[for daniel] there are times when I catch in the silence the sigh of a faraway song

[fallen_ancient]

[dated late afternoon 7/17]The sounds of the river, cool despite the day's heat, masked those of human passage. Voices carried above the pleasant trickle and burble, but heavier sounds, weighty ones like the tread of feet passed unnoticed

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[theunascended]

Daniel wasn't entirely sure what to do with Morgan. She wasn't team. Wasn't a part of the SGC. He didn't even know her. But he felt responsible for her, nonetheless. He just wasn't always sure what to do about it. Like now. He'd gone for a walk, just by himself, just for the hell of it, and he'd come across her floating in the water.

"Okay down there?" he asked, not sure if he wanted to bother her, but knowing that he had to say something.

[fallen_ancient]

The voice that called her from her quiet thoughts was not Cameron's but Daniel's. The only voice, the only mind, on the island she knew better than Cameron's. Yet even if they agreed between the two of them that they had responsibilities toward her, that she was, in some fashion family, the similarity ended there.

If Cameron treated her like a long-lost friend, even lover, Daniel seemed to think of her as the mad aunt who might best be locked in the attic. Of the them, Daniel perhaps had the right of it, but it made it no easier to know how to speak to him.

After a moment, Morgan opened her eyes and glanced up to where he stood on the bank. "It is my impression that drowning is usually accompanied by a good deal of struggling and flailing." Both her tone and her smile had a wry edge to them as she dropped her feet to the river bottom to stand. "I am fine, Daniel. Thank you for asking. And you?"

[theunascended]

"There are all kinds of meanings of 'okay'," he pointed out. "Not just struggling and flailing. And I'm good. Taking advantage of the peace and quiet while it's still there. The island always finds something to throw at us to disturb it." Or the people found something to disturb it. Usually the people. The island throwing things was usually a relief, except for Halloween.

"I just...wanted to make sure you were settling in, I suppose. Any idea when you're getting the new hut?"

[fallen_ancient]

"So there are," Morgan agreed evenly, more even than Daniel knew, since the phoneme okay had meanings in languages he did not know existed. At least, he did not know anymore.

Her fingers clenched beneath the surface of the water at that thought. There was one other person on the island who might understand completely who she had been and help her retain that...and he had lost it before she did. It was hardly fair to hold that against Daniel, but she did occasionally wish to scream at him, or perhaps simply to scream. The fall had not cured her of that, even if it had made her far more comfortable in this body

[theunascended]

Daniel flushed a little. "If you can believe it, it took me a little while to realize that you two looked alike." When you were meeting people, the fact that they looked like an Ancient that you'd met once usually didn't figure into the equation. And they had met just the once.

"Oh."

That was the tiniest bit odd, but he would have done it for Vala or Sam if they'd really needed it. But not for as long as she'd seemed to imply.

[fallen_ancient]

Morgan walked toward the back, hand extended toward the batik sarong. "Would you hand me the wrap on the rock there?"

That Daniel had not recognized her clone she did not surprise her. "In your recollection, we met only once. And in my energetic form, the resemblance would not have been so exact," she said, dismissing his concerns.

"Our mannerisms are also quite different, though I find I like her very well."

[theunascended]

"And I wouldn't remember your Ascended form," he pointed out. "I only remember bits and pieces from that. Not even a day, total, for an entire year's worth of missing memory."

He handed her the requested garment.

"Jill? She's nice. Smart, though it's not my field. She'd probably have more in common with Carolyn than with me."

[fallen_ancient]

Coming up out of the water, Morgan neatly tied the sarong around her waist. It still left her abdomen bare, which felt peculiar when speaking to Daniel, but she let none of it show on her face.

"You know why that is, of course." She smiled apologetically, her sympathy unfeigned and enduring. Despite her frustration with Daniel's condition, her regret of it was not purely selfish. "I don't suppose it matters now, but I did not approve the decision. The Others would not risk another Merlin and my objections went unheard."

Of Jill, she would say only, "Our resemblance made cordial manners desirable, but my liking of her runs deeper than that."

[theunascended]

"Not really. Like I said, I don't remember. Mostly I remember the things that I needed to save my friends and even then it was almost too late. I could do translations of certain languages if I didn't think too hard about it. I must have done something, but I don't know what."

He shrugged at her. Not like it mattered much now.

[fallen_ancient]

"You wouldn't accept that you could not interfere." Perhaps she should not reveal what she knew, but she could not imagine any harm would come of it. "Oma de Sala overstepped in assisting you to Ascend; it was believed you were not ready."

There was more, of course, but that would require exposing more of the Ascended than the Others would tolerate when she returned.

[theunascended]

Daniel smiled a little. "Sounds like me. What use is there in being a higher power if you can't step in and make things right. Especially when the person you're going up against is partially Ascended himself." Which meant that the odds were already in his favor.

[fallen_ancient]

"So I also believed, Daniel," Morgan answered quietly but with an almost fond smile of remembrance for how he had argued with her, both above and below. "I have known since Arthur's time, the day would come when I did as Oma had." Her smile broadened to include Daniel here and now. Whatever she felt, she did not blame Daniel for her choices. "I'd intended to wait until I could be certain of the impact, but your need was great and your passion persuasive."

[theunascended]

"I wasn't there for that, either," Daniel said, shaking his head. "I've apparently missed a lot of things." He didn't mention that the last he remembered of her, the only thing that he remembered of her, was her trying and failing to be much help. They'd gotten a general answer, but nothing specific.

[fallen_ancient]

Morgan settled on the rock where her wrap had been, studying him. "So you have said." She had not forgotten what Cameron had told her of when in time Daniel came from. "If you wish to know, I will tell you." For Daniel, she would even speak of her Exile.

[theunascended]

Daniel hesitated, taking a deep breath and buying himself some time to think about it. Finally, he shook his head. "That might not be a good idea. Mitchell told me that everyone makes it out all right, which is the only thing I really needed to hear." His friends were safe and alive and that was what had worried him those first few months.

[fallen_ancient]

"As you wish, Daniel." Did he give her the chance, she would at least have explained, but he did not seem to care. Much as she wished to have his respect, she felt no need to justify herself.

After a moment, she glanced at him. "It is difficult for me, that I know you so well and you know me not at all. I apologize if it makes you uncomfortable, as well."