. Surely Janet Fraiser, standing beside her writhing patient, would say that something had to be done. Surely the others wouldn’t just stand and say nothing.

Daniel looked around seeking more vocal support from those who had, until then, been willing to let him speak for them.

‘Sir, I agree with Daniel.’ Carter’s eyes were fixed in agonised sympathy on the body of her commanding officer, and she continued to hug her arms around her own body as if in a desperate attempt to somehow share in, or alleviate, his pain.

‘I also believe Daniel Jackson is correct, General Hammond,’ Teal’c said sombrely. ‘It seems strongly possible that O’Neill’s great pain may be a consequence of his treatment at the hands of the people we have recently visited.’ The Jaffa stood off to one side as he often did, his hands clasped imperiously behind his back. His dark eyes clouded with concern for his friend.

Daniel could almost see the pressure of responsibility like a visible weight on the General’s shoulders. His second-in-command, and close friend, was incapacitated to such an extent that no one, and no drugs, seemed able to help him.

Everyone knew that Jack O’Neill did not readily give in, or admit, to pain. Here, it was obvious to a one-eyed man half-blinded by cataracts that the Colonel was in a very bad way, and was completely unable to control the hurt flooding in waves through his body.

Hammond looked at each of the members of SG-1 in turn, as Daniel held his breath and prayed silently with as much fervent hope as he could muster from an earnest civilian soul battered by frequent contact with the thou-shalt-not-question-us military method of operating. He hoped that Carter’s pleading eyes, and Teal’c’s steadfast gaze would also go some way towards persuading the General.

Doctor Fraiser was monitoring Colonel O’Neill’s condition, but she, too, turned to Hammond, saying, quietly, ‘I’ve run every test I can think of, sir. At present, I have no idea what is causing this, so I have no idea of the best treatment, other than to try and control his pain.’

The seconds stretched almost to breaking point.

‘Alright, SG-1, you have a go. But I expect you to be extremely vigilant, Major. Your own safety is the primary concern, above and beyond finding out if anything those people may have done caused the Colonel’s illness. I will not be able to send a rescue mission through for you. Is that understood?’

Daniel barely heard Sam’s, ‘Yes, sir.’ He was half-way out the door by the time the General got to the words ‘rescue mission’.

He would have cried with relief or hugged Hammond in grateful thanks if there’d been time, but he didn’t want to waste a precious second. He dimly recognised that the General was taking a risk, and that his warning about SG-1 being on their own was his way of acknowledging the very fine line he was walking; sending a team back into a situation that had possibly already left their commanding officer in dire distress.

Hammond wanted to help O’Neill, and could probably justify his decision to allow the team to return on the grounds that there had been no overt show of weapons of any kind when SG-1 had visited P37 894 previously. But he was making it clear that, if things did go wrong, he would not be able to defend the deployment of yet more troops.

They would be on their own.

There was no time to say farewells. But Daniel sent a heartfelt thought back to his suffering friend as he hurried along the corridor to the locker room.

We’ll sort this out, Jack. Just hang in there. Don’t give up. I swear we won’t give up on you ‘til we can make you better. Just hang in there.

******

Part 2

Stepping through the Stargate back to P37 894, Sam Carter was anxious and alert. Her CO’s life could very well depend on how she handled things here. But, in addition, she was worried that they had missed something first time around. Something important. Something that meant the Colonel was now lying in agony back in the infirmary.

*What*?

What had they missed?

And if there was nothing, what did they do next?

And if there *was* something, then they’d *all* missed it first time around.

Including the Colonel, who had the inbuilt radar system of an experienced fox stalking the hen-house while only too aware that the farmer was hiding somewhere - shotgun ready.

Sam squashed her concerns and took a brief moment to survey her surroundings.

The Stargate was in a large public area overlooked by strangely faceless, mainly white-walled buildings, and its activation on their last visit had very quickly drawn a gathering band of spectators; an assembly of figures, who had simply watched, in eerie silence, as SG-1 walked down the ramp together.

Although O’Neill had broken the ice with a relaxed, ‘Howdy folks! We come in peace,’ Carter had known his finger was resting on the trigger of his P-90, and his eyes were darting around assessing the danger at a rate faster than that of which she was capable.

Nothing about their reception was different this time, and the Major searched for anyone that she recognised from before, someone with whom she already had a connection no matter how fragile. And, finally, a tall statuesquely slender woman, moving with a confident grace that seemed to be almost ethereal, parted the crowd and came to stand in front of them.

‘You come again, despite being asked not to return.’ The words were spoken gently, without a hint of reproach, in the whispered tones Carter remembered from their previous visit. There was nothing to outwardly show it, and yet the Major sensed annoyance behind the words.

‘We apologise for our second intrusion,’ she replied. ‘But we came to seek your help.’

‘Please explain.’ The woman, whose name Carter could not recall, tilted her head in the universal sign of enquiry. Her eyes flitted across the faces of SG-1, before returning to Sam.

‘Our leader, Colonel O’Neill, is very sick. We don’t know what is wrong with him, but it’s possible that something happened to him on this planet that may have caused his illness.’ Not a good phrasing, Sam, she told herself, reproachfully. Tread carefully, for goodness sake. The Colonel’s life could be at stake here.

She continued, trying to choose her words with greater care, ‘We don’t mean to imply that anyone hurt him deliberately; I’m sure that wasn’t the case. But he was out of our sight for a conference, and we wondered if he ate anything, or drank anything, that might have caused him to become unwell. Something that perhaps doesn’t affect you in the same way.’ Carter watched the woman’s impassive face. ‘We just wanted to speak to you, and find out as much as possible, then be on our way.’

She waited and prayed silently; if they were turned away she wasn’t sure what their next move would be. She could feel her desperation seeping into her eyes despite her best efforts to hold it back, and was reminded of the expression she had seen in Daniel’s eyes as he strove to persuade Hammond to sanction their return.

The woman stood with the quiet thoughtful stance Carter remembered from their previous visit. As time passed the Major shifted slightly feeling uncomfortable, while her observer’s eyes creased at the corners as if she were holding some kind of a deep, internal debate. Then, she nodded her head and gestured for them to follow her. Carter tried hard to swallow her sigh of relief and remain as outwardly implacable as possible, but she knew that her expression was quite probably giving her away. And, anyway, what did her face matter when Daniel’s was positively glowing with delight at their progress? If only they could both be like Teal’c and remain quietly impassive.

The room in which they found themselves was whitewashed and bare of all but chairs and tables. Although not the same room they had visited when they were last there, it was very similar. White was a colour they had seen much of, and decorations were few. Everything on the planet appeared functional but in a gentle fashion. Designs were curved, and sloping, as opposed to square-edged or jagged. It was as if these people had surrounded themselves entirely with quietness and calm, with little of bold colour or harsh architectural intrusion. Everything was reduced to its minimum. Their actions, their speech, their apparel, everything about the society suggested a tranquillity and quiet reflection. And SG-1 had clashed with things from the moment they had stepped through the Gate: dressed in their harsh green BDUs; carrying their shiny black weapons; led by a brash man demanding to know where all the trees were.

Now, invited to sit, what was left of SG-1 settled and faced the woman.

‘You have forgotten my name, I think. It is Mya.’ Her tone was soft, almost like a breath of gentle summer wind. Carter had noticed this quietness before. It was almost as if the woman was unpractised at using her voice.

The Major nodded. ‘I remember you from before, but I’m sorry, you’re right, I couldn’t recall your name.’

Mya nodded with a quiet smile. ‘It does not matter. Please explain your concerns more clearly to me.’

‘Colonel O’Neill was our leader when we came to your planet yesterday. You talked to him . . . at least . . . you took him away so that he could speak to people. Well . . . after we returned home, he became unwell, and since then he has become very ill indeed. And he’s getting worse all the time. It started with headaches and nausea, and now he’s also in severe pain. We can’t find any way to stop it as we can’t find out what’s causing it. Our doctors have run tests and can’t find any obvious answers. So, we had to return, because we wondered,’ Carter hesitated over her choice of words.

Come on, Sam, don’t offend them. Just be as diplomatic as you can.

‘We wondered . . .’

‘If something we had done had harmed your friend in some way?’

Carter could feel the heat of embarrassment climbing up her face. ‘Well, as I said before, we thought that maybe something happened that might have injured the Colonel unintentionally. I’m sure you did nothing that you thought would deliberately hurt him. But if you could just describe where he went, and what he may have eaten or had to drink, we might be able to understand why he has reacted the way that he has. It’s almost certainly an allergy or something. We just need to identify exactly what.’

Mya’s face was troubled, and she looked at her companions. For some time there seemed to be an unspoken conversation, which Carter found disconcerting. Daniel and Teal’c were also confused; she could see it in their attitudes: Teal’c had raised an eyebrow slightly, and Daniel’s eyes switched from person to person as if he were watching an invisible tennis match. Being so comfortable around words he found silence *uncomfortable*, unless it was the silence of absorbed academic study. Now his flickering eyes were almost comical. It was almost, Carter thought, as if he could sense an unspoken language being used.

‘You’re telepathic!’ She jumped up. ‘You’re communicating now . . . with each other . . . without speaking . . .’

She looked from Mya to the others, certain that she was correct and furious that they had not figured this out before.

Mya turned to look at her and, after pausing a long moment as if to consider her response, she nodded. ‘Yes. We are. Amongst ourselves we are able to communicate that way with ease. However, a slightly different method is needed to truly read the thoughts of other races.’

Daniel also sprang to his feet. ‘This has something to do with what’s happened to Jack, doesn’t it?’

Mya looked from one to the other of the team, and finally sighed and dipped her head in acknowledgement. ‘That may be so. The procedure we used on your Colonel was most certainly not intended to harm him. But, in order to learn the truth . . .’ She paused as if to reflect on her words. Then seemed to gather herself, and continued, ‘In our experience, words can be used as a front. They do not always tell the truth about what someone is thinking. Thoughts are more likely to give us an honest reflection of the people we meet, especially if they themselves are unused to our ways and so cannot guard their thoughts from us.’

Mya paused for a long time as if the speech had exhausted her.

‘It is as Mya says,’ one of her companions continued. ‘We did not reveal our abilities to you previously because we did not want to forewarn you. If you were in any way able to mask your thoughts we would not get a completely truthful response to our questions.’

‘We did not think that you had abilities like ours,’ Mya admitted. ‘But we have learned to be careful over the years.’ She paused. ‘We can tell many things by simply sensing the emotions of other races. For example, just now, at the Circle, you were very anxious. You were also confused when you looked at me, which made me suspect that you had forgotten my name.’ For a while she looked hard into Carter’s eyes, as if searching for an answer to an unspoken question. ‘We did not sense any overt threat from any of you when you came before. As, indeed, I sense none now. That is why we decided to seek a greater knowledge of you from the mind of your leader. It would help us to decide whether your race was one with which we could associate more closely.’ Mya again paused for a long time seeming to be considering her words carefully, then, slowly, as if a decision had been reached, she inclined her head. ‘I can tell you a little. About your leader. About what happened. It was not . . . ‘ she stopped, and looked to her associate for help.

Her companion spoke again, ‘I was there when Mya “spoke” to your leader. What she learned, she found deeply . . . disturbing.’ He looked at SG-1, uncertain obviously about upsetting them if he continued.

‘Disturbing?’ Carter seized on his words. Was this their first clue to solving the Colonel’s predicament? ‘In what way?’

‘We are a peaceful people.’ His gaze flitted from one to the other. Resting particularly on Teal’c’s impressive, imposing figure. ‘What was seen in your friend’s mind was . . . not . . . peaceful.’

Carter coughed, and looked at Daniel. ‘No,’ she agreed, ‘it probably wouldn’t have been. On the whole.’

‘You could always look into my mind,’ Daniel interposed. ‘You don’t need to take Jack as a representation of our entire race. Jack is . . . uhh . . . rather unique, really.’

Mya and her companion exchanged looks again before Mya resumed, ‘We chose Colonel O’Neill because he was your leader. He held a position of responsibility, and we needed to see more deeply into his thoughts, to learn about his life and the world from which he came. As a result we would be able to make some decisions about your people in general. Rightly or wrongly. This is the method we have agreed to adopt if someone new comes through The Circle, although we have not had many visitors. You are the first in some time.’

Daniel interrupted, ‘Of course, you didn’t tell Jack what talking to him was going to entail?’

‘No,’ Mya agreed. ‘To let someone know what to expect would perhaps give them the chance to prepare against us. We wish to get as honest a measure of a person and their thoughts and opinions as possible.’

‘So how did you do it?’ Carter could see Daniel was curious beyond measure, and she had to admit to a similar interest. Obviously neither of them could imagine Jack O’Neill allowing anyone to catch him unawares in order to be able to get inside his head, in any way, shape or form. And the Colonel was like a mongoose in a pit full of cobras if any situation looked like it might develop into one requiring a response to the questions ‘Tell Us About Yourself,’ or ‘How Are You Feeling?’

‘Simply by holding his hand and touching the side of his face was enough to begin the process,’ Mya said. ‘Then I was able to guide him so that he was seated and I could take as long as I liked to work into his mind and his thoughts. With our own people we are able to receive thoughts without touching. With other races to be sure of honesty we must be in contact, and once that is established we have increasing access to the person’s true thoughts.’

‘Bit like a Vulcan mind meld,’ Carter muttered, without thinking.

Curious eyes looked her way.

‘Never mind,’ she said hurriedly. ‘And did you?’ Her voice conveyed how upsetting she found the thought of what had happened.

Mya nodded. ‘Yes. But it was difficult. I have not had to perform the procedure in some time. As I said you are the first to come through the Circle in some while. And your leader was not an easy subject. His mind was strangely closed. In a manner I have not encountered before. It was difficult to find a way through. There were many barriers which took time to overcome.’

‘He’s been trained to resist such invasions,’ Carter said bitterly.

Daniel agreed ‘That’s probably what caused all this. Jack resisted, you had to work hard to get into his mind and something had to give.’ Daniel looked at her bitterly. ’Unfortunately, it was Jack’s mind. Or his feelings and emotions. Or all of those things.’

In her defence Carter had to admit that Mya looked truly remorseful as she said, ‘It is possible. And I admit that it might indeed explain what has happened. I can only say how sorry I am. We seek only to improve our knowledge. Never before, so far as I know, have our attempts to learn about a race caused this harm. The person has usually shown no ill-effects whilst here, and has departed in good spirits. However, after what I saw in your leader’s mind we were thinking that it would be no bad thing to destroy The Circle altogether, something that has been advocated before. Indeed, we were meeting there to discuss such a course of action. There were threats to your way of life that would also threaten us . . .’ Mya didn’t have to elaborate. She would have seen the Goa’uld in Jack’s mind. Seen the horrors that accompanied any contact with that race.

Mya drew a breath. ‘It is true that your leader did not seem so well after I drew back, but I could no longer read him well enough. Things were . . . ’ she seemed to struggle to find the right words before continuing, ‘ . . . confused. I am so very sorry,’ she repeated.

‘Jack’s a very private person,’ Daniel explained. ‘He hates talking about himself, or anything at all really, unless he’s in charge. He’d have resisted you.’ He looked at Mya.

She nodded. ‘Yes. It was difficult, as I have said.’ She paused. ‘It was *very* difficult. But I still did not realise that any harm had been done. I failed to sense that. But, I am afraid to admit, I did not try to assess his state of mind afterwards. Once my connection was broken I warned others to avoid contact with his thoughts in any way. I did not wish others to even sense the things that I had seen in his head.’ She looked helpless and upset. ‘That was, perhaps, why, if I have caused damage, we did not realise that anything was seriously wrong. I cannot tell you how sorry I am.’

Her eyes beseeched first Sam, then Daniel, and lastly, with trepidation, Teal’c.

‘I am deeply sorry,’ Mya repeated. ‘I agree that I had to work much harder than I’ve ever had to do before to find answers, but, even then, I could not access all of his mind. So I did not find anything that told me he was trained to resist such invasions. I thought it was merely that his mind was closed because of what it contained. And I was not surprised.’

‘Why?’ Sam and Daniel found themselves demanding together.

‘There was much sorrow, much unhappiness. But the things I saw made my decision involving a treaty with your people an easy one to make. There were things of such . . . violence.’ She grimaced in distaste. ‘Things that we would not wish to experience here. Much that I found . . . ‘ her voice faded.

‘That you found?’ Carter couldn’t help herself. Much of her CO’s past was so shrouded in mystery that there wasn’t even a vague outline to the picture. She found the chance to learn something of it – anything of it – tantalising in the extreme.

Mya looked at her and said nothing.

‘Please,’ Daniel prompted. ‘It may help us to understand what’s happened to him.’

‘I found it . . . ‘ she seemed to struggle for the right words. Then, after a moment, continued slowly, ‘Disturbing. Upsetting.’ She looked at them as if judging the effect of her words. ‘I am sorry but what it showed of your people was, at times,’ she paused again. Then sighing as if making up her mind, she finished with force, ‘It was at times disgusting and degrading. Not just acts your Colonel has committed himself. But things that have been done to him. I am sorry, but what I saw did not show your race in a very positive light at all. Therefore, we decided not to pursue relations with Earth. We are a very quiet, peaceful people. You, on the other hand, are not.’

Sam and Daniel looked at each other and knew that each was thinking the same thing. What had Mya seen in Jack’s head that was disgusting or degrading?

There was a reprehensible desire in both of them to enquire further, breach a protected privacy that they normally respected beyond all things. Temptation is a tantalisingly offered key to any door that is usually solidly shut to the world, and both wanted damned hard to take it. Turn it in the lock.

‘I believe our concern now must be how to aid O’Neill,’ Teal’c interposed, quietly.

Daniel and Carter started, and looked at him guiltily. He inclined his head, one eyebrow raised slightly. His eyes held no censure, although he quite obviously had seen the thoughts in his two companions’ minds. Instead, he merely brought things back to the point in question. Standing guard at the door. Protecting all.

Mya nodded. ‘Whatever harm I have caused I must endeavour to correct,’ she agreed earnestly. ‘It is not our wish to cause any hurt in our search for knowledge.’

‘Are you aware of any procedure that might be of assistance to O’Neill?’ Teal’c appeared to have taken control for the moment, and Carter and Daniel stood back and deferred to his leadership.

‘There are ancient texts that tell of methods to find a path into a damaged mind. Techniques used in the old days when these ways were new and somewhat untried by our people. Mistakes were made by our ancestors that needed to be corrected; minds were sometimes crippled when they were introduced to the telepathic techniques and could not cope,’ Mya explained. ‘Once, we were as you are. We spoke to each other always using our voices. But, gradually, over the centuries, we developed our method of using the mind over the voice.

‘Initially, it was not an easy thing and only the more skilled were able to do it most successfully. Sometimes those who were believed to be ready and able to cope could not, and were overwhelmed by the process. However, slowly, as time passed, more and more of each new generation came to be able to use their minds in this way. It was a quieter way of living. And, of course,’ she smiled, ‘we were infinitely more trustful of each other. And it proved helpful when dealing with other cultures, as we were able to ensure we were not used to their advantage. We have been a peaceful people for a very long time, thanks to our abilities, and have not wanted to suffer the ravages of war with others. Our abilities have helped us over the millennia. They have proved to be our strongest defence and our strongest weapon.’ After a pause she continued, ‘It is possible that your leader was overwhelmed in a similar way to that which afflicted those of our ancestors who were not able to cope with the process.’

‘Did not those with whom you came into contact over the years complain at your methods of interrogation?’ Teal’c inquired.

‘Experience proved that, generally, a subject was left with nothing more than a small headache and a little confusion, similar to being slightly inebriated, and that cleared quickly,’ Mya informed them. ‘And never did they appear to realise that they had opened their thoughts to us. However, the contact with their minds was more fleeting than that required to read the mind of your Colonel O’Neill. I used more effort and time than I have ever needed before. Indeed, records show that in the past contact has never needed to be maintained for such a long period. Usually it has been easy to judge very quickly. Here, regrettably, it was not, as it took me a great deal of time to find my way into his mind. And perhaps that is the cause of this. Although, after I had finished he did not act any differently from how I would have expected.’ She looked at them and waited.

‘Trouble is,’ Daniel said, biting the inside of his cheek in his worry, as he explained things to Mya, ‘Jack doesn’t make a fuss if he’s in real pain. He’ll just say something hopelessly pathetic, or, more likely, say nothing at all, and just shrug things off. That’s his way.’

‘That’s so true,’ Carter nodded. ‘And if he was in real pain while here he probably didn’t think it worth mentioning anyway, because we were being shown the door and asked to go home.’

‘I do now recall that O’Neill touched his forehead on several occasions. Although he did not complain in any way,’ Teal’c said quietly. ‘Did you not sense any distress?’ he asked Mya.

She looked ashamed. ‘As I said, I was avoiding his mind,’ she said quietly. ‘I did not want to experience again anything of his terrible memories. And I told my companions to avoid contact as well. I warned them away. I did not want them to gain any hint of the visions I had had.’ Mya shuddered as if seeing again what had so upset her when she had looked inside O’Neill’s head.

Carter felt the tide of guilt she knew was affecting Daniel and Teal’c as well. They *knew* O’Neill was not one to make a song and dance over illness and injury. He mistakenly believed that if he stayed silent about things that worried him, then those things would not worry anyone else. What he had long failed to realise was that his friends had come to recognise his silences as warning beacons, bright enough to light the runways at JFK Airport.

In this case, though, there had been little time to assess things in any detail, and there had been no long hike back to the Stargate during which things could become more obvious. O’Neill, in true tradition, had camouflaged his condition until they were back at the SGC and he could no longer hide his pain.

Which didn’t stop the rest of his team from feeling guilty about not noticing his situation sooner.

Part 3

‘What happened when you got home?’ Mya enquired.

‘O’Neill’s condition grew progressively worse,’ Teal’c recalled. ‘Even as he was being checked in the infirmary, immediately after returning, things were obviously not as they should be. Doctor Fraiser would not release him.’

‘Which made him a little mad,’ Carter half-smiled.

‘But not *very* mad,’ Daniel interposed. ‘Which gave us all an idea that something was wrong.’

Mya tilted her head in quiet enquiry.

‘Normally,’ Teal’c explained, ‘O’Neill does not take kindly to being informed he must remain in the infirmary for a period of time. However, on this occasion he did not complain when told he could not leave.’

Carter shook her head. ‘And by the time *we’d* all finished our medicals, and were thinking of leaving, he was obviously in real pain.’

‘And it just got worse from there. Headache, and more headache, and then pains everywhere else. Our doctors tried everything they could think of, but nothing seemed to work. And we couldn’t understand what had caused the problem in the first place. There was nothing obvious: no marks on his body, nothing that we could think he had eaten or had to drink. It was all quite baffling.’ Daniel winced in the memory of his friend’s pain. ‘And by the time we left to return here he was unconscious and yet still in so much pain we just didn’t know what else to do.’

The three friends stood and waited. Sure that their distress was plain to the sensitive group.

‘I will return with you,’ Mya said, without prompting. Her companions were already nodding in an unspoken agreement to an unheard conversation. ‘We must try to right this grievous wrong we have caused. I can only apologise once more. We wished only to protect ourselves.’

Her face was drawn with concern, and worry. And her companions also looked upset.

Mya said, ‘I will need time to search for the ancient texts which may help me but, if you will allow me, I will be ready as soon as I can locate them.’

‘Of course,’ Teal’c agreed.

‘Please hurry, though,’ Carter and Daniel said, almost in tandem.

*********

Running her fingers along the spines of tomes that had been neglected over many years Mya searched for the texts she needed. Curious scholarly minds had occasionally wandered into this lost maze of rooms, seeking answers to questions only they found of interest, but beyond those very infrequent visitors she knew that this part of the university library building had been long disused. It dealt with the early mind-reading techniques, the problems that had been encountered, and how they had been overcome. But those methods had been obsolete for many long centuries now, as telepathic methods had spread and people became more confident in their new abilities. Vocal practices were maintained by a few, in order to greet visitors, but beyond Mya and her colleagues there were no others who could speak in the old way. And, if The Circle was destroyed, she wondered if they would be the last who ever would.

Her fingers left trails in the fine film of dust that clung to the books. With the advent of computers the books had been neglected to an even greater degree. Their method of transmitting knowledge was of no interest any more, and neither was most of the actual knowledge that was collected here, much of which, she was aware, had never been transferred over to the newer methods of storage.

If what she sought was not here she did not know where else to look, or how to help the man whose mind she had inadvertently damaged.

They were a strange group, the travellers from through The Circle. She had sensed a strong bond between them all when they had appeared that first time. She had also sensed their very disparate characters. But there had been no doubt about who was in charge: the tall, grey-haired man with eyes that had assessed her carefully, whilst crinkling appealingly at the corners as he smiled a greeting. She had sensed a wariness in him. A distance, which had made her suspicious of him, as had the weapons he carried; despite his apparently friendly front.

She had liked his eyes, she had liked his smile; he was a handsome and seemingly charming man.

And yet . . .

She shivered when she remembered what she had found deep within his mind. The horrific things he had tried to stop her from seeing. Mya paused and had to re-gather herself as the Colonel’s memories came back to her in a sweeping force. She had to right this wrong, and then they must destroy their Circle. There was so much danger in the universe that they needed to shut themselves away from.

She had seen this new race at its worst in the stranger’s mind: the pain inflicted; the suffering endured; the lives taken in violent and sickening ways she wanted to wipe from her memories. She knew there were good things, but she was looking for the bad, the savage, the worst. A race was judged by its worst deeds. The worst of which it was capable.

And she wished she had not been the one to see.

Her eyes strayed to a title she had almost passed over in her distraction. And she pulled it from the shelf. A thin volume.

She blew the powdered grime from the cover, and ran her fingers over what had once been a title written in embossed gilt. This had at one time been a treasured and valued book. Now the writing on the cover was worn and only vague traces of golden leaf remained.

Mya stood for a moment and ran her palm over the cover, thinking about a time when this book would have been revered and cared for as a treasured friend.

Sighing at the changes time and progress wrought to all things, she opened the pages and began to skim through indexes and headings, before moving on to individual chapters. Her eyes read words that she doubted had seen any daylight for many, many decades. The printing was faded but still decipherable, and, after reading through carefully, she knew that she had what she had come to find.

But, if what she had read was true, it would not be easy to put things right.

**********

‘It is an ancient ritual,’ Mya explained quietly, looking from one person to another. They were a strange group, drawn together she sensed by their collective concern for the man who lay on the hospital gurney. Colonel O’Neill: the man she had all so unwittingly brought so low. ‘I do not believe it has been performed for many hundreds of years.’

‘But you think it’ll work?’ Major Carter’s voice held enough concern for all the people in the infirmary.

Mya shook her head. ‘I have no way of knowing if the procedure will be successful. It has never, to my knowledge, been performed on people who are not from my home planet.’

The doctor, Janet Fraiser, looked up from where she was attaching monitors to the Colonel. ‘I’ll be checking his heart rate and blood pressure.’ Mya sensed Fraiser’s frustration at her own inability to help her patient.

Mya nodded. ‘I consider that wise, but, once things begin, it may be very difficult to stop them without seriously impairing the Colonel and whoever undertakes the link.’

‘Tell us about this procedure, please,’ ordered the leader of the facility, General Hammond. In him, also, Mya sensed a deep bond to the Colonel; an almost paternal concern that she felt sure must be beyond the normal relationship between comrades-in-arms.

She was struggling to reconcile what she was learning of the affection all these people had for the Colonel and what she had seen in his mind. Did they know what he had suffered? Did they know the distasteful things he had done? How could they, and yet still respect him as they appeared to do? Or were such things truly commonplace on this planet? Would she find similar horrors in all their minds?

They frightened her, these Earth people. And yet she was impressed by their closeness, and affection for each other.

They had also offered no threat to her, and she sensed no desire to do so, even though she had caused such distress to their friend and also possessed abilities she knew they would also like to possess.

She dragged her own mind back to the task in hand, and began to explain. ‘The texts tell of a method whereby another person may enter the damaged mind, and lead it back to the light. That is how it is described. Nothing more. In the days when this was done more commonly no more would have been needed to be said. But the ritual has died out, and there is some . . . ‘ she paused, and looked from face to face.

‘Some . . . ?’ Hammond prompted.

Mya struggled to find a suitable phrase. ‘There is some . . . ambiguity . . . about . . . how . . . certain things . . . were done.’ Her hesitancy spread concern through the others.

‘This procedure you advocate,’ Teal’c questioned carefully, ‘it carries a high level of risk?’

Mya sighed. ‘Yes, it does.’

‘Then I ask that I be the one to undertake it.’ His calm resonant voice carried no doubts or fears.

Mya shook her head. ‘I am sorry. I am sure, from what I have read, that the person attempting the link must be of the same race as the one who is afflicted. You are . . . ‘ she paused at the unfamiliar word, ‘ . . . Jaffa. The Colonel is not. The person must also be of the same gender.’

Eyes turned.

‘Ah . . . then, . . . that would be me . . . I suppose?’ Daniel’s voice was only slightly unsteady.

‘If you agree,’ Hammond said in a carefully neutral tone.

A sob from the bed behind them reminded them that O’Neill was in desperate need of something to be done as quickly as possible. Hugging his arms around himself, his whole body was wracked by uncontrollable shaking. His breathing was a sobbing cry for relief from the inner pain, and it was obvious to all those standing by that he was suffering almost beyond his considerable powers of endurance.

Mya could feel nothing but desperate guilt for what she had unwittingly caused. This man, despite everything, inspired a fierce and protective loyalty amongst those who knew him. Mya looked from face to face. The General, the Doctor, and the Colonel’s team-mates. And wondered again, how much did they know of what she had seen? Of what the Colonel held inside. She had promised herself that she would refrain from any further meddling in the minds of these people, so she could not even begin to seek the answers she craved.

She had been told that the Colonel was not a person to share things of a personal nature, Daniel had said he was a ‘very private person’, and her other glimpses of the Colonel’s character had revealed that he was fiercely protective of his past and his personal life, so she could only speculate that perhaps they knew much less than she had been bitterly witness to.

Therefore, she could only ponder on how much they really knew.

*Really* knew.

She shuddered.

*******************

Part 4

Janet Fraiser closed her eyes a moment before saying, ‘I’ve given him as much morphine as I dare. Now I’ve added a Versed drip to try and calm him, but as you can see it’s made no real difference.’

‘Will the medication affect what we’re going to try and do?’ Hammond asked.

Mya shook her head. ‘I have no way of knowing. But as it does not appear to be helping I suspect that we must continue, otherwise we may lose your Colonel to the forces that are acting on his mind. I suspect that, as the ancient writings tell us happened sometimes, the forces unleashed are ones that your Colonel has tried to suppress. Certain . . . boundaries . . . have been crossed and his mind is being overwhelmed by things he doesn’t wish to remember. We must chance the drugs.’

Daniel moved over to his friend’s side.

‘Jack?’ His voice was tender as if talking to a newborn child. ‘Jack? If you can hear me, we’re going to help you. You just have to hold on a little while longer.’ And turning with a spirit of determination that shone in his eyes, he looked at Mya. ‘What do we do?’

Fraiser saw Sam, almost lost in the shadows, relax the tension in her hands which were wrapped protectively about her body. And she was peripherally aware that Teal’c had eased his shoulders down half a millimetre - a huge expression of feeling on the big man’s part.

Watching the alien visitor Fraiser found she did not have to be telepathic to read the thoughts running through the quietly spoken woman’s mind. There was respect at the determination in Daniel’s eyes as he prepared to help his friend, and something akin to envy that these two men had a close friendship which was based on trust, and not the fact that your companion could read telepathically anything they chose to in your mind.

Fraiser had learned that Mya’s people had lost the ability to truly close off their minds from each other, and although it meant that crimes and domestic betrayal were almost entirely unheard of in her society, Mya had admitted that she often wondered what it might be like to know that others could not invade her mind at will if they so chose.

‘You do not know what you will see?’ Mya’s voice was uncertain, as if she couldn’t prevent herself asking, and Fraiser saw sparks of doubt glitter in Daniel’s eyes.

Then, recovering himself, he shook his head. ‘No. No idea.’ His gaze searched Mya’s face. ‘You do.’

Slowly, and with seeming reluctant hesitation she nodded. ‘I have some idea, yes.’

‘Jack is my friend, Mya. It doesn’t matter.’ Daniel looked around at the others in the room. ‘We know that he’s never been entirely honest with us about his past. But,’ he looked at her with determination, ‘I can do this.’

‘What if you . . . see something that is . . . so horrible you cannot cope with it? Something that makes you think of your friend in a different way?’

Fraiser saw Daniel pause. Saw him think for the first time about what this really entailed. Being able to see into the private thoughts of someone who was unable to give their permission. But more than that: to be able to see the deeply intimate thoughts of a man known for his barbed wire defence systems.

‘I’ll deal with that if it happens,’ Daniel said, slowly. ‘Actually, Jack’s the one who’s more likely to have the more serious issues with this; because he hates talking about anything personal. He could get pretty mad about it all.’

Mya switched her gaze to the man who lay in such agony, and after a moment’s contemplation said, slowly, ‘Is it right, then, to allow this to go ahead without trying to tell him? What I do may destroy your friendship. I . . . would not wish that.’

It was as if everyone in the room held their breath. Fraiser felt the weight of the decisions being taken in front of her. Medically it appeared that there was little she could do and that was galling. It seemed that everything hinged on the extreme remedy Mya was proposing, and Daniel Jackson’s wits, determination and courage.

‘We should try to get Jack’s permission,’ Sam dropped the words quietly into the pool of silence.

‘Janet?’ Daniel questioned.

Fraiser felt all eyes switch to her. Caught slightly off guard, she gave herself a moment to consider things by appearing to carefully check the morphine and Versed dosages being administered through the IV drip she had managed to place in the back of O’Neill’s hand. But, really, there was no choice in the answer to be given. Ethically, morally and with all good conscience it was only right and proper that they try and seek the Colonel’s agreement to what was going to happen. She was just rather ticked that the suggestion had been Mya’s and Sam’s. O’Neill was her patient and she should have thought to raise the point. Particularly as, having the access to his medical files that she had, she knew a great deal more about his history and what Daniel was likely to witness than most of the others present.

‘We can try,’ she agreed.

‘Do you think he hear us?’ Daniel’s voice quivered with his barely suppressed concern.

Janet finished taping down the IV, then found her hand easing itself, seemingly unconsciously, along his hairline as she brushed back the strands of sweat-beaded grey hair, leaving it childishly spiked in what would, in another situation, have been attractive disorder. Here it somehow served only to heighten his vulnerability.

‘I don’t know,’ she replied as O’Neill appeared to show no comforting response to her gentle touch. If anything he whimpered more at the contact, as if it caused him pain.

Eyes looked to Mya, their questioning like knives to slice open her conscience.

‘I don’t know either,’ she answered. Her haunted eyes found Janet’s and the two women shared a soul-deep, bitter wish that they could reassure and offer comfort. But neither could.

Daniel stepped forward. ‘Jack?’ He rested his hand on his friend’s shoulder in a moving gesture of comfort and support. When there was no immediate response from the prone figure, not even a twin of the whimper Fraiser’s own touch had elicited, he looked up in uncertainty.

Janet nodded quickly in encouragement.

‘Jack?’ Daniel tried again. ‘Can you hear me?’

Jack’s body spasmed under his friend’s hand. But it was unclear to any of the watchers whether that was because he was trying to answer, or whether he was simply responding to the painful stimuli that were wracking his mind and body.

Daniel tried again, moving his taut face closer this time. ‘Jack?’ His voice was getting more insistent.

‘He hasn’t seemed to have heard or understood anything for some considerable while,’ Carter observed.

‘It’s possible that he can’t hear us,’ Fraiser informed them, watching her patient with concern. ‘It may also be possible that he can’t coordinate a coherent response but that, subconsciously, he *can* hear us. Try and explain what’s going to happen, Daniel. Even if you get no apparent reaction, he may understand you on some level.’

Daniel drew a deep breath, and nodded.

‘Jack?’ His voice was hoarse with emotion, as if he was scraping words past bone-dry vocal chords. ‘I don’t know if you can hear me,’ his voice faltered, and he looked up. Janet saw tears in his eyes.

Carter stepped forward and rested a gentle hand of support against Daniel’s shoulder.

‘Sir?’ She took over communication duties. ‘Sir? It’s Carter.’

There was still no obvious reaction from the man on the bed.

‘We’re going to try and help you, sir. Daniel’s going to,’ she paused and looked at Mya, as if for inspiration, before continuing, ‘Daniel’s going to seem as if he’s in your . . . inside . . . your . . . head, sir. That’s to help you.’

Janet watched Sam’s seemingly futile attempts to communicate with O’Neill and then found herself looking defiantly at Mya. Somehow, it was incredibly important that the woman should sense the tension that radiated from everyone. That she understand how much they all cared for the Colonel.

And how much his approval and acceptance of what they were going to do mattered to them.

‘Sir?’ Carter continued. ‘We all think this is the only way. Can you hear me?’

Still there was no obvious reaction.

Gently, Carter reached down and took one of the slender hands that was clenched tight in pain. With care she persuaded the fingers to uncurl and then recurl around her own much smaller hand. She gasped as O’Neill convulsed in pain, and his grip tightened viciously, and then she ran her thumb in circling reassurance across the back of O’Neill’s hand.

‘Sir? We want to try this, but it means Daniel’s going to be . . . inside your head.’ There was real anxiety now. They could all hear its underlying current in Carter’s voice, as she repeated more steadily, ‘Sir? Daniel’s going to be inside your head. But we don’t know any other way to help you. Are you . . . ‘ her voice tailed away before she regathered herself. ‘Sir? Are you . . . prepared . . . for that?’

There was no answer except a sob from O’Neill. Which could have been a reply. Or simply a reaction to pain. And, although Carter tried several more times, there was no further obvious answer, or sound that could be interpreted as permission.

*************

‘Major, I think we’ve done the best that we can do to gain the Colonel’s permission. He’ll either be aware of what we’re going to do, or he won’t be. Either way, I don’t think we have any further choice.’ Hammond’s voice was gentle but firm. He was the senior officer and he was quietly taking control and responsibility.

Carter looked strained, but at the General’s words she released her hand from O’Neill’s grasp as gently as she could and stepped back from the gurney a fraction.

Teal’c bowed his head in agreement, saying nothing.

Daniel turned to Mya in determination. ‘It’s the only way. We have to do this.’

And Mya envied the Colonel his friends, who wanted so very desperately to help him. She could only hope that, when everything was over, he would overcome any barriers he might feel about what they were about to do.

She had seen into his mind.

He was not a man she would wish to be her enemy.

‘You must understand that what you see will be confusing, because it will not be your own memories that you are experiencing?’ Mya watched Daniel intently, looking for any sign of hesitation. ‘You will have no control over what happens in the sense of what you see, but it is up to you to bring your friend back. You will have to close the doors to the upsets in his mind that I have, regrettably, opened.’

‘How?’ Daniel’s voice trembled just fractionally.

‘You will have to let your feelings and senses guide you, and use them to help *you* guide your friend, and help him take control of his own thoughts. He needs someone to be with him to give him valuable support, and then to lead him out of the turmoil of memories in his mind. At present I believe he is experiencing more than he can cope with.’ Mya smiled reassuringly, but with an essence of true sadness. ‘This is a journey that has not been needed by our people for a very long time. What we are attempting is merely described in one of our very oldest texts. There is nothing more that I can say. I only pray that what we do will help your leader.’

Daniel looked down at the body of his friend. He could hear Jack’s ragged breaths. Each one seeming to plead with him for relief from this never-ending, all-consuming pain.

And yet, as he stood there, a sliver of selfish doubt speared his mind. He couldn’t help it, and would probably not have been human had it not splintered his resolve for a moment.

What would all this mean to him? He knew he wanted to follow through with it. He knew that he wouldn’t back out. And yet . . .

‘Mya?’

She looked at him with those strangely depthless and non-judgemental eyes that he was beginning to find disconcerting.

‘I do not know.’

Daniel took a step back, and Mya smiled fractionally. ‘I need no special powers to read your mind. Your uncertainty is natural. I cannot offer you complete reassurance.’

‘Oh.’ Daniel winced a little.

‘There are, however, no records of the person completing your part of the task being harmed in any way.’

Which was reassuring, Daniel supposed, until he realised that what was happening to Jack wasn’t meant to be happening either.

But . . . his friend needed him. Probably more than he’d ever needed him before. And friends were there to do the difficult stuff. That was *why* they were friends.

There were elements that had become accepted parts of Daniel’s and Jack’s relationship over the years: exchanging banter about whether things were rocks or artefacts; being companionable over a cup of early morning coffee; snarking at each other about how much, or how little, Jack claimed he’d understood of anything Daniel had been talking about. And yet, beneath it all, there ran a thread of pure shining steel. Of a friendship forged between a man who had faced danger his entire adult life. And one who had had to learn, at the tutelage of the other, that he could face it.

Daniel knew, beyond any doubt, that if the roles were now reversed Jack would be there for him. No matter the risks. Which was another difference between them. Jack lacked, or was able to control, any thoughts of personal consequences when he went into action. Daniel’s imagination went into absolute hyper-drive.

As now.

Would he end up as Jack was? Crippled beyond imagining by an uncontrollable pain? Lost in a mind that was apparently being consumed from within. Would he just become lost in *Jack’s* consciousness, and lose his own identity completely? Possibly forever.

Daniel felt waves of inadequacy and worry sweep over him.

Stop panicking, Jackson, that’s the last thing that Jack needs you to do right now.

He took a steadying breath. Jack needed him. There was *no one* else. This was the most important thing he had *ever* been called upon to do in the name of friendship. He *had* to do it. *Had to*. Despite his worries. Despite his fears.

Looking helplessly from O’Neill to Mya, he nodded. ‘Okay.’ He knew his voice wavered just a fraction. Couldn’t help it. He drew himself together again with a soul-deep effort. ‘Let’s do it, and hope that I can work out what I need to do as I go along.’

Once those words had been spoken, he felt as if a huge burden had been lifted from his shoulders. The decision was made. He was doing something positive, and something, anything, was better than just watching Jack suffer without being able to offer any hope or comfort.

He felt Sam’s hand touch his shoulder once more in support, and he looked down at it, as if to draw from her every speck of courage he could. Then found himself looking at Teal’c, who inclined his head in a gesture of approval that made Daniel glow.

‘You must lie down next to your friend,’ Mya said quietly.

Two beds were pushed hastily together, and, after removing his glasses, Daniel did as he was bidden, wondering if he was supposed to make a flippant comment. Doubtless Jack would have thought of something suitably pithy if their situations had been reversed. Something about drawing the line at friendship, or some such quip. Which simply made Daniel wish more than ever that this would be successful, so that he could at least hear Jack make *any* sort of quip in the future.

‘You must hold his hand.’

Refusing to go any further down the road of weird thoughts, Daniel merely did as he was told.

O’Neill’s muscles, tendons and ligaments were stretched so tightly, as if suffering extreme torture, that it was difficult, at first, to manipulate one of his hands so that Mya could guide it to one of Daniel’s. But once the hands met, Daniel felt Jack grip his like a drowning man who has found something he blindly recognises might save him. The hold was vice-like, and momentarily hurt the younger man, before it was lost as O’Neill suddenly twisted in anguish and his hands splayed wide, as did his eyes so that they protruded from his head, while his mouth pulled in a rictus of pain.

His cry was beyond human; beyond anything Jack O’Neill would have uttered if he were in control of himself. It was a purely primitive response to an uncontrollable agony, which continued as he then drove the heels of his hands into his forehead as his eyes screwed up tightly. His back arched as if someone had driven an electric current up his spine, and his feet scrabbled against the bed covers.

It was a desperately long time before his cries of anguish became sobs, which then slowly subsided. But Jack continued to hammer his hands into his brow, as if attempting to pound out what was causing him so much suffering.

And the helpless watchers could only stand in horrified sympathy as Fraiser tried unsuccessfully to calm him.

Mya moved closer, waiting until O’Neill had finally collapsed back onto the bed, drained by this latest emotional and physical overload. Then, seizing her moment, she bound one of Daniel’s hands to one of Jack’s.

‘I must do this because if the contact is broken at a vital time by either of you your friend will lose your presence and will be lost again, and if that happens we may not be able to retrieve him. Please grip his hand once more.’

As he lay back, with sweaty palms and his heart pounding Daniel heard Mya begin to speak quietly, hypnotically, and felt her touch his temple. Gradually her words became more distant, and he found himself drifting, like someone half asleep. His eyelids were heavy, his vision blurred and indistinct. He had a strangely disorientated feeling of slipping away; of falling gently, as if weightless. Perhaps this was how it felt to be floating free in space.

And he was not afraid.

Despite being completely unsure about what to expect.

Part 5

Daniel had had some fanciful idea about there being suitcases scattered carelessly about, with their lids thrown open, and their contents, a lifetime’s store of images, floating about in the sort of puffed-out thought-clouds usually seen over the heads of characters in comic books; or, alternatively, he had imagined Keep Out road block signs lying flattened by hoards of out-of-control, rampaging pictures that would be rioting in front of his eyes.

And darkness. Somehow he’d imagined darkness.

When he finally opened his eyes, he was overcome by a sense of wildly colourful disorder.

A kaleidoscope of uncontrolled images swirled in front of him. Like the most dramatic canvas of modern art where paint had been splashed in a seemingly random display. And Daniel was falling through a maelstrom of colour and confusion. In some ways it resembled the tunnelled turmoil he experienced during Stargate travel. But this was a much more vivid vortex, and the sensations were much more dazzling and dramatic, and . . . painful.

There were snatches of things that were recognisable amongst what was otherwise a totally incomprehensible visual cacophony.

A face with an expression of panic and pain. But not a face that Daniel recognised, or had time to remember clearly, because it was swept away in the storm.

Sand.

Jungle.

Mountains.

All came and went in briefly snatched scenes as if projected on to a backdrop for fractions of seconds, and then replaced at lightning speed. Daniel felt sick with the disorientation. The instability.

And the noise. He hadn’t expected noise. But there was noise. Incredible noise. Like thunder. Booming, like the echoing reverberations of bombs exploding far too close by for comfort, accompanied by what sounded like the deadly spit and shriek of shells as they travelled their deadly course. All of which played over an horrific background track of screams of agony and cries of haunting desperation.

And there was pain that gradually bled into Daniel’s consciousness.

Pain, that eventually lanced through every part of his body. As if he was being whipped, zatted, shot with a staff weapon and God alone knew what else, all simultaneously.

And Daniel screamed.

And screamed.

And screamed.

In pain.

And gut-wrenching fear.

And stomach twisting panic.

If this was what Jack had been experiencing for hours no wonder he had been pounding his head, arching his back, twisting and writhing.

The man had to be in total, seventh-pit-of-Hell agony.

***********

Struggling for any sort of equilibrium Daniel tried hard to regain some control of his mind and body.

He had an advantage over Jack. He had been prepared for something of an emotional overload. And he was all but certain that two minds would prove better than one in combating this horror they were confronted with. Jack had been enduring seemingly increasing volumes of this horrendous mental traffic for hours and hours.

Alone.

And so, without doubt and understandably, his will to resist had been weakened.

Daniel, however, had the resilience of freshness to the battle.

And by all he held dear he was going to use any advantage he could.

He closed his eyes to the swirling turmoil. Shut his ears to the savage noises. He had to. Otherwise he knew he was going to vomit. Here, inside Jack’s head, or back on his bed in the infirmary, he wasn’t certain. He was unsure now where his true reality existed. If he was twisting and writhing here, did that mean his body would be reacting in the same manner in front of the eyes of his friends in the SGC? Or was it all merely in his imagination? Or Jack’s?

Daniel struggled hard to divorce his two possible existences; he tried to find some trace of both, a duality which would suggest that he was present in two places at the same time, but he couldn’t. What was happening to him inside Jack’s head was the only truth he could find. What was happening to his body in the Infirmary was lost to him.

However, the exercise of trying to sense his two selves served a useful purpose: he found he was somewhat steadier because he was concentrating on something other than the universal horror occurring around him. However, when he relaxed the more he twisted and turned in the uncontrollable current within which he appeared to be caught. Like Dorothy’s house being swept away in the tornado, Jack would say.

‘Think,’ Daniel told himself desperately. ‘There has to be a way to stop this. Think.’

Eventually, ‘Jack?’ he called out, not knowing what else to do.

At first nothing seemed to happen. Everything continued to spin around sickeningly. He kept peeking through grimacingly slitted eyes to check if things showed signs of improvement, but the tornado showed no sign of abating.

He resorted to shouting. ‘*Jack*!’

And felt his lungs exploding with the effort of trying to be heard over the storm, by a man who might be beyond hearing. Dismissing such negativity, Daniel tried again. And again. Calling Jack’s name over and over. And every now and then he squinted an eye open to see if he was having any effect.

‘Come on, Jack. Listen to me!’ He screamed in desperation. And continued to repeat the word Jack. Eventually he resorted to trying different tonal variations of his friend’s name, and even accompanying phrases from all the twenty-three languages he was familiar with, to keep himself going.

It seemed to go on forever.

And his voice was worn down.

His spirit wilting.

Bowed down by thoughts.

That he had failed at the very first test.

He was sobbing Jack’s name, simply because frustration, desperation and despair were consuming him, when he became aware that, slowly, the swirling whirlpool seemed to be settling, the noise slowly ebbing to an acceptable level, and the pain diminishing to a point where, although Daniel ached, it was bearable. And, as things improved, the fantastically disordered visual canvas began to make more sense.

There were images of the Stargate, bloodied and battered faces writ large with fear, Replicators, Hathor, soldiers, a square-jawed face Daniel didn’t recognise, Apophis, tanks, planes, a dark and threatening room, a face exploding in a fountain of blood, Kawalsky, a troop of men moving away in the distance, an unshaven man waving a half empty bottle of whiskey, men falling - mown down by bullets in a swathe of death, a young blood-smeared boy lying still on a hospital gurney . . . and so much more.

Visions and feelings of death.

Destruction.

Desperation.

Despair.

All running into each other like smeared paint, so that the edges were blurred and uncertain.

Daniel felt almost overwhelmed by the smothering blanket of painful emotions. God, no wonder Mya had been repulsed.

Daniel had sensed such calm in her and her race. Nothing could have prepared her to face the experiences of a man who, in his life, had had to deal with more than his fair share of haunting situations.

Disgust, horror, shame, humiliation and a deep seated self-loathing, all existed in a choking smog inside O’Neill’s head.

This must be what Mya had been trying to warn him about.

Digging deep inside himself Daniel drew his own shattered feelings together. He *knew* Jack O’Neill. He *knew* the man, the person, behind all this dreadful evidence.

Mya had convicted his friend without fully knowing or understanding the facts; or knowing the man. And, now, Daniel could appreciate, why she had done so.

Christ, Jack.

Daniel was finding it hard to concentrate.

He found his mind shying away from what he was seeing, like a horse wanting to turn and bolt from a raging fire.

The mire of emotional detritus shocked him. He’d always known that Jack carried more than his fair share of emotional mess around inside his head.

And these glimpses were a tantalising yet repulsive taster. Somehow, like a young child drawn with intrigue to a violent movie he had been specifically banned from watching, Daniel wondered if he would get to see more than just the disorientation. If he would *truly* get to experience Jack’s life. See what it was that Jack felt was so bad that he rarely ever mentioned his past.

Despite the nausea grasping him, Daniel began trying to catalogue the evidence. There was so much passing before his eyes in a seemingly random scattering of thousands of photographs, thrown into the air and held there in an invisible updraft, creating a confusing gallery depicting Jack’s life, displayed in no apparent order.

And the images were unpleasant. Beyond unpleasant.

Daniel tried to pluck them from the air. Hold on to one. Any one. But he couldn’t. They continued to swirl. To spiral. To twist and turn. Just out of reach. With the exasperating elusiveness of a forgotten name to a familiar face.

Daniel recalled Mya’s words. It was up to him to work this out. Up to him to help Jack. Up to him to bring order to the chaos of images.

He concentrated hard, and tried once again to sense Jack through all the confusion. Tried hard to find something of his friend. Something to touch. Something to hold on to. To grasp tight. That would help him lead Jack out of this world of painful memories.

‘Come on, Jack. Help me out, here,’ he pleaded.

And somehow, through everything, he felt something reach out. Felt a thread of something that was fractionally more real than the ghostly images that swirled about him.

‘Jack?’

It was disconcerting. Was he there or not? Could he sense Daniel in his own mind?

Was Daniel imagining it?

‘I’m here to help, Jack,’ Daniel tried. It seemed so strange to be speaking to someone he couldn’t see. Speaking to someone whose head he believed he was exploring. If this was all going to turn out to be some very weird dream, Daniel decided that now was the time to wake up.

He didn’t wake up.

Okay, here goes nothing.

‘Jack? I need your help!’

If anything was going to get his friend’s attention it was going to be that statement. Daniel knew that anyone on Jack’s team asking for his help was guaranteed a response. It was just the way he was.

‘I need some more order here, Jack,’ Daniel tried.

He didn’t know what else to say. Wasn’t sure what else to try. There was no artefact to translate in order to unlock the code he needed, there was nothing concrete to hold on to. This was all make-it-up-as-you-go-along stuff. Fly by the seat of your pants stuff.

The sort of thing Daniel Jackson didn’t like very much. He liked things to be structured, obeying rules, like any language he had studied. He liked to understand things through a comprehension of underlying patterns.

The sorts of things he would soak up like a dry sponge takes in water.

And, somehow, losing himself in all that study and investigation meant that often any focus on the present, and what was actually happening at the time, was like the world when he took off his glasses. Indistinct. Lost.

He needed Jack O’Neill to watch his six. He needed Jack O’Neill to push his head into the dirt when the shooting started unexpectedly. He’d got better over the years, but he still felt safer knowing that Jack was there. Paying no attention to the millennia-old evidence Daniel was paying attention to but, instead, concentrating hard on the happening-right-now, may-be-threatening evidence Daniel was useless at concentrating on.

But here, right *here* and now, there were no books. There was no previous research. There might be an underlying pattern, but Daniel had yet to find it. And he could not get lost in the fog. He had to stay in the here-and-now. Because if he needed to hit the dirt the only person who could shove his head down was Daniel himself. And he was going to have to improvise. Use his smarts, as Jack would say.

He needed help. He needed Jack. That much he knew. But, more importantly, Jack needed him.

The man was annoyance personified. Had reclassified the extreme boundaries of sarcasm and cynicism. Required a translation code all of his own, and was still in many ways a closed book.

In other ways he was as easy to read as a smack to the jaw.

Daniel didn’t know what he was going to do if shouting for Jack’s help failed.

So he continued to call out the phrase ‘I need your help, Jack,’ until his voice ran dry.

And even then he carried on. Hoping against hope that there would be a recognisable response. And all the time he felt the worry pile up inside.

So it was with a sense of something beyond the realms of thankfulness that he gradually became aware of the pictures becoming even calmer, to the extent that the individual images that had begun to take shape, started to organise themselves into a much more ordered commentary, before Daniel’s eyes. Each scene became distinct and clear in its own right, no longer running in a furious blurring from the scene before, and then frantically losing itself in a frenzied smearing in the one following.

Inexplicably, it appeared he had helped. He had somehow caused the tidal wave to recede a fraction and leave traces of comprehensible debris on the beach. Images. Pictures. Scenes. Faces. That steadied, and stayed.

He had to believe that it was all happening because he was there. Because Mya really knew what she was about. That his presence had helped Jack take some sort of control.

Come on, Jack. Where are you?

Daniel searched urgently for greater tangible evidence of his friend in the morass of mental flotsam and jetsam.

But couldn’t find it.

*******

Sam watched Daniel seem to spasm and twist on the gurney. It was a good thing that Mya had tied the two men’s hands together, because otherwise contact would have been lost very early on. Daniel tried to swing his arms wide, taking Jack’s tied hand with him. His body arched and twisted as if he were caught in an unseen current. She moved to hold him down, but Mya restrained her.

‘Leave him for the moment,’ she said, quietly. ‘I believe he is trying to find his way. To seek out his friend. An outside touch might disturb what is happening. We should just ensure that they don’t fall and injure themselves, but other than that the texts say we should not interfere.’

Mya’s eyes shone with sympathy as she looked at the other woman. ‘I sense your pain. I understand that they mean a great deal to you. I can only say, again, that I am sorry for what I have caused.’

Sam nodded and together the two stood shoulder to shoulder. Teal’c remained behind them in a corner radiating support for all. And, after a long, long while, which seemed to exhaust all the watchers, both Daniel and Jack calmed and lay still on the gurney, their shoulders gently coming to rest against each other, and, as if sensing that he was no longer alone, Jack shifted his position, and turned his face into Jackson’s shoulder. For those on the outside, watching and praying, there was a visible tightening of the joined hands.

And so they lay, side by side, Jackson on his back O’Neill half on one side, tied together at the hand, and also touching, cheek to shoulder. And to the concerned watchers it seemed as if they were sleeping, as, for the first time in a long while, Jack O’Neill’s breathing lost its strained and ragged pattern, and eased out into something akin to a regular rhythm.

Hammond sighed and left to check that all was well elsewhere on the base. Janet stayed for longer monitoring breathing and heart rates, but then, reluctantly, she too left to administer to other patients.

So it was left to what remained of SG-1, and Mya, to guard over the two men who lay together. Lost to those who watched, yet appearing much more at peace than they had been.

And Sam began to hope. Standing and watching, and helpless to do anything more practical, she prayed.

********

Feeling sick and disorientated, Daniel had no idea where he was. He had cried out Jack’s name for so long he was drained almost beyond exhaustion.

And somehow, without seeing him, he sensed Jack. If only in spirit. A spirit that was elusive and lost across the shattering battlefield of memories that separated them. Daniel had struggled to see his friend, but he couldn’t.

So, for what seemed an eternity Daniel did nothing but stand and call out to Jack, and think positive and encouraging thoughts. Hoping that something, *anything*, of what he was feeling would transmit itself, somehow, to his friend.

And, slowly, tentatively, Jack’s hand seemed to reach for Daniel’s elbow, gripping his clothing tightly. Daniel had no idea if it was happening for real, because he still didn’t seem able to actually see Jack, or whether he was imagining it. But it seemed to him that, with growing confidence, the hand slipped down until Jack had Daniel gripped tight by the wrist. And as that happened things became even steadier, and the commentary even more ordered.

And Daniel was to wish it hadn’t.

**********

Part 6

It would seem to be a mobile home. Daniel blinked and wondered how he’d gotten there.

Shaking his head in confusion, he tried to take in the surroundings, but found he had no real control over his movements. And he felt . . . shorter!

Which wasn’t surprising, as he caught a glimpse of himself in a broken and skewed mirror hanging on a wall. He was a kid. No . . . Jack . . . these were Jack’s memories . . . Jack . . . was a kid. And Daniel was a disconcerting mixture of passive spectator, yet somehow trapped within O’Neill’s mind and memories, and now, it seemed, his body as well. As if the clutching hand with which O’Neill had grasped his friend had somehow allowed their bodies to merge into one on a much more subconscious level than had previously been the case.

This is weird.

Very, very weird.

So now, Daniel saw both Jack and himself as one muss-haired kid of about ten years of age, wearing a striped t-shirt, a scruffy pair of jeans and scuffed sneakers. It was strange to remember that when he’d first met Jack O’Neill he’d had light brown coloured hair, just like the urchin in the mirror.

Daniel looked closer and decided that ‘urchin’ was a fairly apt description. And there was a disturbing colouring around his right eye. Daniel took in the rest of the young Jack’s world. There were bottles lying discarded like flotsam and a man carelessly sprawled across an unmade double bed. Jackson found himself studying the man. He was tall with prematurely grey hair, because he couldn’t be more than in his middle forties. His chin was stubbled and his clothes rumpled and unclean. A beer gut was easily distinguishable under a dirty white undershirt.

Rolling over, the man snorted and opened his eyes and Daniel was aware of a surprising feeling of fear hurriedly squashed. Not his feelings he hastened to remind himself. Not his . . . Jack’s.

A young Jack’s.

He watched the man’s eyes focus blearily on the boyish figure. Washed out bloodshot eyes that struggled to focus as they emerged from an alcoholic haze. Daniel could smell the stale odour of vomit and spilled whiskey.

‘Gemme a drink will ya, son?’ The voice was as drink sodden and as blurred as the eyes.

Daniel felt a thread of fear. ‘No, dad. You have to get up and get ready.’ There was a quiver in the voice. Instantly squashed. ‘You’ve that job interview today. Remember?’

‘Ah, forget it. I ain’t goin’. I feel like shit.’

‘You’ll feel better if you have some coffee, . . . and . . . we need the money.’ There was a long pause, and Daniel could feel a hot despair in the young Jack O’Neill. ‘Please, dad.’ A tone that Daniel had never heard from the adult O’Neill.

Pleading.

‘How the fuck can I go to an interview feeling like this? Piss off and look after your mother, I s’pect she’s sick somewhere.’

‘Mom’s sick, but she can’t help it, dad. You can.’

‘Piss off.’

The man rolled away, curling himself up into a foetal ball and pulling the torn blanket over the top of him, effectively shutting out his son. O’Neill stood and looked for a heart-breakingly long time. Daniel could feel the shame, despair, anger and helplessness warring inside his young mind. A mind that was already older than its years. Finally, realising further protestations were useless, Jack kicked at a scuff in the threadbare carpet, and, picking up a hockey puck from a shelf by the door, which he shoved into the back pocket of his jeans, he left. Only too well aware of the aching void in his heart where the love for his father should be.

This is beyond weird, Daniel found himself thinking. If I can feel everything Jack is feeling in these scenes then can he feel what I’m feeling, too?

He tried to halt the young O’Neill; tried to influence how he walked; experimented with trying to lift the boy’s arm. But found it impossible.

“Because these are but the shadows of the things that have been. They have no consciousness of us.”

If he remembered his ‘A Christmas Carol’ correctly.

Beyond weird.

Like scenes from a movie, slipping into each other in front of Daniel’s helpless eyes, O’Neill trekked off to school.

Once there, Jack wandered away alone to a far corner of the schoolyard. There, he found a long tree branch, which he used as a stick to push the puck, taken from his back jeans’ pocket, repeatedly against the nearby wall.

Harder and harder he worked, as Daniel felt helpless anger flow down the boy’s arms and into the stick.

Time and again he propelled the puck against the wall as a few cathartic, half-sobbed tears broke his defences and smeared his cheeks. Faster and faster he continued, until, exhausted, he collapsed down with his back leaning against the bricks, blinking hard to hold back further tears, and rubbing his hands across his face to erase evidence of his crying.

Uncaringly late, Jack wandered into class to be roundly censured and dismissed to detention. Which suited him fine. Sitting by himself, and simply shrugging when folks asked him why he behaved the way he did.

With subtle variations of incidental details several similar stories played themselves out.

Tentatively, ‘Dad . . . it’s Parents’ Conference Day tomorrow.’

‘Piss off. Your mom’ll go.’

‘But . . . dad . . . you know mom’s sick.’

‘Yeah. Well . . . I’ll be out with my buddies. Or, maybe,* I’ll* be sick, too.’

Cautiously, ‘Dad . . . I need two dollars to pay for the school trip.’

‘And where am I goin’ to get two dollars? Ask your mom.’

‘I did. She . . . doesn’t have any money.’

‘Well tough, then.’

Hopefully, ‘Dad . . . I got a place on the Little League team.’

‘So? Playing sports is just a waste of time.’

‘But . . . dad, I need a . . . I need a . . . uniform.’

‘And I need a drink. Where the hell am I gonna get money for a stupid Little League uniform?’

The themes became depressingly familiar: poverty, neglect, loneliness, and a growing self-reliance.

Daniel had never felt more helpless. He knew what a drifting childhood was like. He had been cut off from others because he was different, and so had O’Neill. But in a starkly dissimilar way.

Jack O’Neill was a boy who was learning to hide his thoughts and feelings in case they got stomped on. Who was learning to hide his thoughts and feelings in case people got intrusive. Because he had someone other than himself to consider. Because, besides a father who was prone to drink-induced rages, there was his mother. A woman who was weak and helpless in the face of her husband’s addiction and her own depression. A woman who was gradually, piece by piece, coming to rely more and more on the protection of her young son.

‘We’re a team, mom,’ Jack said, trying to smile. ‘Just you and me.’

‘Jacky,’ his mom said, looking fearfully beyond him towards the door through which a drunken, uncontrolled temper could return at any minute.

‘I won’t let him hurt you. I promise.’ The voice was shaky, but determined.

‘You’re a good boy, Jacky. Such a good boy. I don’t deserve you.’

‘Course you do, mom.’

‘No. No. I don’t. You’re such a good boy, Jacky. I don’t know what I’d do without you.’

‘It’s fine, mom,’ he said quietly, and stroked her greying hair while looking into her frightened eyes. ‘You know I’ll always be here for you.’

She smiled a pathetically grateful smile.

‘Thank you, Jacky.’

‘We could go away, Mom. Just you and me. Leave all this.’ He gestured at the disordered room, with its shabby curtains and war-wounded furniture. ‘We could find somewhere else. There’s got to be some place else. Better. And, maybe,’ he faltered, ‘maybe dad’ll get better and we can come back and be a family again.’

‘Oh, Jacky,’ her eyes watered. ‘I couldn’t. . . . I . . . wouldn’t know . . . where to start.’

‘I could sort it, mom. Find out stuff. I could do it.’

She shook her head, feebly. Defeated before she even got to the starting line. ‘It’s such a big thing, Jacky. I . . . I . . . just . . . don’t think I can cope with it right now. And it’s too much for you. You’re only young. I couldn’t ask you to sort out such a big thing . . . ‘ her voice tailed away, crushed beneath the weight of the despair that consumed her life.

‘I could try,’ he pushed again.

But she simply shook her head once more. ‘Maybe . . . maybe, one day.’

‘Sure, mom.’

‘Jacky!’ There was sudden fear in her voice as they both heard the door open and unpredictable brutality stagger in.

He saw her fear.

And her despair.

Her fragility.

And her helplessness.

And he picked up the heavy duty of guardianship.

Without a thought for the consequences to himself.

‘Where’d you get this?’ His dad snatched the dollar note from Jack’s hand.

‘Working.’

‘*Working!* You’re not old enough.’ His dad inspected the dollar bill as if he figured it must be counterfeit.

‘Old Man Jeffers needed his store sweeping and the shelves stacked.’

‘Oh, yeah? Well . . . I better look after this for ya.’

‘No!’

‘*No*?’ His dad exploded. ‘Did you just say “no” to me, boy?’

‘It’s my money! *I* earned it!’ Desperate pride and despair drove Jack beyond boundaries he didn’t usually cross, because he knew damned well where that dollar was going: straight over the counter at the nearest bar.

‘You saying “no” to me, boy?’ his dad repeated, more aggressively.

It was dangerous ground, but Jack forgot to tread with his normal care. ‘Yes! It’s my money! I earned it!’

‘Well, you best come take it then,’ his dad sneered.

And he tried. So help him, he tried. But his dad was too bulky and too heavy. And way too good with his fists.

So, in addition to losing his money, Jack gained a split lip and blackened eye.

But, as he bathed his face, Jack promised himself he’d do better next time: he’d hide the money more carefully and keep it out of his dad’s drink-stained hands.

It wasn’t easy, and the whole process became a running battle between the two of them.

Jack took on any cheap, exploitative employment at way-below-the-minimum-wage. He didn’t care what the jobs were. The meagre amounts of money on offer were all what counted. Small sums he used to improve things for his mom.

And all the time he struggled to ensure his dad didn’t find out he’d been working; or find the money; or find the little gifts he bought his mom.

And when he failed, fists flew. But Jack made sure it was never his mom who got hit. He perfected a fine line in smartass comments that angered and distracted his dad, and which made sure it was Jack who had to duck. With varying degrees of success depending on how sober, or otherwise, his dad was.

It was just the way things were.

It was just the way his life was.

But working late at night meant scraping by in school.

When he got to school.

Because having a split lip, black eye, or bruised face meant having time off.

And keeping up with his studies became harder and harder.

‘You’re under-achieving, O’Neill.’ The teacher slapped the assignment down on the desk with disdain. ‘This,’ he jabbed at it with his finger, as if poking at a dead rat on the highway with a stick, ‘was a waste of my time. And I *know* you’re capable of better. You’re just lazy.’

Jack looked past him, ignoring the slights. Merely shrugging dismissively.

‘Well, young man,’ the voice continued, laced with a scorn that shrivelled Jack inside his protective outer shell of bravado, ‘you might think it no great importance to fail an assignment, but when you fail to graduate, when you fail to do anything in the future except bum around from one dead-end job to another, maybe . . . just maybe . . . you’ll look back on moments like this and realise what a mess you’ve made of your life, and how different things could have been.’

Jack’s fingers reached out and pulled the thin assignment towards him; clearly labelled ‘Fail’ in red ink across the front. He closed his eyes, and tried to shut things out, as the sound of sniggers swept around the class. Shame burned through him, as it often did when his schoolwork, or lack of schoolwork, was denigrated; which it frequently was.

For years he’d just about been able to manage. Been able to get by because he had a few brain cells stored upstairs. But he had missed so much that it was gradually becoming impossible to keep up.

And he had more important things on his mind.

Like keeping everyone’s noses out of his business. If no one knew, then no one interfered. And it wasn’t himself he worried for. But if he wasn’t there, then who would look after his mom? Sure, there were homes for kids with ‘problem’ backgrounds. But he knew his mom would never find the strength to leave his dad. And if Jack wasn’t there to help her then who would get in the way when his dad was obliteratingly drunk and ready to hit out at his frail wife?

There would be nobody.

Go figure.

And so, time and again, Jack took the blows intended for his mother, then waited for his father to finally pass out before covering him with a blanket wherever he lay. Then he spent time comforting his mom before crawling off to tend to his own bruised face and battered body.

Alone.

And time and time again, when anyone asked, he brushed them aside.

‘Everything okay at home, O’Neill?’

‘Yes, sir. Thank you.’

‘You missed school last week.’

‘Yes, sir. I wasn’t well. My mom wrote a note.’

‘Hmm. You miss a lot of school through illness.’

‘Yes, sir. I’m sorry, sir.’

They didn’t give in.

‘Jonathan, that’s a nasty bruise on your arm.’

‘Yes, ma’am. I fell off my bike.’

He didn’t have a bike. But they didn’t know that. And he’d seen other kids fall off theirs.

He became very adept at side-stepping any personal issues at an instant’s notice.

‘O’Neill, concern has been raised by some of your teachers about the fact that you always seem very tired in class.’

‘Yes, sir. I’m sorry about that. It’s our neighbours, sir. They row a lot. All night sometimes.’

Good story, Jack. Keep them at arm’s length.

Sure you’re tired: working late; waiting up for your dad; guarding your mom. It’s tough.

But they don’t need to know about all the life lessons you’re learning.

No sirree yabetcha.

Else they’ll get involved.

And you don’t need that.

You can cope.

Cope with your drunken dad.

Cope for your depressed mom.

Cope with whatever life throws at you.

And through it all there was the core that Daniel recognised: the lack of personal sympathy and refusal to ask for another’s help that was the adult O’Neill’s trademark. Along with the ability to hide his feelings behind an impenetrable barrier.

It was just so bitterly and uncomfortably hard to learn how and why he had developed them.

A childhood sacrificed at the bar stool of his father’s alcohol addiction, and his mother’s inadequacy.

What was so startling, Daniel decided, was that Jack had all the character traits that his parents seemed to lack so spectacularly. And, yet, who could tell what his father might have made of his life if he had been able to climb out of the pit of alcoholism? Or what his mother might have achieved with a more supportive husband?

Daniel had wondered on many occasions about O’Neill’s childhood, a curiosity fostered by Jack’s singular determination not to talk about anything of a remotely personal nature, which had, in many ways, reminded Daniel of his own attitude.

And, he supposed, because he had never envisaged anything like this, it meant that Jack had done what he’d obviously set out to do: to survive, and camouflage his hurt from others.

Daniel had often wondered at a possible estrangement between a son and parents who had opposed his entering the military, or a divide brought about by some other family conflict. But *nothing* like what he was witnessing. And he could understand fully why Jack never referred to it.

Where Daniel had had a store of happy childhood recollections to sustain him through the bad times after his parents’ deaths, Jack appeared to have only a few memories of a woman’s tiredly fragile, and grateful smile.

To balance against the suddenly exploding violence.

There was fear, pain, despair, anger, and battered determination all swirling in a cauldron of emotions that bubbled and festered as more putrid ingredients were added to the mixture.

And Daniel couldn’t escape the fact that somehow he had to shut these memories off, but he had, as yet, no idea how to do so.

Somehow, it seemed that Daniel’s job was to experience the journey, and support his friend as much as he could and try to keep him on the track towards the finish.

Daniel wished that, just for a fraction of a second, he could step outside the experience and see if Jack had calmed down, if the fact that Daniel was there in his head with him was helping, even if he seemed unaware of his friend’s presence on any level that Daniel could detect.

Had he sensed Jack at his side holding first his elbow and then his wrist, back when he first started to be shown Jack’s childhood? It still wasn’t clear.

Determinedly divorcing his mind from the scenes he scrabbled for a grip with mental fingers at the cliff-face of existence beyond the film. And, with an effort that exhausted him, somehow he found a hold. And also felt the death-tight clutch of someone who was holding on to him for dear life.

And Daniel knew it had to be Jack, lost still in the wilderness of his own mind, but recognising enough to know that there was something there to help him. Something to which he must cling, or be swept away in the vicious sand-storm probably to be buried forever.

Part 7

‘Dad, you can’t!’ There was tearful anger in Jack’s voice as he squared up to his father. ‘It was grandpa’s.’

‘Who gives a fuck? What use is a cabin by a lake? We got no car to get there.’

‘Grandpa took me fishing there, dad.’

‘So what?’ There was disdain dripping from every syllable O’Neill senior uttered. ‘What use is fishing? Sitting by a lake all day, catching nothing. Waste of freakin’ time, ya ask me.’

‘It was grandpa’s.’

‘Yeah, it was. Well, he’s been dead an’ gone these past five years, and the place is sitting there doing nothing now. Dunno why I didn’t think of it before, sitting there doing nothing. Somebody’ll want it.’

‘*I* want it!’ Reaching for the purchase agreement his father held, Jack’s voice was as desperate as Daniel could ever remember hearing. ‘Mom wants it. It’s hers.’

‘Your mom don’t care one way or the other do ya, hon?’ He barely gave his wife, sitting in a corner watching the exchange between father and son, a second glance. Dismissing any opinion she might have had with a grunted, ‘What’s hers is mine, anyhow.’

‘Mom?’ The appeal in Jack’s voice was almost pitiful to hear. As was the weak look in his mother’s eyes as her glance flickered towards her son, then to the husband who dominated her life, before falling down to the folded hands in her lap.

‘I’m sure whatever your dad wants to do . . . is fine,’ she said, speaking down to her hands. Her voice barely audible.

‘Mom! No. It was grandpa’s. You’ve got to want to keep it.’

‘She said she don’t.’

‘No,’ Jack argued. ‘What she said was . . . ‘

His father cut in, ‘I don’t *care* what she said. She don’t want it. Do *you* want it?’ He poked the papers into his son’s chest. ‘Do ya? Eh? Do ya?’

Jack was wilting before his father’s aggression. But the desire to stand up to the larger man was rooted in his head. Alongside the desperate need to do something. And the words were out before Jack could stop them.

‘Yes. I’ll pay you. I’ll earn the money.’

And his father laughed. A loud, mocking, alcohol-fuelled, belly-laugh that scoured Jack’s young soul.

‘Oh, so ya *do* want to buy it! How much money ya got, huh? Do you know how much cabins cost, do ya? Do ya?’

Jack tried to be defiant, but it was hard in the face of his father’s scorn.

‘Come on! How much can you pay? Tell me how much cabins cost,’ his father said with a derisive tone.

‘I don’t know.’ It was almost inaudible. Jack’s courage was almost gone.

‘Huh? Speak up! Make me an offer if you want the damn place.’ His father stood there watching his son in disgust.

Tears welled up in Jack’s eyes, although as Daniel felt so close to tears himself, he didn’t know whose tears they truly were.

‘I…don’t…*know*!’ Jack’s voice broke on the last word as he tried to suck up tears, so his father wouldn’t know how close he was to crying. But, by the humiliation he felt, Daniel understood that Jack knew that his father knew anyway.

‘Here, then! Read it for yourself!’ O’Neill senior spat, as he drunkenly waved the purchase agreement in Jack’s face, the multiple copies flapping apart as some of them struck Jack near his eye.

The boy flinched and pulled his head back as his father let go of the form and the pages fluttered to the ground. His father stood back and watched sneeringly as Jack reached down to pick up the form, with its duplicates. Jack didn’t know how to understand it, and didn’t dare ask his father for help in translating the long important-looking words, but as he looked through it he saw a dollar sign and the typed words stating: five thousand.

Five thousand dollars! A ridiculous sum for a kid. Especially this kid, who had to use every cent he earned to feed himself and his mother. He couldn’t imagine ever owning that amount of money in his lifetime.

He’d certainly never benefit from such a large sum if his father succeeded in selling the cabin, as he knew it would be squandered away on drink in very short order.

He stood there for a long time with his head bent down staring at the form in his hand, which he could no longer see through the tears that blurred his vision.

‘Right, got the idea?’ his father pulled the papers roughly from Jack’s hand. ‘Waaaaay beyond ya.’

Pushing his son away the man snorted with disbelief. ‘What the freakin’ hell do *you* want with a cabin by a lake, anyway?’

‘For fishing.’ Jack’s voice was barely a whisper now.

‘You can’t fish!’

‘I can, so. Grandpa taught me the summer he took me up to there. You can’t sell the cabin. It’s . . .‘ Jack’s voice tailed off, as Daniel sensed a sweeping tide of something akin to embarrassment overtake the desperate despair that his father should not sell the fishing cabin.

‘It’s what?’ His father sneered.

‘Nothing.’ The voice was barely audible now.

‘Nah. Go on. Maybe I won’t sell it after all if it’s important enough. Who knows?’

Daniel could sense the lie, even if Jack couldn’t. But then, Daniel realised, Jack did sense it, but his forlorn hope that his father meant what he said over-rode his usual common sense.

‘It’s . . . beautiful.’ The words were barely whispered. Jack’s eyes were averted, as if he knew the response he would get, despite his wretched hope that his father would, once, just this once, live up to one of his son’s slender expectations. That in this one thing that Jack wished for, his father wouldn’t let him down.

‘*Beautiful*?’ The word was snorted in savage mockery. ‘What’re you? Soft? Queer or something? Beautiful, my ass.’ The last angrily scornful word was accompanied by an unexpected and vicious backhander across the side of his son’s head.

The blow made the boy stumble and, losing his balance, he fell into the wall and sprawled awkwardly to the floor. Fear gripped Jack’s stomach as he sat in collapsed shock, looking up at his father. A long way up from his vulnerable exposed position. His hand went slowly to his smarting face, and stunned tears of hurt and anger stung his eyes.

There didn’t seem to be anything to say. Nothing that wouldn’t aggravate his father further. And Jack was an out-matched marathon-runner slight to his father’s weight-lifter bulk. And although one day he hoped to be tall like his father, any growth spurt hadn’t happened yet and so, in addition to being slender, Jack was nowhere near his father’s just-past-six-foot height. Not even close.

If he stayed silent, looked defeated, maybe his father would go away. Leave him alone with his misery.

Maybe not.

‘What’s something *beautiful* sitting where we can’t take no advantage of it? Eh?’ A kick against Jack’s outstretched sneaker-covered foot accompanied the words. ‘What’s more use? A cabin. A *beautiful* cabin? Or money I can use? Lovely, beautiful *money*.’

Jack still said nothing, and merely tried to shuffle backwards away from his father’s abusive behaviour. But inside a hatred beyond anything Daniel had ever experienced welled up like sewage pulsing below a blockage.

Mixed in with all the festering emotions were stinging memories of a smiling elderly man sitting in a chair by a lake, fishing rod in hand. Talking to his grandson about his love of fishing, and his love of astronomy, and his long Air Force career. Memories that hurt even more because they were pleasant. But they were also painfully brief. Again there were rows, this time between the elderly man and O’Neill’s father. Watched by Jack. Then there were goodbyes.

Memories of all that grew, swelling in Jack’s mind like a boil. Until it burst. In an overspill of shattering emotions as his father poured scorn on the boy’s feelings for his grandpa, and fishing, and the cabin. And suddenly Daniel found the body he co-inhabited was springing upright, and fists were pummelling hard and a voice from a far distance sobbed, ‘I hate you! I hate you! I hate you!’

The bitter outpouring did Jack no good. His father was out of condition, but was far heavier than his willow-slender son. And was driven by a bullying instinct which was the product of too much alcohol.

Pushing Jack back against the wall, and using one hand to pin his son by one of his shoulders, O’Neill senior proceeded to slap his son back and forth across his face. Punctuating each blow with a syllable: ‘Don’t . . . you . . . hit . . . me . . . you . . . fuck . . . ing . . . lit . . . tle . . . shit . . . ‘

Jack’s lips split under the assault; his cheeks swelled, and the inside of his mouth cut against his teeth. Then, the sentence completed, Daniel felt Jack being lifted up and his father’s face shoved towards him so that the smell of stale body odour, alcohol, and long-since-smoked cigarettes became nauseatingly overpowering.

‘D’ya understand?’

These words were enforced viciously, as Jack’s shirt was taken in his father’s thick paws and used to shove the boy back hard against the wall. Pulled forward and then rapidly thrown backwards again, Jack was propelled back and forth like a rag doll as he began desperately to try and fight against his father’s hands with his own. Ineffectually searching for a grip Jack was overtaken by a swell of appalling fear as his back thumped hard against the wall, again and again and again.

Until his father seemed suddenly to lose interest and let go, so that Jack slid down the wall into a collapsed heap. Tears squeezing out from under closed eyelids.

And Daniel wanted so desperately to drag the boy into his arms, and tell him everything would be fine. That he had to hold on. That he would grow up strong and tall, and become someone who could leave all this trash behind. That one day he would wear the uniform of his country and walk through a Gateway that would allow him to have adventures beyond the wildest fantasies any child could dream of. That he would be a respected and highly thought of individual, who would prove time and again how brave and resourceful he was.

He tried saying it. Because reaching out and holding the young boy silently crying whilst his father scornfully opened another bottle of beer, and swigged down a long flush of liquid, was something that was beyond him. It seemed if he was to help Jack then his voice was the key. He couldn’t physically do anything. He was merely a spectator in Jack’s mind. Watching. Learning. And somehow he had to guide. Advise. Help. Offer support.

Somehow.

And so Daniel spoke long passionate sentences about the places that SG-1 had visited. About the Nox, and Thor, and the Replicators. Barely pausing for breath, he poured out feelings of encouragement. Trying to reach beyond the feelings of despair and worthlessness that overwhelmed the young boy. He had no idea if he was doing any good. But could only hope that if he continued then somehow he would help.

Jack crawled painfully into the bathroom after his father left, and cleaned his face. Bruises were already starting to show and there was a blood spilling from the split in his lower lip. There would be no going to school for a while.

Slumped with his back to the wall Jack looked at a flimsy, well-worn photograph; a slightly out-of-focus picture of a cabin by a lake and a tall, grey-haired elderly man holding a fishing pole. Jack ran his thumbs gently over the scene. It was gone. Like so many other things. Everything of value in his life disappeared. Usually a victim of his father’s ever-increasing craving for finances to fund his drinking.

But this . . . this one thing . . . mattered to him more than anything else, because it was inextricably linked to a man who hadn’t aimed his fists at him, hadn’t shouted abuse, and who hadn’t touched a drop of alcohol the entire time they were together at the cabin. And who had treated a boy starved of stability and thirsty for thoughtful attention with care and consideration. But whose influence in Jack’s young life had been as brief as one of his father’s passing fancies to forego alcohol.

It didn’t seem to matter what he wanted. What he wished for. He’d waited for some miracle to happen that would magic his mother and him away from all this misery. And now it was time to realise there wasn’t going to be one. And that wishes were for fools.

He looked at the photograph, and it was as if he was saying goodbye. Withdrawing. Leaving any remaining emotions behind. Slowly, sitting on the floor of the bathroom, Jack convinced himself he didn’t care. And that he would never care again. He gathered his shattered feelings, and, piece by broken piece, glued them back together again so that, unless anyone looked especially closely, they’d never know they’d been damaged. And no one looked. Because there was no one *to* look. Jack had made certain of that.

Daniel felt stinging tears that made the scene go hazy. It was so strange, to have his own feelings and emotions. To be able to cry. And to still be trapped inside Jack’s head. Daniel was certain that if he thought about it all too much his own head would explode.

But still the pictures continued.

Depicting the sorry tale of a son denied of the rich treasures of a supportive, loving home by the very people who should have allowed him to spread his wings and enjoy his childhood.

Daniel had carefully hoarded memories of parents who had been prone to disappear into an academic cocoon for days on end, but who would also take the time to explain and share their interests with their young son.

For Jack, there had been no relationship beyond avoiding his father’s drunken rages and acting as a prop for his depressed and emotionally fragile mother.

Asked to grow up far too quickly, Jack learned independence and self-reliance far, far too early.

In a harsher school than Daniel had ever imagined for his friend.

Eventually there was desolation, and yet hauntingly guilty thankfulness, at the ravaged, emaciated death of a father destroyed by a disease that ate him more quickly than the alcoholism was able to.

And then hopeless despair for a mother who was little more than a walking shadow. A faded bloom who never truly knew the sunlight, and who withered and died pitifully unfulfilled.

All watched across the barren wasteland of a lost childhood.

A desert land scoured by a bitter wind of adversity that, somehow, fashioned a proud young man, with a chiselled, worn face, who masked so much behind a fine line in sarcastic cynicism if he felt threatened, or clowning buffoonery if he simply wanted to divert attention. But who never discussed his feelings. Or emotions. And who rarely revealed his thoughts.

An independent, self-reliant young man who decided the Air Force might give him a direction his life had lacked until then. The Air Force his grandpa had talked of so proudly that one summer long ago at a cabin by a lake.

Daniel filtered images as quickly as he could, afraid to contemplate events too long in case the story left him behind, as he was certain he wouldn’t be able to catch up again. He tried to store as much information as he could. But it felt as if he were running on a treadmill that might at any moment speed up under his feet and upset his balance.

‘I’m so sorry, Jack,’ Daniel murmured. ‘I know you’re going to hate this when you wake up. I just hope it gives you the chance *to* wake up.’

He waited for a response, but there was nothing. Just the continuing blast of images that assaulted his brain.

‘Jack? Can you hear me? I’m here with you.’

Still there was no response.

***********

Part 8

George Hammond walked into the infirmary. Major Carter was seated by the beds of her two team-mates. Fraiser was not to be seen. And neither was Mya.

‘How are things, Major?’

Carter looked up, and blinked as if only just noticing him.

‘I don’t really know, sir. They were flinching and twisting earlier.’ She stopped and swallowed. ‘It was as if they were being . . . hit . . . sir.’

Hammond dipped his chin, as he came to terms with that information, and narrowed his eyes slightly. He was privy to his second-in-command’s file. Being hit was something that had happened a great deal to Jack O’Neill over his years in military service, one way or another. Sadly.

‘I see,’ was all he said.

‘But they’ve been quieter for a little while now.’

The general pursed his lips, and looked at Carter’s tired drawn face. ‘Go and get some coffee, Major. Something to eat. Give yourself a break.’

Just for a moment he thought she was going to protest, but looking at him she changed her mind, and straightened herself with an effort. ‘Yes, sir.’

‘Where’s Mya?’ Hammond asked as Carter walked towards the door.

‘Uh, in one of the VIP rooms, sir. She said she had to go and rest. Teal’c took her there before he went to kel’no’reem.’

Hammond nodded his thanks, and heard Carter leave as he turned back to the two men lying side by side.

Certainly the Colonel looked better than he had when the procedure had started. His body was less taut, and his face less wretched. But both he and Doctor Jackson were prone to flinching suddenly, in curiously mirrored movements. Whatever was going on with the two of them was apparently happening to them both, as their moves appeared eerily synchronised.

It somehow didn’t seem to be the thing to do to sit, so Hammond rested his rear against a research bench running the length of the room, careful not to disturb any of the medical paraphernalia covering it.

Crossing his arms, he sighed. They could only hope that this was going to work. If it didn’t then he had to pray that Jackson at least could be brought back safely by just breaking the link with O’Neill. Mya had been rather vague about some of the specifics concerning that possibility for his liking.

The thought of losing the Colonel was bad enough. Losing Doctor Jackson as well was something he didn’t want to contemplate. They were each, in their own way, incredibly valuable to the SGC. Not that either would be able to see or understand that.

Hammond chewed his lower lip, and tried to convince himself that he’d made the right call. That committing the SGC’s most knowledgeable researcher to what might turn out to be a hopeless search and rescue mission was the best use of resources available.

A search and rescue that was as bizarre a recovery exercise as he’d come across, seeing as it was happening right under his nose. And yet, he knew, Jackson would never have let it rest until he’d given in if Hammond had refused him the opportunity to try and save his friend.

Why Doctor Jackson and O’Neill were so close was one of the odd unfathomable factors that made SG-1 the strangely successful recipe for potential disaster that it was. In the real world they had to be as far apart as any classroom analogy would let them be. Jackson would be at the front taking notes for all he was worth, hanging on every word the teacher spoke. O’Neill would be at the back, as far out of sight as he could possibly get, gazing longingly out the window to the sports’ field, and doodling airplanes into the margins of his exercise book. They had so little in common it was a true cliché of opposites attracting.

‘General,’ Fraiser said, putting her clipboard down on the side.

‘Doctor. How is it all going?’

‘Truthfully, sir? I don’t know.’

Wonderful.

‘They seem quieter,’ he tried.

‘Yes, they do. But they did that before, and then started twisting and turning again.’ Fraiser was all clinically professional. If she couldn’t tell for sure she wouldn’t give false hope. Which was fine, but Hammond felt he could do with a little encouragement to chew on right now. Even if it proved to be bittersweet in the long run.

‘Did Mya give any indication about how long we might have to wait?’

‘No, sir, she didn’t.’ Fraiser sighed, and the general guessed she’d had to answer these questions already with Carter, and possibly Teal’c, too. And probably others. The Colonel and Doctor Jackson were popular figures around the base, and news of what was happening had spread like the proverbial wildfire. He was surprised he hadn’t tripped over a line of well-wishers at the door.

‘So, we just . . . wait?’

‘Yes, sir. I’m afraid that’s all we can do.’

He nodded his reluctant acceptance, and waited for Carter to return, watching Fraiser check their monitors, and record the readings on a chart on her clipboard.

Hammond felt helpless. He often felt helpless. It was part of his job. Standing and watching men and women he respected and admired going through the Gate on potentially hazardous missions whilst he could do nothing but observe and offer up the odd prayer.

But, in all the time the Stargate project had been running, he had found that he had gotten particularly close to several individuals. Because they’d been there the longest. SG-1 meant more to him than he cared to admit. And it was incredibly hard to stand and be able to do nothing while two of them fought a desperate, internal battle for survival.

Fraiser eyed her commanding officer, and then left to check on other patients.

All Hammond could hear was the shuddering breathing from the men on the beds.

Pushing himself away from the bench, the general moved to stand beside Jackson.

‘Do what you have to, son,’ he said quietly. ‘Dig in, and bring him back with you.’

Then, coughing slightly, he turned as Carter appeared with a cup of steaming coffee in her hands.

‘Right,’ he nodded, ‘I’ll be in my office. Keep me updated with any changes, Major.’

‘Yes, sir.’

He left.

**********

Jack had joined the Air Force. That much Daniel knew.

And it wasn’t proving to be a pleasant experience from what he could see. There was no flag waving, there were no starched-smart uniforms, no victory parades, and little by the way of back-slapping comradeship. Instead, there was a long stream of pictures depicting pain, injury, and death.

Images of carnage. And of ruin.

Overlaid with by a desperate hopelessness. And through it all, Jack walked with the gritted determination of someone who had shut his heart to his own suffering, and the suffering of others. Because he had to. Was forced to. Was trained to. In order to survive. And do his job.

As he had done before. To survive his childhood.

Daniel choked as the back of a head mushroomed in a red mist of blood, seen down the cross hairs of a sniper’s rifle. Jack’s rifle. And he felt Jack’s feelings of self-loathing as they were smothered beneath a heavier weight of duty.

How the hell had Jack lived with all this? And was it any wonder, when folks meddled with what they didn’t understand, that the whole sorry mess was forced out of its careful containers like the contents of an overfilled garbage bag spilled carelessly on the sidewalk, and left rotting in the sun. Damn Mya. Damn her and her interference.

Damn her.

Daniel could feel the hot taste of nausea rising in his throat.

He couldn’t vomit. It would spoil everything. Lose him every moment he’d gained. He had to hold on. He had to stay in control. Jack needed him to do that. Jack would do whatever it took to save Daniel if the situations were reversed. He knew that. Therefore, goddammit, he would do the same. He’d learned from the Master.

Dig deep into your reserves of self-control, Jackson. Don’t you dare give in now, if you do you’ll leave a man behind; and that’s the one thing you can’t do. You cannot, *cannot* leave a man behind. You *cannot* leave *this* man behind. And particularly not there. Lost in the wasteland of these fetid, sickening memories.

Struggling hard to catch up, he felt sand beneath his hands. Beneath his knees.

He was on his hands and knees.

Jack was in pain and disorientated.

He couldn’t move, could barely lift his head, and there was blood. Jack’s hands were covered in Jack’s blood.

And Jack was in trouble, because the chopper was almost fifty yards away, and somehow Daniel knew the bad guys, whoever they were, were close. Pain tore through his head and made concentrating on getting to his feet difficult. Everything was strangely unfocussed, and putting one foot in front of the other was an awkwardly uncoordinated task. Legs wobbled and folded.

The soft sand swallowed his knees, and his hands sank awkwardly into the shifting grains. It as if it was clinging to him. Unwilling to let him go. Colluding with the enemy who were closing in.

Ah, God. Jack sobbed, as he tried to push himself upright. But he couldn’t. Energy drained from him and he slumped forward into the sand, the rough particles scraping his skin.

There was no way in hell he could make it to the craft on his own. The fifty yards might as well have been fifty miles. He just couldn’t do it.

But Jack refused to give up hope. Not even then.

They wouldn’t leave without him. Daniel was surprised at the strength of Jack’s conviction. There was an image in his mind: a sunburned, square-jawed face, with fierce dark eyes, and silver hair. A face Daniel had never seen before, but he could feel Jack’s trust, complete and unwavering.

This man would not leave him behind.

And so Daniel was as shocked as Jack when the pitch of the rotors changed and the chopper began to rise. The sense of betrayal hit with a force that was hard to even begin to comprehend.

They were leaving.

Goddammit!!

Frank!

Frank!

Oh, shit.

Guys!

Guys!

Hey!

I’m here!

Guys!

FRANK!

Don’t leave me behind.

Please . . . don’t leave me . . .

Trying hard to get to his feet.

Head pounding from the bullet’s glancing wound.

Wobbling unsteadily on elbows and knees.

Jack could do no more.

He heard them leave.

Booted feet entered his field of vision.

He raised a weary head.

To look up the barrel of a gun.

Saw the barrel move swiftly, as the gun was rapidly reversed and used as a club.

Then the world went black in a blaze of pain.

*****************

Gradually, consciousness returned. Hazy, pain-filled consciousness.

And the slowly remembered recollection that Frank and the others were gone.

And that . . . he was . . .

Jack turned his head, slowly. Taking in walls. Ceiling. Floor. On which he lay.

Nothing else.

No table.

No chair.

No bed.

Nothing.

Except . . .

Men. Who stood around casually smoking vile-smelling cigarettes.

And who smiled with nicotine-stained, feral anticipation.

Ahhhhhh, crap.

The men moved in. In small packs. Like hyenas. Taking turns to hunt.

Laughing at the antics of those in the fray.

Before taking their own thoughtless, careless turn.

As if this was something they were used to. Something merely mundane to them.

Which, Jack realised, it was.

But having an American to abuse was something new, that they relished. There was no adherence to The Geneva Convention. Not even a mocking acknowledgement that it existed. Instead, there was simply cruelty in its coldest, most calculating, most uncaring fashion.

And that was merely the beginning.

The cascade of events that followed left Daniel exhausted and drained of emotion as he suffered trauma after trauma along with his friend. And came to realise, in appalled disbelief, what horrors Jack had been hiding all this time.

Horrors he would almost certainly never forgive Daniel for seeing.

And, as things got worse, Daniel began to understand why Jack had never shared this. Had never even hinted at its occurrence. It was depraved. Sickening beyond anything Daniel had been able to imagine he might see at the outset when Mya had tried to warn him. No wonder the woman had been repulsed.

So, also, was Daniel.

Oh, God.

Jack.

There were beatings.

Through which Jack spat out his name and rank and serial number.

Defiance stiffening his resolve.

Defiance, however, that simply invited more pain.

More savage suffering.

More beatings.

Near-drownings in freezing water.

Floggings.

And, finally, electric shocks to parts of the body most vulnerable to such sickening torture.

From which Jack arched and twisted in agony, trying to escape as the current poured through every nerve ending. And Daniel, too, experienced what it was like to have electricity burn as if searingly hot needle points were being scoured through every artery and vein.

And Jack screamed until his lungs ached and his throat lining was skinned.

Until the voltage was switched off, and he felt nothing but the exposed frailty of his entire body. As he sagged against straps that held him helpless in his chair whilst men stood and laughed because he’d lost control when the electrical energy had torn him apart, and he was left sitting in his own waste.

There nothing but powerless humiliation.

Raw-throated, pitiful shame.

Endless sobbing despair.

And pain.

And Daniel couldn’t take it. He could feel his own need to escape overwhelming him, galloping through his head like an out-of-control renegade stallion. He felt himself pulling away. He couldn’t watch any more. Couldn’t stand it any more. Hot bile rose up in his throat. Tears burned his eyes. He could feel what Jack was feeling. Suffer what Jack was suffering. And it was too much. He was going to retch. He wasn’t a soldier. He wasn’t trained for this.

Oh, God.

Get me out of here.

Get me out!!

Panic welled up inside him like hot surging water inside a geyser; bursting towards the surface.

And he turned away.

How did he get out?

How?

Oh, God.

How?

Where?

Mya!!

Help me!

Please!

Doc!

Sam!

Teal’c!

General!

I can’t do this. I can’t. Oh, sweet Jesus Christ!!

I can’t do this.

Help me.

Please, God.

Oh, Christ. The pain.

He felt himself heave, and vomit.

How he could do so, and still remain a spectator was beyond him.

But he could.

And did.

And still he experienced Jack’s torture.

Still he experienced everything Jack remembered.

And felt.

And he couldn’t carry on.

He tasted the stale trace of sickness in his mouth.

And wanted more than anything to swill it clear.

Clean out his mouth.

Escape.

The fear.

The pain.

The despair.

It was all too much to bear.

And yet, somehow, through the overwhelming fear and turmoil, came the glimmering realisation that he couldn’t leave. If he did he was abandoning Jack to this forever. And Jack had fought to survive this once. And *had* managed to survive. If Jack could suffer it for real and survive, then Daniel could suffer it all by proxy and stay the course. He couldn’t leave Jack. He couldn’t abandon him here. In a place where he already felt abandoned.

Oh, Christ, Jack. How?

*How* did you survive?

And there was more than just the questions pulsing through his head. There was respect mixed with horror. And there was admiration mixed with anger.

And more than anything there was the overwhelming desire again to take Jack and shield him from all the savagery, and all the suffering. To hold him tight and shut out all the misery and pain.

But he couldn’t. All he could do was continue to witness what Jack carried in his soul. And try to work out how he could stop this. Was Jack aware that he was there? Did his presence help in any way? What was he meant to do? Daniel felt helpless. He needed to figure this out. And quickly.

Concentrating on those thoughts helped to steady his mind. Ease the violent feelings of nausea.

Until he wondered about how Jack would feel when he really came to understand what had happened. When he came to realise that Daniel had seen all the intimate details of the most degrading moments of his life.

*******

Part 9

Janet bathed the faces of both men. Daniel, in particular, seemed to be having a difficult time. His body was shuddering violently, and she was all but certain he was going to have a seizure. And then, without any further warning, he vomited.

‘Janet!’ Sam shouted jumping up from her seat at Daniel’s side.

‘Turn him,’ she responded quickly, grabbing a bowl from the side.

Between them they got Daniel awkwardly shifted so he was facing away from O’Neill.

‘Mind the binding,’ Janet reminded urgently.

They held Daniel as he heaved again and again. Until it was obvious that he had nothing left to bring up, and he lay gasping like a grounded fish on a bank, tears swilling from his eyes and smearing his face.

Letting Sam continue to hold him, Janet got rid of the bowl, and used a cold cloth to gently wipe the crying man’s face, followed by the use of a damp swab to clear out his mouth. Through it all Daniel continued to heave for breath in strangled, pitiful half-sobs that caused Janet to grimace and catch Sam’s eye.

Neither woman knew what to say for the best and so, in the end, they settled for saying nothing.

Needing to do something, Janet continued to wipe away seeping tears, and Sam’s hold became almost a hug although she was careful not to disturb the link between the two men.

And both knew that the other was wondering what could have induced such a reaction in Daniel.

‘Janet?’

Daniel had been shuddering for some while. Jack twisted and jerked spasmodically. But Daniel refused to lie still.

‘I don’t know, Sam. I really don’t.’ She felt so helpless. Useless. Worthless. It seemed that there was nothing that she could do, except watch, and bathe faces. Christ, a first year nursing trainee could do that. She couldn’t even look at samples through a microscope and try and identify some criminal micro-organism. They knew what was causing this.

And she couldn’t do anything about it. And she wanted to scream. Because two patients, both of whom she called friend, were suffering terribly.

*And she couldn’t help.*

She felt a hand on her arm. Sam had released part of her hold on Daniel. ‘It’s not your fault, Janet.’

She half-smiled to answer the encouragement. ‘Then why does it feel like it is?’

‘If anyone’s to blame, it’s me.’

‘You?’

‘Yes. I let the Colonel go off and have a conference with Mya and her friends. Alone.’

‘Did you try to stop him?’

‘Of course.’

‘Then you’re not to blame.’

‘I should have tried harder to get him to listen.’

‘Sam, since when has the Colonel listened to anyone if he doesn’t want to?’

They exchanged sad looks.

‘True,’ Sam agreed. ‘Doesn’t make me feel any better though.’

A figure appeared in the doorway.

‘Hi, Teal’c,’ Janet greeted. ‘Welcome to the mutual blame society. Care to join in?’

There was moment’s silence. Then, ‘I am not aware of anything for which I need to blame myself, Doctor Fraiser. For what are you both blaming yourselves?’

The women exchanged looks. ‘This,’ Janet said indicating the two prone men.

‘I do not see how either of you could be blamed for what is happening to O’Neill and Daniel Jackson.’

‘Yeah, we’d just got to that part,’ Sam said quietly.

‘Then, is this mutual blame society not a waste of your valuable time?’

Sam sniffed and Janet felt herself half-smiling. ‘Yes, Teal’c, probably.’

‘Then, I fail to see its purpose.’

Looking faintly embarrassed, Sam gently rested Daniel’s head down onto the gurney as he quietened.

Janet moved to wipe O’Neill’s face, avoiding further eye contact with the new arrival.

After a moment the two women spluttered and began laughing.

Teal’c looked quizzically from one to the other.

‘Thank you, Teal’c,’ Janet smiled. ‘We needed that.’

‘You are both most welcome,’ Teal’c replied with his trademark gentle bow from the waist that Janet always felt would have graced any seventeenth century English drawing room in the romances she was so fond of reading.

*************

There were long periods of soul-draining sleep deprivation, until mental and physical barriers began collapsing despite Jack’s desire and desperation to maintain them.

Humiliations, beyond anything Daniel would have been able to believe another human being could inflict upon another, wore Jack to a bare shadow of himself. Leaving him curled up in the classic protective foetal position, pushed back as far as he could force himself into the corner of his cell.

Daniel wanted to reach out. He wanted to be able to take Jack and hold him. But he couldn’t. He could only be a suffering witness to the tragedy unfolding before him, although he found himself murmuring again and again, ‘It’ll get better, Jack. You get to go home. You get to see Sara again. And Charlie. Hold on. You get to go home. You get to go home.’

Gradually losing hope that he would ever be freed, O’Neill’s will power and ability to hold out against the torture of his captors leeched away, fraction by fraction. His once determined response of ‘Major Jonathon O’Neill, United States Air Force’, became slower and more laboured. His voice slurred with pain, and tiredness, and encroaching hopelessness. And Daniel felt every blow, every kick, every shock, every long hour of pain.

Hatred hardened for the man who had left Jack behind, and become a focus of O’Neill’s anger, bitterness and despair. Daniel shared the need to punch a square jawed face into a pulp with bare fists, rip it to shreds with a knife, batter it into a bloodied mess with a gun butt, explode it apart with a close range shot, stomp it underfoot with the heel of a boot. All the things that O’Neill wanted to do to those who tortured him, and humiliated him, he channelled into crystallised feelings of loathing against the man named ‘Frank’.

And yet, conflict warred in Jack’s mind. Because these two men had been the closest of friends. For many years. And to give up on that was one of the hardest things Jack O’Neill had ever done. Because trust was not something O’Neill gave easily. And this man, no matter how unknowingly, had betrayed it.

But that hatred helped O’Neill hold on to the barest shreds of his sanity as the weeks turned into months, and it seemed that there was to be no reprieve. And slowly, the determination to keep going faded as the belief that others must have given up on him, and could not know that he was still alive, grew stronger.

And the fire of hatred burned ever stronger, as life’s flame began to fade.

Then, finally, came the worst day when, tied to a chair awaiting another round of electric shock treatment, O’Neill looked hopelessly into the eyes of his torturers and knew that they had won. Because there was nothing he could give them that would be useful anymore, after so long away from the front line.

He knew that he would die at their whim, as they used him merely for their continuing sadistic entertainment.

He watched as thin wires were held tantalisingly over already often-abused parts of his body by expert hands that knew how to cause such appalling pain.

And he looked up into eyes that examined every reaction he gave.

Finally, he accepted that Sara and Charlie were people he would never see again.

And he knew that his captors saw his empty despair, and the tear that slipped down his cheek.

And he knew that, in that moment, *they* knew they had, however briefly, broken him completely.

And that they were glad.

And that they gloated in their triumph.

The traitorous tear slid down Jack’s face. There had been other tears that had fallen over the days and weeks that he had been a prisoner. They had been produced in response to pain. This tear, and those that followed, was in *anticipation* of pain. The raggedly drawn breaths that bordered on sobs in his throat fought for release against his folding self-control. And Jack couldn’t hold it together. The thought of what was to come, wickedly poisoned with the memory of what he had already faced, was too much. He watched the wires as they were moved in slow exultant millimetres, hovering above his skin with their sickening promise of more pain.

And Daniel tasted the salt of tears that ran into the corners of Jack’s mouth. Felt the heaving of his lungs as he tried to regain control of his breathing and his emotions.

As he fought and struggled as never before to recover some self-control.

As he fought the hopelessness.

And the fear.

The anticipation of pain.

And then the agonising pain itself.

In what became a hopelessly recurring loop.

Of suffering.

Of losing control.

And of recovering as much as possible.

In order to prepare for the next time.

But, it was harder and harder to recover, in the face of a seemingly eternal incarceration.

And Daniel was crying too. He didn’t know how it was possible, but he was. Tears for a man he respected and admired, who had been brutalised to a point from which Daniel was amazed he had been able to recover, let alone face situations where he might be captured and tortured again. *Had* faced situations where he had been captured again. And every time must be reopening the wounds of Iraq and all he had suffered there.

And, like in his childhood, he deflected attempts to know him more deeply with sarcasm and buffoonery. Lessons learned by the child had served the adult well. But it meant that he walked a lonely path and never let anyone see what he suffered. Kept the world and his friends at arm’s length.

In long minutes Daniel lived four months of hell that drove Jack O’Neill deeper inside himself than he had ever been before. Drove him beyond the reach of those who tried to help him recover the life he had had before. That life was gone. Along with any remaining innocence life in Special Forces had left him.

Unable to discuss fully what had happened and how he felt, unable to expose the despairing tears he saw as weakness, and the inability to continue to spit in his torturers’ faces after weeks of humiliations and degradations, which he felt would be despised by his military colleagues, O’Neill withdrew behind an impenetrable barrier, and refused to reveal his soul to anyone.

Torturers had looked into his eyes and seen his despair; others never would again.

Even if they were the closest people in the world to him. Even if they were those best equipped to guide him back to the light from the darkness he now inhabited. He had lost whatever ability he had ever had to reach out and tell others what they wanted to hear. He had resisted so hard for four long months, and descended into such depths that the climb back to the surface was just too difficult.

And Daniel wept for the man O’Neill had been and the man he had become. Wanted to hold him in his arms and make the horrific memories disappear. Comfort a man who wouldn’t take the comfort anyway.

O’Neill was determined that barriers he had lowered would go back in place. Barriers Daniel somehow knew he’d lowered for the woman who was now his wife. A woman who had beaten back the defences erected in childhood, until Jack had let her in.

But now, he built them back up again. Because he couldn’t let anyone else see this hell he lived with.

The pain. The despair. The shame.

Because they might pity.

Or they might not cope

So, as he had protected his mother from his father’s violence, he vowed to protect Sara from the newer violence he had suffered.

And Jack once more perfected the art of deflection. No matter how he wanted to he couldn’t bridge the gap. He couldn’t open up to others. And expose them to his suffering.

And so, slowly, he become a barren island.

Daniel wanted to interfere. Wanted so much to be able to scream at Jack that it was okay to trust, okay to reach out, okay to look into someone’s eyes and let them see your deepest fears and suffering. Because they *wouldn’t* gloat over what they saw. And you had to give them the chance to cope and to comfort. That someone who loved you would hold you whilst you cried, and released your bitter soul like the unplugging of a stagnant sewer. That that person wouldn’t love you any the less for your pain, and hurt, and shame. That you weren’t protecting them by your silence. You were hurting them as much as you hurt.

Daniel could only watch. And yet, inside he was crying and breaking apart with Jack. No wonder that when the barriers Jack had erected to memories of such horrors were pushed down with inadequate preparation by Mya’s meddling, he was unable to control his thoughts. There was so much here. So much.

And yet, there had been a wedding to Sara, the birth of a son. Where were they? There had to have been good times with the man named Frank. Where were they? Daniel struggled through the pictures. Where were the good times? Was that the answer to Jack’s suffering? Finding the good times? Would that allow him to lead his friend out of the darkness?

*********

Carter was worn out. Hammond could see that. Mya had returned to check on things, and then gone back to rest some time ago, but the major had refused to leave, taking a chair and sitting just watching, as if hoping that her presence would in some way help the two men on the beds, who twisted and turned in response to unseen cruel stimuli.

After a long period where they had seemed peaceful they had both begun to twitch and then struggle. Jackson had cried out several times. Whatever it was that they were experiencing it was painful. Jackson had screamed, ‘No!’ more than once and had thrown up arms as if to ward off blows. There had also been reactions as if the bodies were responding to something like electrical currents passing through them.

Carter had watched in horror, turning pleading and uncomprehending eyes to Hammond. The general had shaken his head, and continued to watch grimly. Mya had warned him that everything might be linked to memories O’Neill had locked inside his head, and the general had read his second-in-command’s personal file more than once, so he had a good idea about the bulk load of bad memories that O’Neill carried around with him, usually locked in vaults as safe as those at Fort Knox. As he watched the continued effects of what the two men were experiencing he had no doubts as to what memories the two men were being exposed to.

Unable to explain it to Carter without breaking regulations and privileged confidences, he could do nothing but shake his head helplessly. But he would eat his hat if Jackson wasn’t finding out that his friend had been a prisoner during the first Gulf War, and that he had not been well treated.

Sensing a presence behind him, the general turned.

Teal’c inclined his head. Sometimes the general was grateful for his calm steadying influence when things were not going the SGC’s way. Jack O’Neill was an proponent of the “blow your top and things will automatically get better, and if they don’t *you* will certainly feel a whole lot better”, school of thought. Jackson simply threw his hands in the air and retired to his lab with a petulant slamming of doors, and Carter did much the same, but without the petulant slamming of doors. Teal’c would simply assess and accept what he couldn’t change. His quiet thoughtfulness was something the general had come to appreciate more and more over the years of their acquaintance. He wouldn’t change the other members of SG-1 for a moment. But there was something to be said for the quiet reflective method. So much so that Hammond was thinking of asking for instruction in the art of kel’no’reem. The SGC was a demanding command, and he wasn’t getting any younger.

‘General Hammond,’ Teal’c inclined his head in greeting. ‘How are things progressing?’

‘I’m not sure, to be honest, Teal’c.’

‘They were in trouble,’ Carter said. ‘It was as if they were in terrible pain.’

‘This is connected with O’Neill’s memories?’

‘I don’t know.’ Carter’s helplessness was there for all to hear in her voice.

‘I think we can assume that is the case,’ Hammond interposed gently. He didn’t think he was breaking any rules by saying that.

‘Then we must be glad that Daniel Jackson is there to try and aid O’Neill. To suffer once is enough, let us be grateful that O’Neill has his friend at his side this time.’

They all turned as Jackson cried out again, and Carter blinked back tears. But the two bodies seemed to quiet again, settling, and Carter’s tears fell as Jackson’s free arm came over to gather his friend in, and pull him to rest against his chest as if he were comforting a child from nightmares, and Jack O’Neill, in a show of vulnerability and desperate need for solace that he would never have displayed if he were conscious, threw his free arm across Daniel’s chest and curled up to hold on as if he were clutching on to a lifebelt in a storm.

And it became clear to the reluctant spectators that both men’s faces were wet with tears as they experienced a momentary lull in their battering psychological assault.

Part 10

The disorientating swirl of change to which Daniel was becoming accustomed swept in again, as did the nauseous feeling caused by the manner in which he was thrown about as if caught in a high-powered wind.

Each time he was swept into a new scene he had to take in as much as he could as quickly as he could, because he was never sure how long the scene was going to last. It was like conducting detective work in the dark, at a hundred miles an hour, with a torchlight beam that fluctuated at a spiteful whim between overpowering and non-existent, and all strengths in between.

Now, he became aware, almost instantly, of well-worn photographs being taken gently from the old cigar box resting at Jack’s right elbow, and placed across a wooden table like the pieces of a beloved jigsaw puzzle.

Slowly, Jack’s long slender fingers arranged the pictures of Charlie’s life into order, each image touched with the tenderness of a father holding his new-born for the first time. Then, gently, as if these fragile treasures would tear at the barest pressure, O’Neill turned the photos over, one by one. On the back of each was a message written in a neat script, underneath a date. And every message ended, ‘Love You Always, Sara’.

The later ones had ‘Love You Lots Daddy, Love Charlie’, added underneath his mother’s words.

O’Neill sat so long looking at the pictures, and the messages which had been sent to all corners of the world, showing how he had sacrificed witnessing his son’s childhood to the vagaries of military service. His contact for so much of Charlie’s brief life had been through long phone conversations and letters and photos.

And time couldn’t be lived over.

And now his son was gone.

Daniel could feel the pain and guilt, like a knife that was twisted into his friend’s gut, and continually being manipulated. The grief of the time that had been missed, and the agony of the time that would never be.

Daniel had never been a parent, and had only ever been able to guess at the pain and despair Jack must have experienced over his son’s death. Now, in all its soul-shattering, spirit-eviscerating agony, it was revealed to him. Daniel felt his own breath choking in his chest as he looked at pictures of a child loved so desperately and taken so tragically.

‘Oh, God, Charlie. I’m so sorry.’ The words were barely audible.

Covering a desperate need to cry. To fall apart. To completely fracture at the seams. And the savage unspoken need to be held by someone.

But there was the underlying fear of letting go. Of being something less than the tough soldier that the US Air Force and bitter experience had moulded. The father inside the soldier wanted so very much to show what he felt. But steel-edged training, hammered into the core of the man, refused to let him buckle.

No matter how lost he had been as he held his child to his chest and looked down into blind eyes; no matter the panic as he felt the slick wetness of his son’s blood; no matter the desperation as he sensed only one heart beating, where there should have been two frantically beating in tandem. No matter all that, he couldn’t let go of his emotions.

Daniel remembered his own uncomprehending grief at the death of his parents. Felt the matching plummeting depths of O’Neill’s despair. But more than that: felt the cancer of guilt that ate away at his friend, as the echo of a single gunshot reverberated continually through his mind, like a relentless tide pounding against a cliff face. Wearing Jack out, until he was crumbling apart; holding on by his finger tips.

Jack touched a picture of Sara with the barest brush of his finger-tips.

‘I’m so sorry, Sara.’

And his breathing staggered as emotions squeezed his heart. His lungs. His mind. His spirit. His soul.

He had come home from Abydos to wander from empty room to empty room.

Calling out with a voice choked with an desolate intuition he couldn’t hide, because he knew, deep down that there was no one to hear him.

‘Sara?’

Jack had opened her closets that held only bare hangers. Checked the bathroom where only his own few toiletries remained.

‘Sara?’

He had walked around and around the house. Hoping against hope that, somehow, if he turned the right corner, she’d be there. Laughing at the elaborate joke she was playing on him. Until, finally, he could do nothing in his pitiful exhaustion except sit on the deck staring at photographs of his wife and son, both of whom, he finally accepted in hopeless emptiness, were now lost to him.

‘Oh, God. Sara.’ It was a half sob. A stuttering of emotion, broken free of its mooring far too late.

And Jack knew it.

The night grew chill around him but Jack barely felt it, as it was nothing to the icy feeling settling around his heart. There was nothing on Earth for him now, except an empty house that symbolised so well his empty life.

“’Tis better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all.”

So they said.

They were wrong.

For Jack was haunted by what he’d had. And had no longer. And the difference between the two was as a completely stark grey canvas, compared to a painting in the richest, boldest, most vibrant colours that had invaded his consciousness and enthused every moment of the life he had shared with those two special people who had meant everything to him.

And so days melted into one another with no real meaning. And then, days became months, and months became a year of merely existing. Going through the motions of being a functioning human being. When inside it felt as if every meaningful thing in his life had been ripped out of his existence.

****************

In what had become a ritual of routine, Janet Fraiser checked the monitors giving her readings on her patients’ conditions. Their heart rates were still above normal, as were their blood pressures, but not significantly, compared to where they had been at other points since the experiment began. During the last hour or so the readings had definitely settled into quieter rhythms, for which she was thankful.

She stepped back and looked at the two men who lay together like scared children clinging to each other to ward off nightmares.

Sam, who had finally fallen asleep in a chair drawn up at Daniel’s side, shifted her position and opened her eyes. Stretching she turned instinctively to check on her friends, and then yawned as she focussed bleary eyes on Janet.

‘How are they?’

‘Quieter,’ Janet reassured her. ‘Their heart rates are much steadier, so whatever is happening is not as stressful as it was.’

‘Do you think it’s ending?’

Janet shook her head slightly. ‘I have no way of knowing. They’ve been quieter for about an hour now. But I’m still worried by the readings. They’re still up beyond normal. Whatever is going on is still affecting them. Just not as badly.’

Sam stood up and stretched out bones, muscles and ligaments that protested at having to move.

‘Go and shower, Sam, you’ll feel better. You’ve been here all night. You need to eat as well. You cannot take on the burden of watching twenty-four seven. Teal’c will be along soon. His regular kel’no’reem pattern finishes about now. I’ll stay until he gets here.’

Sam looked as if she was going to refuse.

‘Sam, you’re no use to them, or anyone else for that matter, if you overdo things and make yourself ill. I don’t need another patient right now.’

‘No. Of course not.’ Sam smiled weakly. ‘You promise you’ll stay until Teal’c comes along?’

‘Unless there’s a dire medical emergency, which you’re bound to know about anyway as I’m sure it’ll involve an off world activation, I promise to stay right here.’ Janet ushered her friend to the door. ‘Now, go. Look after yourself.’

Still with reluctantly dragging feet Sam left the room.

And Fraiser shook her head. ‘Honestly, Colonel,’ she said with quiet affection, ‘your team is as much trouble as you.’

Moving to the side of the beds she contemplated the two men. Jackson was pale, and his unbound arm was still wrapped around the Colonel. Their breathing, like lovers sleeping, was in synchronised rhythm with each other. Fraiser smiled momentarily at her thoughts. The two men, the Colonel especially, would certainly throw a pillow at her if she ever brought up this little moment in conversation in the future! And then, with a saddening thought, she considered the Colonel’s probable reactions to the exercise as a whole: pillows, she suspected, were the least of what might get thrown when he found out what had occurred.

We only did what we thought was best, Colonel. I hope you come to understand that.

Pillows, she reflected sadly, rebounded easily.

Friendships, however, had been known to shatter.

Only what we thought was best.

She ran her hand absentmindedly along the edge of O’Neill’s blanket-covered foot. And then patted it gently.

Come back to us, Colonel.

And we’ll deal with the fall out. Pillows. Broken friendships. Whatever.

Just come back to us.

Without thinking she found herself rubbing the outline of Daniel’s foot in exactly the same manner.

And you, Daniel.

Please.

Daniel Jackson had been like a lost child when he’d first come to the SGC, and she had wanted to mother him, along with, she knew, all the nurses on the Infirmary’s rotations. It had had something to do with the floppy hair that fell over those rounded glasses he used to wear back then. He had been the absolute geeky-victim stereotype. The sort that brought out the mothering side in women. He had always looked perpetually perplexed by events around him, and had retired far too easily into a protective academic cocoon to shield himself from the real world.

He had looked vulnerable. He had looked lost. He had looked like he needed feeding up. He had looked like he needed a mother. Or a big sister. Or the wife he’d lost. That tragic story had appealed to the sensitive side of every female on the base.

Yet, slowly, almost without anyone really recognising it until it was over, he had transformed into a more confident young man, who didn’t constantly hide behind mannerisms such as continually pushing his glasses up his nose; or trying overly hard to impress everyone with his vast warehouse of knowledge.

And the big sister, mothering clan had become an adoring, doe-eyed, hearts-palpitating-every-time-he-came-into-the-infirmary following. Much to Janet’s secret amusement.

She leaned over and brushed a stray hair from his face.

She couldn’t afford to be taken over by emotional feelings for her patients. She ignored it in her nurses unless it got out of hand, but in herself it wasn’t professional. And she always led by example.

As did the man lying next to Daniel.

Okay, if she was going to be non-professional about any of the people on the base it would be the man lying in Daniel’s arms. There was just something indefinable about him that made him special.

Janet could not remember having such feelings of respect for one individual to the extent that she respected Colonel Jack O’Neill.

Before she’d even had time to read his file, before she’d even had a chance to really introduce herself to him, she remembered being faced by a man who was willing to sacrifice himself to help find a cure for a mysterious virus sweeping the base.

She shivered as she remembered his order: ‘Experiment. On . . . me.’

She’d refused. Yet he’d persisted.

‘Use . . . me,’ he’d demanded.

And so she had.

Afterwards, when she’d had time to read his personal file, she’d understood the kind of man she was dealing with. And she’d found it difficult to look him in the eyes for a few days. There was so much in there that was hard to believe he’d survived. So much that he had suffered. She had, however, recovered her professionalism, and after enduring one or two sessions of Colonel O’Neill’s now infamous Desperate To Get Out Of The Infirmaryitis she’d found it easy to overcome any lingering awkwardness. But it was not easy to get out from under the growing weight of respect she felt for him, and the way he faced adversity with such stubborn pride.

He was going to hate what she and Hammond and the rest of SG-1 had done; if it worked.

He was going to detest the invasion of his mind, even by a man he considered to be his best friend.

If he got well there would be difficult times ahead.

Which, she knew, everyone would willingly face just so long as he *did* get well.

Janet sighed, ‘Come on, Daniel. If you can hear me, we’re all still here for you. And we will be. For as long as it takes.’

She grimaced as she thought about what Daniel might be learning about his friend. She could think of several examples of less than savoury things that Daniel might encounter, not the least of which was the Colonel’s incarceration at the hands of the Iraqis. Janet knew that that was something O’Neill had never even hinted at to his team. She, on the other hand, had read the psych. evaluations, seen the graphically upsetting photographs, and struggled through the carefully reported details. If Daniel was to witness that . . . maybe that was why he’d thrown up earlier . . .

‘I know some of what you see will be really bad.’ Understatement that *that* was, she thought bitterly. ‘But, please, Daniel, hang in there. The Colonel will need you to hold on. Even though I know it’ll probably be the hardest thing you’ve ever had to do.’

She looked up as she realised she was not alone.

‘Are Daniel Jackson and O’Neill able to hear your words, Doctor Fraiser?’

‘I don’t know Teal’c,’ she admitted sadly. ‘But it certainly makes me feel better. And there is a school of thought that advocates speaking to people who are unconscious. It claims that if they can hear you it comforts them, and gives them a valuable link to the outside world.’

She looked down to the curled figures, and then to the monitors. Was it her imagination, or had the readings steadied even more? Or was she just hoping for that result? Or was the fall in the readings the result of something else that she didn’t know about?

‘Ah.’ Teal’c inclined his head. ‘I believe that Daniel Jackson and Major Carter have mentioned this custom to me on previous occasions, although I have, myself, not partaken of the ritual. Would it be useful for me to speak, in the hope that they might be able to hear my voice?’

‘It certainly wouldn’t hurt,’ Janet nodded.

‘Is it required that I talk about anything in particular?’

She shook her head. ‘No, I don’t think the subject matters. It’s the sound of your voice that’s the most important thing. It simply lets them know that you’re here with them.’

Teal’c studied his comrades thoughtfully for some while. Janet watched as he frowned fractionally; Teal’c was never a man to rush decisions if he had time to consider them.

‘Then,’ he said, finally, with a half bow, ‘I shall endeavour to ensure that Daniel Jackson and O’Neill know that I am here with them. I shall relate stories of Chulakian mythology and legend. They contain many tales of bravery, and friendship forged in adversity and battle.’ His dark unfathomable gaze rested on the duo. ‘Such accounts would seem most appropriate at this time.’

Janet could only agree, and she left Teal’c seated at the head of Daniel’s bed, his deep rich voice beginning quietly to share stories from the history of his native planet.

**************

Part 11

As Daniel watched, familiar events began to unfold before his eyes, but slanted from O’Neill’s unfamiliar perspective.

It was strange to witness familiar missions from a differing viewpoint, and to feel differently about them. To inhabit a colder more distant world than his own. One that assessed everything and everybody with a pointed distrust and caution.

And the memories of SG-1 were not the positive moments Daniel wanted to see.

A searing pain shot through Jack. A deep emotional agony that tore the man apart inside, ripped his defences down and exposed his feelings in a way he hated and yet couldn’t control.

‘He said . . . he said . . . “Colonel, help me.”’ The words were dragged out of depths of pain and despair. ‘And then, he was . . . gone .’

Hammond questioned quietly, ‘Gone?’

Grief consumed Jack as he said, ‘Engulfed in fire, sir.’

Hammond tried to comfort. ‘There was nothing you could have done, Colonel.’

Which was no consolation, as Jack said, ‘No. I swear to God, I tried to get to him, but the heat . . .’

Daniel could barely believe the overwhelming sense of loss. But beyond that: the guilt. The words that echoed around Jack’s mind were: Never leave a man behind. *Never* leave a man behind.

And he had.

He was the leader, and he had failed. He had lost a man under his command, and more than that he had lost a man who needed his protection more than any other person he’d ever served with.

And it didn’t matter what platitudes people tried to comfort him with, the sense of blame was overwhelming. No one was ever harder on Jack O’Neill than Jack O’Neill himself.

As Jack propelled the hockey puck into a net set up between two parked cars, Daniel was reminded of the scenes in the school yard, when the young Jack had worn out his anger and despair in a similar manner. Here, as the net toppled down, O’Neill swept his stick through the window of the nearest car with a sudden decisive swipe of pure frustrated anger.

Daniel was taken aback by the amount of feeling O’Neill was displaying because he believed that Daniel was dead.

‘I’m not dead, Jack. I didn’t die. It was all a hoax.’

Again and again Daniel spouted the words. Hoping, somehow, that Jack could hear him.

Dammit! Why couldn’t Jack find his good memories?

‘Daniel . . . dammit!’

Daniel jerked at the sound of his own name, for a brief hopeful moment believing that Jack had managed to make contact through the mess of memories. And his heart leapt at the thought that he’d finally found his friend. Then, he realised where he was . . .

‘I’m dead anyway. Just get outta here!’

‘I’m not leaving you here, Daniel.’

Again Jack was swamped by the responsibility of being the leader. And the need to never leave a man behind.

An overwhelming tide of guilt for having led Daniel into a situation where he had been savagely wounded coursed through O’Neill like corrosive liquid.

Christ! Iraq! Never leave a man behind. No wonder Jack always . . .

Daniel heard his injured self say, ‘Get outta here! You’re gonna blow up with the other ship anyway. What difference does it make? Go! Just go! I’ll stay and watch your back.’

And he felt the warring emotions inside O’Neill. The guilt. The helpless anger. The unspoken affection. The desperation to be able to do something. *Anything*. And yet the bitter acceptance that, in all truth, there was nothing he could do.

He was going to lose Daniel.

This is what it meant to leave a man behind.

This pain.

Was what it meant.

To leave your friend.

Behind.

An unforgivable sin.

Although there was something just as bad.

Letting a friend down.

Standing aside and letting forces you didn’t trust take a friend away. To endure goodness only knew what fate.

A leader worth anything didn’t let his team down like that . . .

Hammond held out the papers that transferred Teal’c from the SGC to the NID.

‘Oh, for crying out loud!’

Daniel wanted to weep at the familiar saying.

And he felt O’Neill’s heart sink into his boots. ‘You’ve got to be kidding!’

‘It’s an official order. I have no choice.’

O’Neill felt an all-consuming disgust as Harry Maybourne tried to justify the unjustifiable, and tasted bitter hopelessness at being squashed by forces he couldn’t control. At letting Teal’c down. At being helpless in the face of a faceless machine that had more influence than a lowly Air Force colonel would ever have.

Suddenly, Daniel heard himself ask, as Teal’c was shackled to leave, ‘How can we just let this happen?’

And Jack despised himself even more, swamped by a feeling that what Daniel was actually saying was how could *you*, as Teal’c’s commanding officer, let this happen? How could *you* let down this man who serves on your team, and respects you?

How could you?

And Jack’s response, ‘What do you want me to do?’ seemed so inadequate. So useless. And that was how Jack felt. To see his friend led away in chains . . . Jack turned and with a muffled, ‘God!’ walked away from a scene he couldn’t bear to witness any more.

Into a side room. Alone. Where he pounded his fist against a wall until his knuckles bled, whereafter he simply opened his hand and slammed the heel of his palm repeatedly against a convenient locker.

‘Hopeless! You are so fucking hopeless, O’Neill. Why didn’t you do something? For God’s sake! The man’s your friend and you let them take him away. Call yourself a leader? You’re useless. *Useless!*’ The last word was yelled, as Jack smashed his hand so hard against the locker door it dented in like a wrecked car fender.

Nothing would go right.

He was such a bad luck magnet.

And, if he got the chance to put things right, to give someone the forgiveness they deserved, then he threw those moments away as well.

Daniel found the confusing disorientation hold him and sweep him around, as Jack’s thoughts about being left behind and losing the chance to put things right suddenly meant that he was standing in the Control Room of the SGC. With a man named . . . Frank.

*That* Frank. The He-Won’t-Leave-Me-Behind Frank. The man Jack had channelled so much hate towards as a result of what happened in Iraq.

Shit!

‘One minute,’ Jack said.

Frank looked at him. ‘Maybe the last one. We used to be friends, Jack.’

‘Yep.’

‘I was sick to my stomach when I found out you were still alive. I wanted to go back for you.’ There was a sense of a man trying to salvage something from the burned out wreckage of a friendship, with what might be the last opportunity he would ever get.

Jack seemed uninclined to pursue the topic. ‘Why don’t we just do this and get the hell out of here, all right?’

Cromwell wouldn’t let it go. Pushing the point he continued, ‘Someone dropped a dime on the incursion. You got hit. You went down. I made a judgement call to save the rest of the team.’

Jack’s voice was hollow, ‘And I saw you take off. And then I saw four months of my life disappear in some stinking Iraqi prison.’

Jack’s mind, and Daniel’s, were invaded again by the hateful haunting memories of that time. Of mocking voices. Gloating eyes. And the all-consuming, agonising, despairing pain.

‘I thought you were dead!’

‘You *thought wrong*!’ Jack exploded. ‘What do you want? You want me to forgive you, is that it?’

This time Daniel saw the revenge Jack had wanted to exact on Frank through the long months of captivity. The way he’d wanted to injure him grievously in recompense for not being able to hurt the men who inflicted the torture on him. How that hate had kept him going. And had not waned in the years since.

‘Yeah,’ Cromwell admitted, simply. ‘I guess I do.’

‘Well, that’s tough. What happened to “nobody gets left behind”?’

Cromwell gestured to a picture on a monitor, and suddenly Daniel knew where he was. What was happening. He remembered Henry Boyd and his team. Crap. The black hole.

‘Well? What about him?’

‘That’s an entirely different scenario.’

‘That is exactly the same damn thing, Jack.’

And suddenly Jack was drowning in a mudslide of doubt. Was it the ‘same damn thing’? Like hell it was. But . . . was it? And if it wasn’t, what about Daniel when Jack had thought he was dead, and he hadn’t been. On planet whatever, when the rest of SG-1 had come back convinced Daniel had been consumed by flames. And what about when he’d left him on the Jaffa pyramid ship? *That* was certainly the same damn thing. He’d been wrong *twice*. Frank, had committed this cardinal sin only once. Daniel had forgiven Jack easily. *Twice*. Jack had spent years believing that he hated Frank Cromwell’s guts.

And above the black hole swinging and desperately trying to hold on, because there were so many things still to be said, so many issues that needed to be resolved, Jack looked down into calm accepting eyes. And he tried with every single ounce of strength he had to hold on. Tensed each muscle, each tendon, each ligament, and pulled against the greater inexorable hold of the wormhole that was millimetre by millimetre claiming his friend.

Shit.

Frank!

I can’t hold you!

I let you down for years, because I’m such a stubborn son of a bitch. Because I couldn’t get past the fact that the needs of the many outweighed the needs of the best friend you were sure was lying dead in the desert sand.

Frank!

Hold on!

But, Frank couldn’t hold on. Jack couldn’t hold on.

And the black hole claimed another victim.

And Jack’s heart tore apart again. The man who had been Jack’s best friend, who had introduced Jack to Sara, been best man at his wedding, been Charlie’s godfather . . . gone.

Like everything else that Jack ever valued.

One way or another.

And in that last moment Jack hadn’t been able let Frank know that he’d finally forgiven him.

Which hurt even more than all that had gone before.

***********

Part 12

The journey through other SG-1 missions scudded past Daniel, but they were never the pleasant, enjoyable moments, of which Daniel knew there had been plenty. He’d been there. He absolutely knew that, even if Jack was in full-on I’m-the-leader-and-I-need-to-analyse-everything mode, there had been times when Jack had laughed. Times when he’d joked and made the local kids laugh. More and more Daniel was beginning to think that those memories were the key to everything. Finding them had to be the way of guiding Jack away from this morass of horror he was trapped in.

‘I’m here, Jack,’ Daniel said. ‘I know that you’re watching all this, and I know that it hurts. But it has to end. Somewhere it has to end. Somehow, Jack, I swear to you, we’ll get though this. Together.’

He waited.

And hoped.

But Jack’s consciousness couldn’t reach out to Daniel while his mind was too busy flogging itself bloody with images of suffering, both mental and physical.

No sooner had Daniel had that thought than another scene thrashed into view. Accompanied by a stark streak of fear that Jack tried to squash as Hathor ripped his shirt at the collar. He was pinned down, and about to be exposed to something more invasive than the torture he’d suffered in Iraq. And Daniel knew, beyond any shadow of a doubt, that the deep-seated horror and revulsion for the Goa’ulding process would be exactly how Jack would react to Daniel invading his mind when he found out what had happened. And Daniel shivered involuntarily.

He watched through Jack’s eyes as the snake was placed on his chest. There was such a feeling of terror that Daniel was almost overcome. Jack was panicking, and trying to remain as strong as he could because there was a gloating audience, and he wouldn’t give Hathor the satisfaction of seeing his despair. Christ knows, he’d learned that lesson in Iraq.

And he frickin’ well wasn’t going to let his team know how much he was really struggling not to scream in an absolute raw fear that consumed him more than he could remember anything doing since he’d picked up Charlie’s lifeless body.

And then there was a deep digging agony, as the Goa’uld struggled to find a way into the spinal column at the back of O’Neill’s neck. The pain was like nothing Daniel had ever experienced, and he felt Jack’s body spasm and twist in a fruitless attempt to prevent the process going any further. Felt the burrowing reptile journeying through Jack’s body, as the woman Tok’ra told him to fight it.

What the *fuck* do you think I’m doing?

And then there was a dim response from the Goa’uld who had also heard the instructions to hold on.

I will control your mind.

And a challenge thrown down by a man tied and seemingly helpless.

Like *hell* you will.

And the battle lines were drawn, and it was as if Jack’s brain was being consumed by fire, from the stem upwards.

Slowly.

But still Jack resisted.

With every ounce of effort he could muster he forced the Goa’uld back, and he fought the urge to give in to the pain and the loathsome intrusion. Total helplessness was something Jack O’Neill hated. He had experienced it at certain times in his life, and had fought bitterly every time. And he was damned if some freakin’ snake was going to take up residence in his head. Nosirreeyabetcha.

His head was his own.

His brain, such as it was, belonged to him.

He was not letting some goddamned reptile see everything that was hidden away upstairs.

No *way*.

So, Jack continued to repel the repulsive creature.

But . . . through that long ago fight for possession of O’Neill’s mind, Daniel sensed a trace of the battle he had more recently fought.

With Mya.

As O’Neill’s body fought to hold on long enough, in response to the memory of the salvation that would be the cryogenic chamber; there was more than that.

There was a desperation to push away something that would violate his body and mind.

Hathor’s Goa’uld.

Mya.

Something that would intrude where secrets were carefully stored and pick away at memories that were best left to rot in private.

The Goa’uld.

Something that would seek to peel away the protective layers that defended who Jack O’Neill really was.

Mya.

You are *so* not getting in my head.

A man’s head is his castle.

Out . . . you snakey rat-bastard.

Out.

Out . . . you bitch.

Out!

Out!

And Daniel felt the strength of will that pushed desperately to repel the invasion of his mind. Pressing the contaminating invasive presence outwards, driven by a sickened revulsion that anyone would be able to witness what his thoughts contained. By the horror that anyone would be a witness to his life.

The loathsome shame that a *Goa’uld* would know his innermost secrets.

The humiliation that one of his greatest enemies would know things about him that he’d not shared with his most intimate acquaintances, made Jack fight with a fury that consumed him entirely. Crucified him. In a way that, had Hathor known it, would have given her some small measure of satisfaction at what she’d inflicted on a proud and private man.

But, as the chills of the freezing cryogenic process took over, other thoughts were caught in the frozen stream of consciousness, and memories of that other, more recent, invasion took over.

There was a burning feeling all around. As if everything was surging up in a wall of flames. Angry, despairing flames. That tried to drive back ice-cold tendrils that sought to find a way through the walled heat. Tendrils that wove skilfully through the fire. Easing their way through defences that had stood for years.

Get out.

Get out!

What’re you doing?

Hathor’s Goa’uld had not penetrated them. But Mya’s skilled fingers, like invasive ivy, found the smallest cracks to weave into, found their way into his mind. And probed and investigated. As a blind person sensitively runs their fingers across an unknown face. Seeking out each tiny line that told a story of life.

No!

No!

No!

And O’Neill resisted Mya.

No!

As he had resisted his father’s blows.

No!

As he had resisted the Iraqis all those years ago.

No!

As he had resisted the Goa’uld invading his head.

So he resisted this new threat.

Get out of my head.

His mind twisted and turned using every desperate strategy of defence.

You want to invade my head? Well, fuck you.

Ducking and weaving.

Ha! Thought you’d got me there didn’t you? Well, go figure. Round one to me, I think.

Hiding.

Blocking memories.

Fighting back.

Want a fight? I’ll give you a fight. Yeahsureyabetcha.

Until, finally, he had to give in.

No way . . .

. . . you’re not . . .

. . . seeing . . .

Barriers were broken.

No way . . .

Get out . . .

. . . of . . .

. . . my head . . .

. . . you . . .

. . . *bitch* . . .

And, finally, Jack could hold out no more.

Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooo . . .

The scream was feral in its desperation and fear. Rising and throwing itself around inside Jack’s skull like an uncontrollable banshee spirit seeking release.

As Mya broke through.

And, suddenly, Daniel began to see his way through.

Jack’s memory, whirlpooled by the bitter fight to reject the Goa’uld and by the savage memory of his defence against Mya, was invaded by the bestirred debris, and . . . something . . . a very faint trace, like a brief scent carried on a following wind came to Daniel. An essence of his friend. Something indefinable, like a recollection that might or might not be real.

‘*Jack!*’ Daniel felt as if he were shouting. Screaming until his lungs were empty and his throat sore from the effort. Again and again he called out across what seemed a dark, empty expanse.

And slowly, a fraction at a time, he felt something definite shift, and rouse itself from the broken, haunting recollections. As if, finally, somehow, there was space for the real Jack O’Neill to find his way through.

‘Come on, Jack,’ Daniel encouraged. ‘Fight it! Like you fought the Goa’uld that wanted to invade your head. Fight it!’

There it was again. A faint stirring. Nothing more. But, definitely, something.

‘Remember where we went? The planet with the woman who wanted to talk to you? She messed with your head, Jack. You fought her! That’s what caused all this! But it’s okay, because we can fix it. Together.’

There!

Through the murkiness! He knew Jack was there. It was the merest something - almost indefinable, but it was Jack.

‘Come on, Jack.’

Somehow, he sensed that this was an important moment. Everywhere was almost completely dark. And, somewhere, in this wasteland, Daniel sensed, Jack O’Neill was still lost but struggling to find his way home.

And so, gathering his courage once more, Daniel moved forward. Searching for . . . what? He wasn’t totally sure.

‘Jack! I’m here! Let me in! It’s Daniel! I’m here! *Let me in, Jack!*’

And, just as he’d lost hope it was as if a door opened the slightest fraction.

And he heard a whisper.

‘Dan . . . iel?’

Faint, but definitely there.

‘Oh, God,’ Daniel sobbed. He felt tears. He felt his heart pounding fit to burst, and his blood thundering in his ears.

‘Jack?’ He knew he was crying and couldn’t help it.

And, again, distinct but distant, his name. ‘Dan . . . iel? . . . You there? . . . You . . . left . . . me . . . I . . . think . . .’

‘Left you?’

‘Umm . . . ‘

‘No, Jack. I’m here to help. I won’t leave you. You have to let me in. Let me help.’

‘He . . . lp?’

‘Yes! That’s why I’m here. To find out what’s wrong and help you fix it.’

There was a stirring of what seemed to be panic.

‘No . . . thing . . . wrong.’

‘Yes. Yes, there is. Help me, Jack.’

‘No . . . nothing . . . wrong . . . You . . . shouldn’t . . . be . . . here . . . Go . . . away . . . Need . . . you . . . to . . . go . . . away . . .’

Panic surged and things tipped on their axis, sweeping into another scene as Daniel screamed his frustration.

And Jack said coldly, ‘Then, no, I guess you couldn’t relate to me any more than I could relate to you.’

Despair washed over Jack, like cold oily water against a derelict tanker aground upon a reef, as he sat unmoving watching Daniel leave, with those seemingly careless words all that were needed to shatter the shell of their friendship.

And Jack sank his head into his hands. He couldn’t say anything. There were suspected listening devices.

Then, slowly, and with tremendous effort, Jack began gathering himself from the core outwards as if he were freezing all his feelings, gathering himself behind a wall of ice. So that he could go on, and do what he’d been ordered to do: to save the planet, once again.

No matter the sacrifice to himself.

And the watching Daniel shivered. It was a cold and unforgiving place that Jack inhabited as he regained control of himself. But it was as if his very soul was tainted by his words.

Because he’d had time to think about what he was going to say. Had time to sit there and wait for the inevitable. Like a condemned soldier who is going to be shot at dawn.

And Daniel was overcome with fear that he would lose his friend to his memories again.

Oh, God!

‘Jack! Please! We got through all that! You’re my *friend!* We got through that. It’s all in the past! It’s over! It wasn’t easy, but we did it. And we can do the same here. Are you listening, Jack?’

How far down the road beyond Daniel’s reach had Jack slipped?

And, suddenly, it was desperately important that he say, ‘I need you Jack. Now. Today. I need you to help me sort this all out. It’s all memories. Everything. It’s not real.’ The words tumbled out in furious haste. ‘Everything is stuff that’s already happened. I need you to help me sort it all out. But I . . . need you . . . anyway. Because . . . you’re . . . my . . . best friend. Jack! You’re my best friend. And I don’t want to lose you.’

Daniel felt his voice catch. Somehow, there were things he and Jack had never said, in a manly can’t-possibly-say-that sort of fashion. And Daniel could never remember saying the phrase ‘you’re my best friend’ to Jack. Or having Jack say it to him.

Faced with the possibility of losing Jack forever, and with the sad realisation that the opportunity he had now might never come again, Daniel found that it was easier, despite the oddity of things, to say words he had failed to say when he was standing with Jack face to face. Eye to eye.

And anyway, Daniel smiled slightly to himself in a fractional lightening of his mood, Jack would probably never have stood still long enough for the conversation to occur in the first place. He seemed to have an inbuilt radar system that alerted him when anything personal even became a mere blip on the horizon, and was very adept at changing course to avoid it.

But Daniel found himself wishing, with a fervency that surprised him, that, just once, he had found the courage to at least try and pin O’Neill into a corner and say how he really felt. Because, unless everything worked out for the best, he would never be truly certain that Jack had heard what he had just said.

And, from everything that he had seen of Jack’s life thus far, the man needed someone to say, whatever has happened to you in the past, however you feel about it, and yourself, you are a *good* man. A very good man. And there are people who care about you. And will always care about you.

No matter what.

And they will, importantly, care about you even if they know *everything* that you have bottled up and have been afraid to share.

‘Whatever our differences, you’re my best friend, Jack, and you taught me a great deal. About . . .’ he was going to falter. He could feel it.

Come on, Jackson. This isn’t about you. This is about saying what needs to be said to a man you admire, because you may never get another chance.

*Say it!*

And so he gripped himself mentally, and carried on.

‘You taught me about me, Jack. About myself. About making tough decisions. And the fact that I *could* make them. About confidence. And the fact that I had it. About courage. And the fact that I had that, too. All those sorts of things you taught me. About me. Because you accepted me. Because you let me be part of SG-1. Because you gave me time to learn how to be part of SG-1; how to be part of a team. And because you pushed me into corners and made me defend things important to me.’

He paused a moment. Then, ‘It wasn’t always perfect, Jack. We’d both admit that. You exasperated me by always putting military issues first, which I understand because it’s your job. And I exasperated you by always putting my research first, which was my job. And we’ve argued and disagreed. But, . . . also . . .’ and Daniel had to smile, because many of his best memories of Jack had nothing to do with being serious at all, ‘ . . . you made me laugh, Jack. You taught me how to laugh.

‘I *was* . . . a geek. I’m *still* a geek. I *like* being a geek. But I’m a confident geek who laughs now. I wasn’t that before I met you. And . . . I like the new me.’

He smiled, and hoped that, somewhere, Jack heard him and saw him smile. And knew.

‘Despite our differences, Jack, . . . I . . . admire you . . . you know?’ He paused. If Jack could hear him there was no point in letting him get big-headed about this if it could be avoided. ‘A little,’ he qualified.

He waited again.

Still nothing.

‘Sam wants you to get better. Teal’c does, too. And Doc Fraiser. And General Hammond. All of your team, Jack. I might be the one here in your head, but the others are there at your side, waiting. You’re not on your own here, Jack.’

And he hoped, somehow, that Jack heard him. And realised. And that, somehow, it helped.

‘We *all* need you, Jack. The SGC needs you. The whole world needs you. Hell, the universe does too. Whatever you’re seeing, whatever you think about yourself and what you’ve done, no matter how ugly some of what you’re seeing is right now, I know that there’s other stuff.’ Daniel found his words were just spilling out now, like water through a broken dam. He’d never say these things to Jack, ordinarily, but here, lost in O’Neill’s head, he found an eloquence that surprised even him.

‘You can’t give up, Jack. You can’t stay lost in here. There are good things in your life. You’ve just got to dig deep, Jack. Find them. Because otherwise all this . . .’ Daniel swept around,’ . . . all this stuff will win. And you can’t let it. You’re a fighter, Jack. The best there is. And you have to fight this.’ He took one last breath. ‘We all want you to get better. So c’mon, Jack, fight it!’

Did Jack hear him? Could Jack hear anything?

And yet, there was coherence where, when Daniel had started, there had been total confusion. Perhaps if he hadn’t interfered Jack would already have imploded. At least, so far as Daniel could tell, Jack must still be alive as the memories were still active, and Daniel was still experiencing them. Perhaps that was because Daniel had done what he’d done.

He decided to hold on to that positive thought.

He concentrated hard and tried to focus on words like ‘slow down’ and ‘I’m here, I’ll help you, Jack’, like a record that was stuck on the same track. He drove himself relentlessly, as he said them over and over. Refusing to believe that he couldn’t help. If he kept going, somehow he must break through. If he thought about good things maybe eventually that would happen. If that was what was needed. The trouble was that he wasn’t sure. Mya hadn’t been sure. Nobody had. There was no certainty about how to solve this.

Okay, Jack, I just want you to know that I’m still here for you, and I’m along for the ride, however long it takes.

And he hoped Jack got the message.

Because Jack O’Neill had taken him home when others had not known what to do with him. Jack O’Neil had held Daniel in his arms and rocked him like a baby when addiction had crippled his mind and body. And Jack O’Neill had become the big brother Daniel had always wished for and the father-figure he’d lost, all wrapped up in one cynical, sarcastic package. But more than that, he had, despite their differences, been Daniel’s friend. In many desperate, dark situations.

And Daniel was damned if he was going to forget any of that and give up.

‘Dan . . . iel?’

Oh, God!

Jack was there, again.

Please, please let us have more time to talk. Please.

‘Jack!’ he answered quickly. ‘I’m here. For as long as this takes.’

‘Ple . . . ase . . . Dan . . . iel . . . Help . . . me . . . Lost . . . ‘

‘Oh, God, Jack! Sure! I’ll help you. You’re not lost. I’m here with you. You need to think about good things . . . ‘

‘Good . . . things . . . ?’ He could sense O’Neill’s bitterness.

‘Yes! And don’t tell me you’ve not had good things in your life. I know you have.’

‘Dan . . . iel?’

‘Yes, Jack?’

‘Where . . . are . . . you?’

Ah. Well, he’d known that he’d have to face this sooner or later. ‘Umm . . . this will sound, ah, odd. Slightly.’

‘Odd?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Ev’ry . . . thin’s . . . odd.’

‘Odd*er*, then.’

‘As . . . in?’

‘As in . . . I’m in your head, Jack.’

‘In . . . my . . . head?’

‘Yes. Well . . . sort of. Look, we can sort that out later. For now . . . ‘

‘In . . . my . . . *head*?’

‘Yes.’ Daniel was certain Jack’s voice was vaguely stronger now. Which was a good thing.

‘Cr . . . ap.’

Or not.

‘Yes . . . umm . . . I thought you might not take it well, but . . .’

‘Dan . . . iel? Feel . . . lost . . .I . . . can’t . . . hold . . . on . . . Help . . . me . . . ‘

He’d lost him.

It was as if the idea of Daniel being in his head was too much. Which was hardly surprising, bearing in mind how this whole sorry mess had started. But, goddammit, he wasn’t an alien, he was Jack’s friend, and that should make some kind of difference.

Daniel screamed Jack’s name as things once again splintered into another memory.

Looking down the tunnel was like looking down the barrel of a gun. Straight down. No left or right turns to be had. No choices to be made, except how long he could possibly stand without firing.

Twice.

‘The ship is in position, sir,’ Carter insisted, looking up at Lotan’s ship. ‘If you’re going to do it, do it now.’

And O’Neill looked up as well, his conscience tearing him in two. If he set off the bomb, he killed the Gadmeer and Daniel Jackson. If he didn’t, the Enkarans were toast. Talk about rock and a hard place decisions, where neither decision would be the right one.

‘Daniel Jackson has made his choice, O’Neill.’

Like that in any way helps, Jack thought. Like that in *any* *way* makes me feel better.

Oh, Christ, Daniel . . . I’m so, so sorry . . . his soul cried out in despair.

Anger and desolation were outweighed by a viscous morass of guilt, as Jack pushed the button he believed would kill his team mate.

And then did it again.

And watched Carter enveloped in the blue zat gun fire.

He was killing a member of his team, again. Two shots from a zat gun kills, and once more he was having to act as judge, jury and executioner.

It was only right that if it was going to be anyone, it was going to be Carter’s commanding officer. It was down to him to administer the coup de grace. Because it had to be somebody he’d know would do it right. And somebody who would care. Not see it as another job to be done in the line of duty.

But it was more than that.

It was somebody else Jack O’Neill had let down.

And now he could do nothing but sit beside her body, which was being kept alive byl machines.

And look in hopelessness at Fraiser as she said, ‘I don’t know if she ever told you this, Colonel, but Sam made a living will. No extraordinary means.’

With ashes in his mouth he barely managed, ‘Yeah, she told me.’

‘There’s no brain activity of any kind . . .’

Of course there’s not, for crying out loud I *shot* her. With a *zat*. *Twice*.

‘ . . . no brain wave for either Sam or the Entity . . . ‘

Because I killed her, Doc. I do that. It’s what I’m frickin’ good at. My one true skill in life. Somethin’ to shout about, don’tcha think? God, I’m such an asset to the human race.

‘ . . . she’s being kept alive entirely on life support . . . ‘

Because she’s *dead*, Doc. What do you expect? She’s d-e-a-d. And she’s dead because *I* killed her. I’m not sure how you can bear to look at me. I sure can’t bear my own company right now.

‘ . . . I think it’s time to let her go, sir.’

And he knew that the special person that had been Major Carter was gone. Robbed by an entity they couldn’t control, and finally destroyed by her commanding officer. Who sat in a lonely hopeless vigil at her side. Haunted by thoughts of another bedside. Where he’d known there was nothing more to be done: despite the tubes, despite the monitors, despite the readings.

His son was dead.

It just remained for him to die.

As with Carter.

And it was his fault. Again. He’d not pressed his own opinions home hard enough. He’d not protested enough against people communicating with the Entity. In the same way that he’d not made his point clearly enough to Charlie about guns. It didn’t matter what he did in life, everything turned to ashes. Always.

He had failed. Again.

Inside he felt empty.

Desolate.

Bereft.

Responsible.

And this time he had pulled the trigger himself.

*************

Part 13

‘Jack?’ Daniel called his friend’s name. ‘I don’t blame you. Not for any of it. Sam doesn’t blame you for anything. Teal’c doesn’t blame you for anything. You have to believe me.’

Over and over and over and over until his throat was drier than the desert parched by years of no rain.

Until, eventually, ‘Don’t . . . you . . . ev . . er . . . give . . . up?’ The voice sounded drained and weary to the soul.

‘Ah . . ., no, Jack.’

‘Id . . . i . . . ot.’ There was no energy. And the word lacked Jack’s usual spark.

‘Thank you.’

‘Wel . . . come.’

There was a pause.

Then Jack asked with what sounded like exhausted puzzlement, ‘Are you rea . . . lly in my head?’

Daniel coughed. At least Jack remembered that from last time. ‘Yes.’

There was a long pause.

‘How?’

‘You remember the woman who spoke to you on the planet?’

‘Uh . . . yeah . . . ’

‘Well, after she caused all this upset in your mind, she wanted to put things right. And that involved . . . me . . . being in your head.’

‘Sweet.’ Again the word lacked the usual O’Neill sarcastic bite.

Daniel wasn’t sure where Jack was. He could hear him. And the words and voice were certainly Jack, even if the tone was flat. But he couldn’t see him. Not that he was absolutely certain he was meant to see him.

The whole situation was *still* that weird.

One hopeful thing was that Jack didn’t seem that upset at Daniel’s presence.

Yet.

Although, to be honest, he didn’t sound as if he had really come to grips with what was going on.

There was still time.

A less than encouraging thought.

‘Jack?’

No answer.

Crap!

‘Jack?’ Louder this time.

‘Umm?’

‘You okay?’

‘Not . . . sure.’

‘Oh?’

‘Feel pretty bashed up. And . . . tired. Very tired. Did Doc give me some happy juice?’ Jack’s voice tailed off as he finished speaking.

Daniel had no idea how much time had passed since this whole hop-into-your-best-friend’s-head experiment had started. But he knew that Fraiser *had* given Jack morphine.

‘Just something to help you, Jack. You were in a pretty bad way.’

‘Ummmmm . . . have . . . you . . . been . . . here . . . long?’

‘Weeeeeeell, I’m not sure, to be honest. I’m not sure how much time has passed.’

‘Oh.’

There was a long pause again, as if Jack was trying really hard to think things through.

Then, ‘Have you . . . been . . . shouting . . . at me?’

Daniel wanted to shout out loud! *Yes*! Jack had heard him! It had worked!

‘Ah, yes! Yes! Yes! Yes!’ He did a happy little mental circle dance. ‘For ages! Did you hear me?’

‘Think . . . so. Yeah.’

Daniel was continuing to ignore how very, very weird this whole conversation was. He still wasn’t one hundred per cent certain Jack really understood what was going on, or had begun to appreciate the long-reaching consequences. Which was understandable, to be fair. It wasn’t every day you woke up and found your best friend walking around inside your head.

‘It was the only way I could think of to help you. Shout at you. Try and make you realise you weren’t on your own. Help you. But . . . I . . . had to get inside . . . your . . . head . . .’ he ventured.

‘Every . . . thing . . . was . . . messed up.’

‘Ah, yes. It was. You couldn’t cope and had lost all sense of the real world. We couldn’t help you any other way.’

‘I was lost . . . I remember . . . then . . .’

‘Then?’

‘Then . . . I didn’t . . . feel . . . so . . . alone. Weird.’

It surely was. Jack still sounded indescribably weary. Still seemed to be trying to sort things out in his head. And how much of this he was going to remember when he woke up was a worrying thought that Daniel still tried to ignore.

‘You could sense me?’ he asked. If Jack had been able to do so, and was able to remember doing so then maybe there was hope for the survival of their friendship when this odd blending was over.

‘Uh . . . yeah . . . you . . . were . . . shouting . . . at . . . me . . . about . . . ‘

‘About?’

‘Uh . . . needing . . . my help . . . friendships . . . and . . . you . . . cried . . . with me . . . helped me . . . ’

Daniel was very much aware that Jack had to be worn to the very marrow because he would never usually say such things. And it was as if Jack suddenly realised that as well because a heavy silence suddenly fell between them.

Then, ‘You . . . saw . . .’

Oops! Jack was definitely starting to put the pieces together.

‘Let’s just forget about that right now, shall we?’ Daniel hurriedly tried to gloss over Jack resurgent memories. ‘You need to think about good things instead, Jack. Think about good things.’

Sounding bewildered and confused, ‘I . . . do?’

‘Yeah. I think so. I think it’s kinda like the recovery after the illness. Physiotherapy for the mind, I think.’

‘You . . . *think*?’

‘Umm . . . well . . . yeah. No one’s really sure how this all works.’

There was a long pause, and Daniel could almost sense the cogs trying to grind back into action inside his friend’s head.

Then, ‘Isn’t . . . this . . . it . . . then?’

‘No, Jack. I’m sure there’s more that you need to do.’

‘Why?’

‘Because . . .’ Drat it. Why, indeed? He could only assume, ‘ . . . Because we’re still here. But the bad stuff is over. So, I’m sure you have to do something else. Therefore, I think you have to find the other side of the coin. Good things.’

‘Umm . . . ‘

‘Remember the needing my help thing?’

‘Yeah?’

‘Trust me, Jack. This is more of it.’

He waited.

‘Jack?’

‘Dan . . . iel . . .’

‘Good things, Jack. Please. Trust me.’

‘Good . . . things?’

‘Yes. *Trust* *me*.’

There was no reply.

‘Jack?’

What was going on?

Had he lost him again?

‘Jack?’

‘Jeez . . . Daniel . . . gimme . . . a . . . break . . . here . . . I’m . . . trying . . . o . . . kay?’

And Daniel half-sobbed with the relief of it all.

Because, maybe, just maybe, Jack was finding his way home.

And slowly, and so mutedly that Daniel didn’t realise at first that anything was happening, a gentle breeze touched his face. Like the sleeping breaths of a lover, quietly tickling his skin.

His skin.

Jack’s skin.

Jack.

Standing . . .

. . . on a shoreline.

With shingle beneath his feet.

And gradually there was a calm early morning breeze that gently ruffled hair, like the well-remembered hands of a quiet elderly man with twinkling brown eyes, who had stood on this spot with Jack so many years before. When, standing together, they had watched the sunrise of a new day.

Standing alone, now, Jack looked out across the lake, watching a new dawn rise through the veiled mist that still hung over the water.

The breeze disturbed the gossamer shroud and moved it aside with patient invisible fingers, revealing the quietly spreading reaches of sunlight to the watching man, who had waited so long to see this sight, in this place, once more.

And as the rays reached out towards him with every new lapping of the water against the shoreline, a warmth spread through him.

The water came gently up to his toes, kissing his boots in gentle affection; the wind caressed his skin with the gentle greeting of a long-lost lover who can barely understand that fate has brought them together again; and the trees rustled their own heart-felt welcome in the background.

The sky slowly became an idyllic, cloudless, azure blue; and the lake a faintly rippling picture-book perfection.

As if it had all been saving this wonderful moment just for him.

And within Jack, Daniel sensed a settling peace that grew. There always seemed to be something restless about O’Neill, and yet here there was an ever-increasing serenity, an acceptance of things. Because he was alone. There was no one from whom he had to shield his demons, no one with whom he had to pretend that things were fine, no one he had to protect. There was just nature at her most tranquil, mothering him.

And there was a simple and calm acceptance that here he belonged, and that here he was safe.

‘I did it, grandpa. It’s mine, now.’

The words were said so quietly that Daniel almost missed them, as they were caught by the breeze and carried out over the water.

And the feelings of fulfilment and satisfaction were overwhelming as O’Neill stood in quiet contemplation of what had been lost for so many years, but which was now *his* land.

And he stood to attention, in honour of the old man who had shown him that not everything in life was selfish and mean.

‘There may be no pesky fish here Jacky boy, but that doesn’t matter. It’s the peace and quiet that matter . . . you watch the sun come up over the lake and you know it’ll be a good day . . . you watch the sun set below those trees behind you and you know it’ll be another good day tomorrow.’

The old man reached into his deep jacket pocket ‘These are for you, Jacky. They’re mine. My Air Force medals. I want you to have them. Keep them safe . . . ‘

He folded his grandson’s hands around the glass cases.

‘You remind me of me when I was your age, Jacky. So much.’ He smiled a sad smile. ‘Life’s not always easy, you know. But, do your best. No one can ask any more of you. And you can’t ask any more of yourself.’

Jack looked down at the cases and then into his grandpa’s kindly eyes.

And promised to treasure them always.

Which he had.

As reminders of one brief cherished summer.

As reminders of a kindly gentleman.

As reminders that there was more to life than what he saw every day.

He’d hoarded them in his school locker. And taken them out in private moments of secret pleasure to look long at them. And when he’d bought a place of his own he’d put them up in full view, over the fireplace.

In memory.

And respect.

And love.

Daniel was surprised at how long O’Neill could stand and appreciate his surroundings. Relaxed. There was no tenseness in the shoulders. There were no rapidly assessing thoughts pulsing through his brain. There were no swift eye movements when something stirred in the trees.

There was simply peace. A soul-deep, spirit-resurrecting calmness.

And, slowly, precious memories slipped into his mind, like the first drops of fresh clear water melting from the ice in early spring, and trailing down the course of the newly reborn stream; gently clearing the way for more to follow.

At first there was just a trickle of warm, gentle and peaceful thoughts. Not things readily associated with Jack O’Neill.

His friend was coming back. Daniel was sure of it. Somehow, he could sense it.

Jack was healing, as the old ritual intended.

Kneeling at his mother’s bedside young Jack was telling a joke, and watching the smile light up her face; making her greying roughened skin seem to shine with a rare expression of life.

And constantly Jack held her hand and passed his strength to her after a bad day, with a feeling of love that was stronger than Daniel had expected to sense between them.

With a sudden gesture of affection, Jack took his mother into his arms and hugged her close, then, pulling back, he looked into her eyes as she raised a wavering hand and ran it down his cheek in the most gentle of caresses.

It was an intimate moment between two people who had faced a bitter adversity together.

‘I love you, Jacky.’ Her voice was the fragile wing-beat of an injured bird.

‘I love you too, mom.’ Jack’s words were quiet, but spoken with a heartfelt sincerity that moved Daniel to tears, because he was so unused to hearing such emotion from his friend.

He heard it again as Jack knelt beside a small stone, engraved simply with a name and two dates. He was holding a paper held tightly in his hand as if it was the most precious manuscript known to man.

‘Mom, I did it. They took me. It says, “We are pleased to offer you a place on the Basic Training Program for the United States Air Force.”’

Pride stiffened a back that had had to carry more than its fair share of burdens thus far in life, as Jack continued, ‘I promise, mom, I *promise*, to make you proud of me. And grandpa. I promise to make grandpa proud. I’ll win medals, just like he did. And be brave. Just like grandpa.’

And Jack’s hand brushed across the carved headstone, in silent affection and farewell.

And Daniel hoped that somehow, Jack realised his mother and grandpa would be proud of everything he’d achieved.

The desire to succeed, the aspirations, the yearning to be better than his broken upbringing had prepared him to be, but, ultimately, the need to do something that would have made them both smile with pride, drove Jack onwards.

But, in addition to the pride, the young man’s smile became wider and more irrepressible as his natural sense of humour was given room to expand and come out to play more often, as he gained a popularity he’d never enjoyed at school.

He shed his roots like a snake left behind its old skin, and found the companionship and respect so far denied him in life during his early days of training in the Air Force.

It was hard work, but it was *fun*.

‘You’ve done good, Jack,’ Daniel said. ‘I’m sure your mom and grandpa are both proud of you.’ He hoped Jack heard his words, but it seemed less important now, because the tension and despair and anguish that had prevailed before were gone.

And Daniel was sure that these much happier thoughts were drawing Jack away, beyond any chance of being reclaimed by the clutches of the lost world he’d been inhabiting.

********

Part 14

It was obvious to the watchers that something significant had happened.

The two co-joined men were much quieter. Nestled together as if they were both exhausted and sought rest and comfort in each other’s arms. There was no more twitching, turning or sudden uncontrolled movements in response to things only they were experiencing.

Mya tried to sense their thoughts. Closing her eyes she attempted to merely connect with their general feelings. They were faint, but she was certain that there had been a sea change. She was aware that both men were calmer. Warmer.

***********

Gentle, quiet thoughts, of times of peace.

‘I love you, Jack O’Neill.’ Sara played with his hair as he lay beside her on the grass looking up at her. And she smiled into his eyes.

A corresponding smile drew itself across his face. ‘Love you too, Sara.’ The words held the deep sincerity and emotion with which Daniel remembered Jack speaking to his mother. ‘And . . . thank you.’

‘For?’ Sara’s eyes twinkled with affection and understanding.

‘Not giving up on me.’

‘I’ll never give up on you, Jack.’

He reached up and grasped the hand that ruffled his hair. ‘Marry me, Sara.’ It was a spur of the moment request, and yet he’d never felt so sure of anything in his life. This woman, who had refused to let his inbuilt childhood barriers stand in her way; this woman, who made him feel like the most special person in the universe, . . . loved him. Unbelievable as he found that.

‘Sara? Marry me.’

And her smile was the most wonderful thing he’d ever seen, before he heard the word he’d unconsciously been holding his breath for. Spoken with a trust and a love that overwhelmed him, along with a sense of well-being and belonging that Jack had, without knowing it, been searching for all his life.

‘Many of you good folks’ll know that when I first met Jack O’Neill he was a right royal pain in the . . . ah,’ the tall man Daniel now knew as Frank Cromwell suddenly looked a fraction embarrassed, and slid his eyes sideways towards the bride.

Sara laughed and waved her hand in a carry-on gesture. Jack was trying to put his Best Man off by firing berries at him, plucked from the table decorations.

‘Well . . . anyway,’ Frank coughed, as he continued, ignoring the berry that had just hit him on the nose. ‘He and I started Special Ops training together. And Jack was nearly out on his ear in the first three minutes. He decided that . . .’ A berry struck his own ear, but Cromwell proceeded doggedly, ‘. . . he would treat the whole thing as something of a joke.’

He aimed a fierce glare at his friend as a further berry rebounded off his cheek. ‘And being the Jack O’Neill that we all know and,’ without warning he swatted O’Neill round the head, to prevent further missiles heading his way, ‘. . . love, so much,’ laughter echoed around the room, ‘he instantly annoyed the instructor who, being a man of great insight and discernment, knew a troublemaker and Grade A clown when he met one.’

The room rocked with laughter, whilst Jack spread his arms wide in an innocent who-me? gesture.

‘However, thanks to my tutelage and long-suffering guidance Jack survived that early set-back, which may, or may not, be a good thing for the future of the United States Air Force.’

More laughter smothered the room.

‘But, I need to tell you, Sara, he’s your responsibility now. I feel that, over recent months, I’ve issued you enough warnings about his inability to sing, his terrible sense of humour, his incomprehensible desire to spend much of his spare time sitting beside ponds with no fish in them; to say nothing of his sadly misguided belief that ice hockey is a superior sport to football.

‘There is also the worrying fact that, at any moment, he’s likely to annoy a superior officer enough to get busted back to Second Lieutenant, which will seriously impede his ability to support a wife. However,’ Cromwell grinned widely, ‘you’ve chosen to ignore my concerns. So, I therefore wish you well with him!’

He raised his glass and the whole room resonated to cheers of, ‘Jack and Sara!’

And the audience rose as one, and Jack felt that life could get no better than this.

He was wrong.

‘A name?’

‘It’s usual, Jack.’

‘I don’t know. I was kinda hoping for a daughter.’

‘Sorry to disappoint you!’

‘Aw, shucks. You could never . . . I never . . . he’s not. . . I mean . . .’

Sara laughed.

And Jack was sure he was going to drop the precious bundle he held. ‘Y’see, I’d thought, . . . maybe . . . Charlotte.’

‘Oh?’

‘For . . . my . . . mother.’

Sara stroked their son’s soft-downed hair. ‘Well, how about . . . Charlie . . . then?’

And tears flecked his eyelids.

‘That’s . . . perfect. Just perfect.’ He looked down. ‘Hi, Charlie. Son.’

Warmth.

Holding and hugging Charlie.

Holding and hugging Sara.

Holding and hugging Charlie and Sara.

Laughter.

Laughing with Charlie, at the most ridiculous things.

Laughing with Sara, at the most ridiculous things.

Laughing with Charlie and Sara at the most ridiculous things.

Being a father and a husband.

Daniel was no psychologist, and he had no doubt that Jack would have scoffed the idea out of court, but Jack had been denied a true childhood of his own. So, it seemed, he was determined that his own son would not be denied one. And Jack was also, in many ways, experiencing the childhood *he* had never had and was making up for anything he had missed by joining in with his son. And others: Merrin, Reetou Charlie, Kayla and Tessa. . . .

And for all the pus-filled reminiscences Daniel had experienced, there were matching lancing moments of relief and happiness.

The exhilaration of looping the loop in a manoeuvre that nearly cost the exuberant pilot his wings.

The adrenaline rush of that first HALO parachute drop.

Daniel knew it was needed, this bathing in the warm waters of good times, and happy memories.

And Daniel needed to see these things as much as Jack did. Because he was worn to the core. Wrung dry of emotion by what he had seen. And he needed to be sure that both he and Jack had a store of feelings that would counter the degrading, soul-destroying horrors they had witnessed together.

They both had to believe that there was a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. That there was a possible resurrection after crucifixion.

And Daniel felt the tears well up in his own eyes, as Jack’s heart pounded with emotion and he thudded his friend across the back with the most rib-squeezing hug. ‘Space monkey!’

Followed by a cascade of exuberantly mixed up images that swept past his eyes.

Meeting the Asgard for the first time, aboard a strange ship; reaching out in wonderment to take hold of a proffered seemingly frail grey hand. Holding it gently, as if afraid it would be crushed in his own larger stronger grip if he pressed too hard.

Daniel’s own face . . . sharing a meal and a hockey game on television after a mission . . . any mission . . . there were so many to choose from . . . good times . . . good memories . . .

Carter’s face . . . baiting her about her science experiments . . . wagging an admonishing finger when technical explanations had advanced beyond the five words Jack usually allowed.

Teal’c’s face . . . boxing . . . brotherhood, trust and honour.

Hammond’s face . . . ‘continued patience, latitude and understanding’ . . . respect.

Fraiser.

Cassie.

Laira.

‘I’m a big fan of fireworks,’ said with a childish pleasure Jack rarely allowed others to see.

Woooooooah? When the *hell* had he *kissed Sam*? Daniel couldn’t help but laugh. The moment was brief, but sweet, and left the Colonel bathed in feelings of pure contentment.

And then Jack was looking at Daniel over a bowl of Fruit Loops.

Ahhhhhh. That enigmatic smile was totally explained now!

Jeeeeezzzzz. Carter would kill him if she knew!!!!!

And . . . playing . . . golf? Through the Stargate!! In those socks?! With Teal’c!!

Daniel had to laugh to himself . . . Hey, Jack, you sliced that shot!

‘We are brothers, O’Neill.’ Teal’c’s warm tones spoke untold volumes beyond the few words.

Daniel struggled to work out where they were. In space. Of course. On board the drifting X-301, waiting to die. Yet there was such a feeling of comradeship and affection that Daniel felt a tad jealous. They were two of a kind, Teal’c and O’Neill: warriors who would make any sacrifice in their cause, no matter the pain. Daniel felt the flood of emotion, including embarrassment that washed over the Colonel. Heard his stilted ‘Backatcha,’ but at the same time knew the depths that O’Neill felt but could not express. So much was sealed behind those defensive brown eyes, the flippant mouth and deflecting humour.

And Daniel knew that O’Neill would probably never forgive the intrusion because sharing was not his style. He designed defensive bridges with the ability of a master architect, and built them to last with the care and skill of a first class engineer.

The warmth was spreading through the unconscious O’Neill like an infusion of fresh blood.

Love, companionship, comradeship. All there in a protective blanket of emotions.

And Daniel felt his necessary influence slipping.

And his required presence dwindled.

And he drifted away.

Alone.

********

Part 15

Carter stood beside Mya, and watched as Daniel’s face slowly lost its haunted pinched look, and Jack’s its harrowed nightmare-driven demeanour. Together their faces relaxed, and lines smoothed out. It had happened before, but this turning of the tide lasted for longer and longer, until she began to hope that the tempest was over.

Daniel had gathered in his friend again and held him tightly against his chest so that Jack’s cheek rested where he must be able to subconsciously sense Daniel’s comforting heartbeat. A feeling that would tell him he was not alone. And he noticeably snuggled in and curled up, as the two men slept.

Sam watched for a long, long time. Daniel looked so young, and yet so protectively responsible, even in sleep. The colonel looked for all the world like an over-grown schoolboy. His hair, as usual, was mussed all-ends-up, giving him a childishly appealing appearance.

‘Is it over?’ Carter asked, looking at Mya, after waiting those long, long minutes for the two men to show signs of disturbance again without anything happening.

‘I believe that it might be,’ she replied quietly. ‘We may have to wait a while longer to be certain. But they both appear to be at peace, which I take to be a good omen. It would seem that your friend has completed his task well.’

Carter nodded. ‘Yes.’

She watched and couldn’t help but think, ‘They may look peaceful now, but just wait until the Colonel wakes up.’

Mya half-smiled, and Sam knew the woman was worried about the men waking up and whether everything would okay. She tried to put that unwelcome thought out of her own mind.

**********

Jack shifted slightly, as a gradual awareness of mind, body and spirit seeped through him. His mind ached ferociously, as if it had been mashed up under some huge gladiatorial hammer; his body ached through the marrow of every bone and his spirit was drained. So . . . not feeling so good then.

Reluctantly, after a time, he opened his eyes.

His head really hurt.

Badly.

Very badly.

Disorientation washed over him as he tried to dredge up memories of where he was and why. He had a sluggish feeling, as if he’d been drugged. His vision was blurred. And, in fact, he seemed to be blind in one eye.

Crap. That wasn’t good.

People were talking away to his right. He squinted towards them with the one eye that seemed to work and found himself looking across . . . a . . . chest.

*A chest*?

Calling on long years of training, he didn’t move but let the one eye that could see anything perform a much needed reconnaissance.

It was definitely a chest.

And a man’s chest at that.

Resisting the desire to shy away rapidly, Jack let his eye rove. Upwards he could see a chin; downwards a chest and legs.

Sideways there were gurneys.

So, he was in the Infirmary.

Which meant . . . his sluggish brain assimilated the information, and Jack nearly choked . . . he was lying on another man’s chest . . . in public.

Crap!

It slowly dawned on him that the reason he couldn’t open his other eye was because it was mashed up against the man’s shoulder in a very intimate way.

Double crap.

He tried to move his left hand, and found that he couldn’t. Not easily anyway.

Slowly, so as not to attract attention, he looked down, and bemusedly found he couldn’t move it because it was taped. To another hand. The man’s hand.

This was *so* not funny.

Okay . . . more information needed.

He raised his head with infinitesimal stealth. Because he didn’t want to be seen and because he was certain that any undue movement would make his pounding skull roll off his shoulders and on to the floor.

Wooooooohhhhhhhhhh???

Okay, so *what* was going on here?

‘Colonel?’ Janet’s voice. Damn. Rumbled. Did she sound rather worried, or was it just him?

‘Ummmm. Doc.’ He gathered his woolly thoughts, ‘I seem to be a bit snared up here?’

‘Yes.’

‘Well, wanna tell me what’s going on and why I’ve grown an extra arm? Body?’ He slowly rolled over and off the chest, with careful consideration for his thundering head. He looked down at his hand, and followed the line of sight to its natural conclusion. ‘That looks suspiciously like . . . Daniel?’

Fraiser was definitely looking shifty.

She coughed. ‘Ahhhhhhhhhh, I don’t think that you’re really ready yet to take in everything that’s happened, Colonel.’

Damned shifty.

‘Doc! Why am I tied up to Danny?’

‘Ahhhhhhhhhh, because we’re not sure that the right time has come to untie you’

‘What right time? Whatcha talkin’ about? Doc?’

He became aware of another presence. Someone who had caught Fraiser’s cough. ‘Ahhhhhhhhhh humph, Colonel.’

‘General?’ O’Neill looked at his commanding officer, ‘Would somebody tell me what the hell is going on here? Is Danny okay?’ O’Neill was overtaken by sudden concern.

‘Ahhhhhhhhhh, actually, Colonel, it was you we were worried about,’ Fraiser admitted. ‘Daniel’s just fine. He’s sleeping at the moment, but he’ll wake up soon.’

Jack looked from her to Hammond, ‘Well will somebody AHHHHHHHHHH tell me what the hell’s been GOING ON!!!’

Fraiser and the General exchanged uncertain glances.

‘What’s the last thing you remember, Jack?’ Hammond took the lead.

‘Umm . . .’ Jack searched his mind, wincing with the painful effort. ‘A woman . . . on a planet we visited. P something or other. She . . . wanted to ask . . . some questions,’ he paused as recollections became less clear.

‘And then?’

‘Not sure. Think I passed out.’ He looked anxiously from one to the other, ‘What? What?’

‘You don’t remember anything else?’

He searched his mind. There was . . . something. Something. He could almost touch it . . .

Something about . . . Daniel . . .

His head hurt if he tried to think too deeply, and yet . . .

O’Neill struggled to untangle the scrambled mess his mind seemed to be in.

‘I was . . . dreaming . . . I think. Lots of stuff. Mixed up, kinda.’

‘About?’

He remembered . . . dad . . . mom . . . school . . . sheesh. What the *heck* had been going on here? He rarely thought about those days if he could help it. And . . . Frank . . . and . . . lots and *lots* of other stuff he liked to pack away nicely in carefully locked boxes, thank you very much.

‘Just . . . stuff.’

He narrowed his eyes as he saw Fraiser and Hammond exchange glances.

‘Stuff, sir?’ Fraiser asked.

‘Oh, for crying out loud! Just life stuff, okay? I don’t really remember.’

Which was true. He didn’t. But things were coming back to him. More rapidly than he wished.

‘Good things?’ The power monger just couldn’t let up, could she?

‘No, not really. Not most of it, anyway. Seem to remember it hurting a bit. Sorta. Look, Doc, General, is this strictly necessary? And you still haven’t told me why I’m HOLDING HANDS WITH DANIEL!!’

‘On the planet the woman you spoke to messed with your mind,’ Hammond said, somewhat vaguely, Jack thought.

‘Un, huh?’

‘Colonel, what I’m saying is that what she did messed up your mind.’

‘With respect, General, I’d say that happened way before then, ’ Jack joked thinly.

Hammond half-smiled. ‘Jack, you were in deep trouble.’

O’Neill frowned and waited for his CO to elaborate further.

‘You were going insane with pain. This woman had managed to touch your mind in a way we didn’t know how to deal with. So, we eventually had to ask her for help.’

‘You went back to the planet?’

‘Yes.’

‘And they helped?’

‘With some assistance from Doctor Jackson.’

‘Danny?’ O’Neill looked down at the taped hands. He felt they were likely to up and slap him across the face at any moment. ‘How?’

Why did he have this nasty, sneaky feeling he already knew what Hammond was going to say?

‘Doctor Jackson had to get inside your head, Jack. With the help of the people who interrogated you. They didn’t mean to harm you permanently back on the planet. But it was out of control. The whole thing was killing you. We had to calm you down. Help you. Getting inside your head was the only way to do it.’

‘*In* *my* *head*?’

Yep. Bullseye. Somehow, he’d just *known* that was what the General was going to say.

That meant that Danny had seen . . . what?.

*Everything*.

If he had wandered around with a free-to-view ticket then Daniel Jackson probably knew as much about Jack O’Neill as anyone . . . on the face of the planet. Jack had never been very comfortable with people knowing certain things about him at the best of times. Now, a man he considered to be his best friend, or *had* considered to be his best friend, had crawled around like a traitor inside his head.

Sara had known some things, but he’d prepared himself for the moment when he had told her about his father, and about mom. Just having Daniel slide on in was an invasion of privacy beyond anything Jack had ever experienced before.

‘Crap!’ He lifted his hand and made to rip away the tape that bound him to Daniel.

‘Colonel! Don’t!’ Fraiser cried.

He narrowed his eyes and tried to burn her to a crisp with his glance. ‘Why not?’

‘We don’t know when it’ll be safe to separate the two of you. Mya, the alien, said to wait until you were both conscious.’

‘It was the only way these people had ever used to help someone suffering as you were,’ Hammond was saying. ‘They had to study some ancient texts and follow ancient procedures.’

And that made it better how, exactly?

‘And you allowed this?’ He made sure each word was icicle cold.

‘Yes, Colonel. I allowed it because we couldn’t think of any other way to get you back. We were losing you. You were . . . going insane . . . right in front of our eyes . . . from pain.’Hammond held O’Neill’s eyes with his own. ‘Don’t you dare blame Doctor Jackson for this. He took a very brave decision on a procedure we weren’t sure would work. But I authorised it. We were out of options, son. And so, quite frankly, were you.’

‘Yes, sir.’ Arctic tone. Brief and brittle. Hope you get the message, sir.

Hammond tried again. ‘Jack, this was done because we . . . *we*, Jack, not just Doctor Jackson . . . really didn’t know what else to do. So, if you’re going to be mad at Doctor Jackson you need to be mad at all of us first.’ He smiled as if to get O’Neill to share the joke.

His 2IC was having none of it. ‘Fine.’ He rolled over and presented his back to the infirmary as much as he could with his hand still attached to Daniel. He studied the wall for some time, before shutting his eyes. Blocking everyone out, and his thoughts in.

Therefore he missed Hammond shrugging at Doctor Fraiser and mouthing, ‘That went well,’ with a grimace as he left the room.

‘He’ll get over it,’ Fraiser muttered in reply.

***********

He didn’t get over it.

He didn’t get past it.

He didn’t get under it, for that matter.

And he didn’t get through it, either.

Instead he wallowed in it.

It wasn’t his usual practice but he couldn’t help it.

He knitted back together, thread by thread, everything he could remember of the past couple of days. Until he had a fairly clear picture. And it was not one that he liked very much.

Lying with his back stubbornly presented to the rest of the world as he waited for Daniel to wake up, he tried to recall what had been going on from the time he recollected leaving his team and accompanying the woman on the planet to a separate room. Slowly, like whips of smoke scenting the air, he slowly recalled the invasion by the woman, Mya, and his desperate attempts to keep her from seeing the darkest depths of his mind. He knew that, as she insisted and he resisted, important barriers had crumbled in the battle for supremacy in his mind. But it was as if his mind had now blocked out much of that conflict, perhaps as a protective mechanism in order to prevent a repeat of what had happened as a result.

He remembered feeling hazy when he returned to the rest of his team, feeling as if he’d been moving through glue. He remembered wanting to tell them what had happened, and yet feeling ashamed. And confused. And his head had been starting to hurt like nothing he’d ever experienced before.

He had recollections of simply wanting to get back to the SGC in the belief that he could sort things out from there.

Then, he could simply recall an overwhelmingly painful torrent of images that had pulsated through his head. Uncontrollably. He’d felt as if he was drowning. Choking on the debris of his own sordid past.

He’d tried to stifle it. Shut everything back up in protective boxes again.

Obviously, he’d failed.

Now, he deliberately shut everyone out, even refusing to look at Fraiser when she came to check his heart rate and take some blood samples, as he relived the scenes that Daniel must also have seen.

And tried to work out how best to react.

And couldn’t.

He couldn’t remember the last time he’d truly shared any of his feelings with anyone. Apart from, apparently, Thor and the Asgard, and somehow they were never around enough to count. Even Sara had eventually accepted that he was the emotional equivalent of an overly stubborn clam.

Now, people who knew how much he required his privacy had allowed Daniel to wander through his mind like someone going from stall to stall at the fleamarket.

Hammond and Fraiser knew what was in his personal files. They had to, as his doctor and his commanding officer. They also knew he never discussed them. Ever.

That it was all strictly off-limits.

And yet, they sanctioned this. There had to have been another way.

Other avenues to have been explored before proceeding down this one.

Letting someone who knew him have access to all his personal memories, thoughts, and emotions.

It was like being mentally raped. He couldn’t think of any other equivalent.

And there was a huge shame about what Daniel had witnessed.

His childhood.

For one thing.

Iraq.

For another.

Oh, God.

Things he’d shut out himself, let alone having someone he knew sit back and watch it in all its grimly technicoloured detail.

Wrapped up in his turmoiled emotions Jack closed everyone and everything out as a slow burning anger grew. It scorched his own bruised feelings, until he was able to forget the bonds of friendship, in the furnace of the fury that raged inside him. How the hell could Hammond and Fraiser have allowed it to happen?

How the hell could Daniel have thought that he would want him to walk around inside his head, a place O’Neill rarely examined too closely himself? Had the man learned nothing over the years they’d served together? Had he not taken account of O’Neill’s reticence about his personal life? Jesus H. Christ the man was a multi-doctorate academic. He didn’t need a picture book to explain it all. He had more brain cells than a whole brigade of Marines, not that that was a fair comparison.

He should have freakin’ *known*.

Carter should have found another way. That’s what she was there for, right?

Feeling as if someone had scrubbed out his mind with a scouring pad, and still left him with a rim of festering dirt, he lay and picked at the filth with furious mental fingers. Unable to come to terms with this most intrusive of invasions.

And so when Daniel woke up things did not go too well.

*********

Part 16

With a hazy consciousness sifting into his mind Daniel lay for a while letting his mind play with thoughts, as he tried to remember what had happened to him to make him feel so drained of energy. He could hear comforting infirmary sounds, and could sense someone beside him.

Like the proverbial bolt of lightning the whole unhappy scenario came back to him and Daniel opened his eyes wide.

Shit.

Jack.

Oh, crap.

Daniel turned his head . . .

. . . to find deep brown eyes looking straight at him like lasers.

‘Uh, hi . . . Jack.’

‘Daniel.’ Jack’s eyes were cold. Empty. Piercing. Accusing. ‘Have a good time? Like whatcha saw?’

Daniel sighed. Let’s not mess around then. Straight on to the attack. Gee, thanks, Jack. How about, thanks for my sanity, Daniel? How about thanks for taking part in an experiment that could have gone really, really wrong? Sure, Jack, you’re welcome.

Still, he’d known it might be like this.

Yeah, true. But he’d hoped it wouldn’t be.

It was obvious things were going to take time. But at least Jack seemed . . . normal. Furious. Bitter. Unforgiving. But at last he was Jack. And not curled up in so much pain it was as much agony to watch as it looked to be curled up.

The procedure seemed to have worked.

Daniel took a deep steadying breath, and thought back over the times he’d tried to apologise while in Jack’s head for the invasion he’d committed. Jack obviously had no recollections of those.

He also thought back to the decision he’d made before Mya had started the procedure: that if Jack survived then that would be enough. If he never forgave Daniel for what he’d done, well, so be it. For Daniel the reward would be that his friend – ex-friend if necessary – was able to walk around and operate as a normal human being. And not end his days in some asylum for the insane because no one knew how to help him, and cure him of the brutal suffering he was enduring, except by drugging him senseless and locking him away.

That thought alone gave Daniel the fortitude to face Jack’s lancing eyes.

‘Jack, I didn’t understand most of it. Honestly,’ God would forgive him a little – okay whopping – white lie in the name of friendship, surely?

‘Yeah, right.’

The brown eyes were looking up at the ceiling now. Shutting him out completely.

‘I couldn’t make sense of stuff, Jack. It was all . . . too confusing.’

A frozen silence greeted his words.

And Daniel decided not to push it. Jack needed time to understand what had happened and why. And maybe after that he would accept it.

The signs were not comforting when Janet came to untie their hands, however, as Jack simply took the tape and ripped it off before Janet could move. He then threw it away from the gurneys and rolled over to face the wall, with both his hands clasped together as if to stubbornly deny that the traitorous contact with Daniel had ever happened.

‘Toys and pram come to mind,’ Daniel said snittily as he sat up.

‘Daniel . . .’ Fraiser warned quietly.

‘Yeah, yeah, all right.’ Actually, he felt a little bad for having said it, but, hey, Jack wasn’t the only one with issues over this.

Looking at Janet he knew damned well the next stop for him was a debriefing with Fraiser, who obviously knew lots about Jack’s past because of her access to his medical files. But, still, as he eased himself off the gurney and agreed to meet her in a couple of hours he found himself debating hard about how much to say about what.

An hour later, while still washing himself down in the showers in a vain hope that constant sluicing would cleanse away much of the stain of guilt he felt and also the dirty memories of what he’d experienced, he was still contemplating that question.

***********

With all her tests completed, Fraiser had no reason to keep O’Neill on the base. She hated the fact that throughout there had been none of his usual comments about Napoleonic power mongers, or snide remarks about Dracula as she took a syringe of blood for analysis. In fact O’Neill had made no comments at all, he had simply studiously ignored her eyes and examined the corners of the infirmary instead. His cold shoulder treatment was hard to accept, but she decided to just get through it with a professional attitude, and hope that he would eventually come round. As she knew the rest of SG-1 did, for they were faring no better in the O’Neill popularity stakes than she was at present.

‘There we are, sir. All done.’

He rolled his sleeve down. ‘That it?’ his voice was distant. As if he cared not one jot for her opinion.

‘Yes, sir.’ Fine. If you want to play at distant professionalism two can play that game.

‘What? No medication to take? No recovery plan?’ There was no care or concern in his voice.

‘No, sir.’

‘Fine. I’m outta here, then.’

And sliding off the bed he strode away without a backward glance.

‘Thank you Doctor Fraiser. I’ve enjoyed my stay. You took such good care of me, *again*,’ Janet murmured to herself as she labelled the Colonel’s blood samples.

Sooner or later he would end up back in her infirmary with his ass in a sling, and they would either establish a new working relationship that involved less of the friendly humour and good-natured grumbling she was used to, or they would slip back into the trusting relationship they had fallen into over the years. She could cope with either one, it would just be painful for a while for it to be the former.

‘Talking to yourself, Doc?’ Daniel asked, strolling in with his hands in his pockets.

‘Ummmm, I get a reasonable conversation that way.’

‘Jack still here then?’

They met each other’s eyes and half-smiled in sympathetic understanding.

‘Actually,’ she indicated towards the bare bed, ‘he just left.’

‘Ah. So I just missed him.’ Daniel seemed unsure whether that was a good or a bad thing. After his own dismissal from the infirmary the previous day, Janet had stubbornly held on to O’Neill a night longer hoping against hope that the Colonel would get over his poor humour in that extra time.

Some chance.

‘Give him time, Daniel. He *will* get over it.’

Daniel grimaced.

Janet smiled encouragingly, hiding her own doubts. ‘He just needs a little time. Give him a few days, and then go and check on him.’

**************

The Last Part

The sun cast long shadows across the yard.

Sitting on the deck outside his house in the late afternoon, Jack listened to the sounds of children playing that carried on the faint breeze. People shouting in laughter. And a dog barking excitedly. There was the scent of a barbecue starting to taint the air with the charred smell of wood smoke and the rich aroma of roasting steaks.

He’d been sitting there much of the day. Occasionally he’d sipped at his beer, and once or twice he’d got up to change the music in the CD player. Now ‘Aida’ had played its course and he couldn’t find the inclination to move.

He listened to the sounds of people being together. Children. Families. Friends.

And thought about the child he’d lost. The family he’d lost. The best friend he’d lost.

Charlie. Sara. Frank.

And the family he still could have. The best friend he still could have.

If he could just find the means to reach out.

It had taken three days to reach this point.

Three whole days.

And a whole lot of beer.

And a whole lot of music played as loudly as he dared without causing the neighbours to come calling.

And enough exhausting exercise to make his knees discover an entirely new level of complaining.

And much long and deep soul-searching.

*Much* long and deep soul-searching.

He had gradually found that he remembered more and more of the turmoil that had gone on inside his head and if he remembered it he was pretty certain Daniel did as well.

The first day home, Jack had taken his hockey stick and driven himself to exhaustion thundering pucks against the wall of his house. As a defence against overspilling emotions it was something he’d been using all his life. Which was fine, until he realised that Daniel probably knew that about him too, now.

The stick still lay away in the corner of the yard where he’d thrown it as he raged over that thought.

Sitting with his head in his hands he’d wanted to cry.

Instead, he’d donned sweatpants and top, and literally run himself into the ground.

It had helped somewhat with sleeping, until the nightmares struck. Then he’d ended up pacing the decking until the early hours.

Mentally and physically worn out, he’d had no choice but to begin to think things through.

And the second day had been hard.

Churning through so much that he was certain Daniel now knew about him.

But, also, Jack began to think about the best friend he’d lost, because he’d been too stubborn to reach out and find a compromise. To understand the other side of the story.

Frank Cromwell was dead and gone now, but, at the very last, when he’d watched the man whose life story had for so long been inextricably linked to his own slip away into the black hole, Jack had felt his regrets at what couldn’t be undone consume him in a similar black hole.

Which was something else Daniel knew about him, too, he supposed.

He’d grabbed sweats again, and once more run himself to exhaustion.

Now, today, the third day, he was calmer.

If they hadn’t done what they’d done, if Hammond hadn’t given the okay, if Fraiser hadn’t monitored it all, if Daniel hadn’t taken a hell of a risk with something they hadn’t really been sure would work, then, by all accounts he, Jack O’Neill, would be lying in a bundle of agony somewhere, or committed to an institution for the rest of his days. Not something that he really wanted to dwell on.

They had made the best call they could, having weighed the options available at the time. As he did every time he made a command decision. Some turned out better than others. Some came down in flames. Like Frank’s decision to leave him behind. Like his decision to shut Frank out of his life after he’d been rescued.

And his friends had not made their decision lightly. He knew that.

‘I’m sorry, Jack.’

He had gradually remembered those words echoing through his head.

Continuously.

Daniel had made endless apologies.

In a tone of voice that suggested he was really not sure Jack would accept them. But in a tone of voice that suggested he would still carry on despite that.

‘You’re my best friend, Jack.’

He remembered that, too.

Had dwelt long and hard on that phrase as he sipped beer on the deck today, sitting head back, looking at a sky that gradually changed from azure blue to salmon pink through to early evening grey.

‘You’re my best friend, Jack.’

And sometimes it was Daniel’s face he saw.

And sometimes it was Frank’s.

And sometimes it was a curious mixture of both.

‘You’re my best friend, Jack.’

The door bell rang.

Splintering his thoughts apart.

Three guesses.

Four. Could be Fraiser.

Five. Might just be Hammond at an outside bet.

It wasn’t.

Deep down he’d known it wouldn’t be.

The two men stood in awkward silence, avoiding each other’s eyes.

Then, ‘Can I come in?’

He really, really wanted to say no.

‘Ah, yeah. I guess.’

He wasn’t sure he was ready for this.

He opened the door, and let Daniel pass into the hallway.

They stood awkwardly for moment as Jack shut the door. Daniel shifted from foot to foot like a nervous teenager meeting the father of his first ever date for the very first time. Then Jack gestured towards the sunken well of the living room and they made their way down the steps, awkwardly avoiding any unnecessary contact. Daniel perched on the edge of a seat and then, when he saw Jack was still standing, stood up again.

For a moment there was silence, and Jack could tell that Daniel was deciding whether to flee. He had that rabbit in the headlights look he always wore when very nervous. It was something to do with the glasses, Jack thought. They made him look oddly vulnerable.

And, somehow, he knew the call was his. Daniel could apologise until Doomsday, but it was up to Jack what happened now.

He looked at Daniel, and saw Frank standing there, trying hard to rebuild their friendship.

Looked at spectacled academic nervousness and saw rigid military shoulders pulled back as Jack blasted a friendship to pieces with stubborn pride and embittered silence.

‘Ah . . . Jack?’ Tentatively.

Jack blinked and pulled himself back into the present.

Quietly, because overwhelming enthusiasm was simply beyond him, he swallowed and offered the first glimmerings of an olive branch.

‘Beer?’

Daniel still looked nervous. ‘Ah, a beer? Sure. Okay.’

Jack left him still fidgeting nervously and went in search of a new bottle for Daniel.

Taking a long pull from a bottle in an effort to gain some courage, as well as using the breathing space to give himself something of a pep talk, Jack returned to the seating area.

‘Here,’ he offered the bottle to Daniel.

‘Thanks.’

The silence settled in again as they both sat down.

‘Jack,’ ‘Daniel,’ they dueted. Then both sat awkwardly looking at the other.

‘You first.’

‘No you.’

‘You spoke first.’

‘Didn’t.’

‘Did.’

‘Didn’t.’

There was a long pause, but at least the initial, skiddingly-dangerous ice was negotiated.

‘So,’ Jack coughed. ‘How are you?’ Banal, O’Neill. Jeez.

Daniel nodded. ‘Ah, yes. Fine. Thanks.’ Thank God the linguist wasn’t on top form either.

Jack chewed the inside of his mouth.

Daniel rolled the bottle neck around between his fingers.

Finally, Jack lifted his beer up to take a mouthful as Daniel asked, ‘You?’

Jack felt his eyes dart from side to side in confusion. ‘Me?’ he asked, eventually, when the walls refused to give him any crib notes.

‘Are you okay?’

‘Oh. Ah. Yes. Much. Thanks.’

‘That’s good.’

They smiled briefly at each other. Then tried hard to find other things in the room to study in deep concentration.

Shit. This was not going to be easy, Jack realised.

And a detailed scrutiny of the potted plant wasn’t going to help him resolve things.

He coughed.

Oh, hell. Get on with it, O’Neill.

‘Ummm . . .’ he started.

Daniel looked up briefly from his close inspection of the rug.

‘Look . . . I . . . may have acted . . . like . . . an ass, I think,’Jack said, looking at his feet. ‘In the infirmary. You know?’

Daniel coughed. ‘Ah, well, yes, you . . . might have . . . but . . . you had some cause,’ he said carefully, talking down to the bottle he held in his hands.

They made fleeting eye contact to accompany their still not quite comfortable smiles.

‘Yeah, but . . . ‘ Jack murmured, talking to his knees this time.

‘We did the only thing we could think of,’ Daniel explained to a bottle of untouched beer that listened attentively. His nervousness seeming to get the better of him as he rushed on, ‘Even though . . . we knew you’d hate it.’ He risked a cautious look at his friend, still obviously uncertain whether saying the wrong thing, even now, might not still explode things in his face.

Jack was suddenly aware again of everything that this man had seen. Of all the private intimate experiences that Daniel would now know about him, and his eyes dived way down deep into the bottom of his own beer bottle.

Daniel clearly realised the cause of Jack’s sudden withdrawal.

‘Jack,’ his voice was soft. ‘I know you wouldn’t have chosen to have me see . . . what I saw . . .’

‘Damn straight on that one.’ He couldn’t help the bite to the words. And dug deep to try and compose himself. Christ, where was Teal’c and his calming influence when you needed him?

And thinking about Teal’c helped. Not only because the big man was so calm about everything, but because he had agreed to what had happened.

They all had.

Carter. Fraiser. Hammond. All the people closest to him in the world. But Teal’c . . . had never made an unmeasured decision in all the time Jack had known him.

Jack wished the Jaffa was present right then. He need the steadiness, the warrior brotherhood understanding Teal’c could provide with just one assured and steady glance.

And Jack didn’t want to lose that affinity. If he rejected Daniel he was rejecting all the other people he valued as well.

He could almost hear Frank’s warning voice in his ear: take the opportunity, Jack. You never gave me a chance, but these people . . . do you wanna screw up again? Do you *really* wanna make the same mistake twice?

And Teal’c speaking in his quiet authoritative tone: I would be sorry to lose your friendship, O’Neill. But I cannot be sorry concerning what we did. It was the right decision.

Carter getting all emotional: I’m sorry, sir. But we had to do something.

Fraiser standing all pursed lipped and marginally disapproving, in that scary power mongering manner she had: come on, sir. You’ve had time to think. Are you going to carry a grudge forever more?

And Hammond: you’ve overcome things before, son. You can get through this. And do the right thing.

Jack swallowed hard. ‘I’m . . . sorry.’ Daniel’s head jerked up. ‘I didn’t mean to . . . well . . . you know . . . snark . . . just now.’

‘Snark?’ Daniel raised a questioning eyebrow.

‘It’s in the dictionary.’

‘Isn’t.’

‘Is.’

‘Isn’t.’

‘Is.’

‘Isn’t. Snark! C’mon, Jack. What sort of word is ‘snark’?’

‘A verb.’

Jackson snorted. ‘Yeah, right.’

Jack drained the rest of his beer and gestured towards his visitor. ‘’Nother?’

‘Ah, no.’ Daniel held up his untouched bottle. ‘Thanks. But, I don’t . . . really . . . ‘

‘ . . . like beer. No, you don’t, do you. Get you something else?’

‘No. I’m fine. Really.’

‘Okay. Well, if you don’t mind . . .’

‘Ah, no. Help yourself.’

When Jack came back Daniel was examining his fingernails closely, and the tension was back in the room.

‘So . . . how are you?’ Daniel ventured again.

Jack cracked the beer top off and took a fractional pleasure in the fact that the sharp sound made Daniel flinch.

Then, taking a deep breath, ‘Fine.’

‘Ah. So . . . how are you?’

‘I just said.’

‘Yes, you did. But you were lying.’

Jeez, Daniel. Trample right on in why don’t cha?

‘How d’you know?’

‘Ah . . . because if . . . if . . . ummmm . . . because if . . . ‘

‘Iiiiiiiiiiifffff?’

‘Because if I’d . . . had someone in *my* head . . . looking through the story of *my* life . . . ‘

‘Yes?’

‘I don’t think I’d be fine.’

‘Well, there ya go. Difference between you and me, Daniel.’

‘You weren’t fine before. In the Infirmary.’

‘That was then. I’m fine now.’

‘Really?’

‘*Yes*. *Really*.’

Jack was aware his hand was throttling the neck of his beer bottle.

Christ, Daniel. I spent three days realising I needed to hold on to the friendships I’ve got. Three days learning to accept the decision you all made in order to help me. And three days realising I can’t do Frank Cromwell all over again.

Which is fine.

Except I really, really don’t want to discuss what you saw.

With you.

Ever.

‘Are you sure?’

Christ! Daniel!

‘Yes! I’m sure. For cryin’ out loud, will you drop it?’ He was aware his voice was louder, but couldn’t help it.

‘You don’t sound sure.’ Typical Daniel-dog-with-a-bone-it-can’t-leave-alone.

‘And how am I supposed to sound?’

Oh, shit.

And he couldn’t stop himself.

The words just bubbled up and spilt over. Almost without warning. ‘Hey? Tell me that, Daniel? How am I supposed to sound? You get a free pass to the inside of my head and get to look around at *everything*! So now you probably know there’s some serious shit in there. And every time I look at you I’m gonna know that you know what you know. And that’s gonna be very, very hard to deal with!’ He was on his feet now, although he didn’t remember standing up.

‘Jack . . .’

‘Don’t *Jack* me. I know you did it all with the best intentions. I *know* that! And I appreciate that, too. *Really* I do. But that doesn’t mean to say I can’t feel like *shit* about it and what I know you saw!’

At which point the beer bottle somehow became a very accurate hand-to-window missile and there was suddenly beer froth and broken glass everywhere.

‘Ah, Christ . . .’ Jack sank down on to a seat and, dragging in an unsteady breath, surveyed the damage. After a long while he murmured, ’Christ, what a mess.’

Daniel coughed. ‘Ah, yeah. But we really had no choice, you know?’

‘I was talking about the window.’

‘Oh.’

Looking at the shards of glass mixed with pools of beer, Jack couldn’t help but think of another pane of shattered glass; one that had been blasted apart by a swinging hockey stick when he’d thought Daniel was dead.

Looking up he said quietly, ‘Sorry.’

Daniel looked at him and fielded the ball perfectly. ‘It’s your window.’

‘Do what I like with it?’

‘Absolutely.’

Jack scrubbed his face with his hands. ‘Waste of good beer though.’

‘If you say so. Bet you’ve got plenty more.’

Jack brightened. ‘Good thought.’

When he returned with a new bottle Daniel watched him sit.

And it was somehow as if the exploding window and bottle had released the tension between the two men. And everything was oddly calmer.

Jack cleared his throat carefully.

Daniel raised an eyebrow.

‘Umm . . . thank you.’

Daniel’s other eyebrow outdid the first and disappeared under his hairline, as he tilted his head questioningly. ‘For?’

‘Doing . . . what you did.’ Jack waved his hand in inconclusive vagueness. ‘You know . . . the whole getting in my head thing. All of it.’ Jack shrugged. ‘Thank you. Despite . . . this.’ He gestured in the direction of the broken glass and beer spreading in pools across the floor. ‘I . . . needed . . . help. You . . . well . . . thanks.’ He shrugged again.

‘Ah. You’re welcome.’ Daniel was obviously as embarrassed by things as Jack.

Jack nodded. ‘Don’t think I could have done it without you, ya know? Find my way back, and all that.’

‘Oh. Really?’

Jack shook his head. ‘Don’t think so. Nope. Not from what I remember.’

‘Oh. Good. Uh . . . what I mean is . . . ummm . . . pleased I could help.’

‘Yeah, well . . . don’t think this means I owe you one or anything. ‘Cause if you think I’m climbing inside *your* head with all that stuffy language stuff, and all those mouldy encyclopaedias and so on that you’ve got stored in there, you’ve got another think coming. Okay?’

‘Ah, yeah. Okay.’

‘Good. Just so long as we’re clear on that, then.’

‘So,’ Daniel asked carefully, after a moment. ‘We’re good?’

Jack took a long swill of liquid. And let it slide down. ‘Yeah.’ He even found a weak half-smile from somewhere. ‘We’re good.’

Daniel looked as if the weight of the world had been lifted from his shoulders.

For a while neither man said anything.

Then, ‘Good move, by the way.’

Jack narrowed his eyes and looked suspiciously at Daniel over the top of his beer bottle.

‘What was?’ he enquired cautiously.

‘Kissing Sam on that loop thing. Good move. Wish I’d done that.’

They looked at each other and began to splutter.

‘Ya think?’

‘Yeah. You sly old fox.’

‘Hey, Jackson. Less of the old.’

‘Okay.’ Daniel grinned. Then more seriously, ‘And your secret’s safe with me, I swear.’

Somehow, they both knew he was referring to much, much more than just the kiss.

And Jack nodded. ‘Better be,’ he said. And paused, significantly. ‘Otherwise I’ll have to shoot ya!’

********

Jack was sleeping. Curled up quietly on the sofa. Daniel had gone to make a call to Carter to tell her things had gone well, and came back to find his friend had not been able to stay the course.

They had talked about many things for a long time. Very little of which had to do with their shared experiences. But Jack had admitted that he owed Hammond several months worth of reports submitted on time without moaning, and that he owed Fraiser a year’s supply of flowers and chocolate, and several grouch-free stays in the infirmary.

The only moment that had sounded a sour note was late into the evening. Daniel had caught Jack looking sombrely at a row of decorations across his mantle.

‘Penny for them?’ he had enquired gently.

Jack had pulled himself back from wherever he had gone.

‘I was wondering if . . . ‘ he paused for a very long time.

‘If?’ Daniel prompted.

‘If . . . I’d tried . . . whether . . . maybe . . . it would have been . . . I’m not going to say easy, because this sure as hell hasn’t been easy . . . but whether I could have . . . if I’d tried . . . ummm,’ Jack paused, as if to assess how far he’d travelled down the road towards saying absolutely nothing with the greatest possible number of words.

Daniel raised a baffled eyebrow.

‘If . . . the . . . stuff . . . with Frank. You know. Whether I could’ve . . . as easily . . . maybe . . . ’ The words tailed away, as Daniel nodded silently in understanding.

And there was an unspoken understanding that, despite everything he’d claimed about not remembering much, Daniel knew exactly who Frank was, and precisely what Jack was talking about.

There hadn’t been an answer Daniel could find to what was, after all, an unanswerable question. And by unspoken consent they had moved on to other topics. But their mood had been spoiled, and Daniel had excused himself to go and call Carter.

Now, he contemplated his sleeping friend. So much pain. So much loss. So much sacrificed. And yet, so much to be thankful for.

Jack made the tough calls when he had to, regardless of the cost to himself. Had been doing it all his life. Daniel had learned so much about O’Neill. And was actually thankful for the opportunity that had come his way. Understanding Jack was nigh on impossible if the only thing you had to go on was what he told you. Actually, you could probably work out more if you analysed what he *didn’t* tell you!

Daniel understood him so much more now. And was grateful for the knowledge, and proud. Somebody, other than the man himself, should know all those things about him. Jack deserved that somebody else should understand him. Respect him for all the things he’d achieved and never talked about. Know about the things he’d achieved and never talked about. And not just in a superior-officer-who’d-read-the-files sort of way either. In a first hand, in a how hard it had been but I survived it, way. From the very start. When he’d struggled with his father’s addiction, and supported his mother. Right through everything else he’d experienced and suffered. And fine, Daniel couldn’t – wouldn’t – share his new found wisdom with anyone. But he knew.

And could appreciate.

And admire.

And respect.

It needed no more than that.

When there were tough decisions to be made Jack stepped up to the plate and made them. Made any sacrifice that was needed. For people he knew, and people he didn’t.

Daniel listened to his friend’s calm breathing.

It had been an easy decision to make. To perhaps sacrifice their friendship so that Jack could be saved. To do what he could for his friend.

But, Daniel wondered, if the time ever came, would he be able to make any necessary sacrifice for people he didn’t know?

<The End>

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