Dog Heaven: Pack Mates - Part 4/5
Title: Dog Heaven: Pack Mates
Summary: Jack gets in touch with his animal side after accidently participating in a ritual off-world.
Timeframe: Mid-season two-ish
Characters/Pairing: Team, Sam/Jack, Janet
Genre: Humor, Drama, Hurt/Comfort, Friendship, UST to RST
Rating: G
Part Four
Later in the afternoon, Sam left the computer in her office to answer a knock on the front door. She heard the Colonel bark instinctively a scant second before the knock sounded. He limped down the hall ahead of her and stuck his nose in the crack under the door with a sniff before turning and giving her an approving look. Sam smiled and patted him on the head with a “Good boy,” without thinking. The Colonel’s ears quirked with amusement as her cheeks burned in embarrassment and she immediately apologized. “I’m so sorry, sir.”
Sam didn’t touch him, but the look he was giving her seemed to indicated an It’s okay. She opened the door to find Daniel standing there with a timid smile on his face. “Hi, Daniel.”
“Hey, Sam.” He looked down and nodded in greeting. “Jack.”
Ruff. Colonel O’Neill bowed his head slightly, then turned and limped back to the living room where he’d come from.
“Come on in.” Sam waved Daniel inside and walked with him into the kitchen. “Want something to drink?”
“Ah, no thanks, I’m good.” He sat at the breakfast bar, then waved a hand vaguely toward the open living room where the Colonel had gone to lie down again. “How’s he doing…with the bullet wound thing?”
Sam smiled wanly. “I can tell his leg is painful, slowing him down a bit, even if he won’t admit it. But it only happened last night so I’m not expecting any miraculous improvement quite yet.” She shrugged.
A few loud, disgruntled barks from the Colonel on the other side of the couch caught Sam and Daniel’s attention, and Sam grimaced. There was no barrier between the kitchen and the living room, and with O’Neill’s super-sharp hearing at the moment, she quickly realized the barking was akin to a sarcastic, “I can hear you, ya know.” Sam had even imagined her commander’s voice in her head.
“Sorry, Jack,” Daniel called out his apology, shifting uncomfortably in the tall chair at the breakfast bar. “Oh, so Jack,” he turned, but was unable to see his friend who lay on the other side of the couch. “I’ve got some news from the planet. You might want to hear this.”
Sam swiveled in her own chair, looking at Daniel with interest. She heard the Colonel struggling to get up, his claws tapping on the wooden floor as he gingerly made his way over and sat down.
“The young man that went through the ceremony while you were there-he’s back; human again.”
The Colonel cocked his head, his pointed ears sticking up with interest.
Daniel continued, suddenly looking a little uncomfortable, and Sam noticed his cheeks turning a little red. “He found his, uh, his soul mate I guess. A young woman in the tribe. I don’t really know what else had to take place for him to turn back, but…well, he did.” Daniel lifted his hands up in a helpless gesture.
Colonel O’Neill snorted, and Sam could have sworn she saw his eyes roll.
“Daniel, if you’re touching the Colonel you can hear his thoughts. He might have some questions for you.”
“Really?” the archaeologist exclaimed with surprise. “When did this happen? We couldn’t before.”
“I know.” Sam shrugged. “It happened late last night. And after he was shot I could touch him and sense emotions and I was even getting flashes of images from his memory. That’s how I knew how he’d gotten shot.”
“Really?” Daniel glanced down at the Colonel and he nodded. He got off his chair and held out one hand. “Could I?”
The Colonel gave another nod and didn’t move, waiting for Daniel to pat him on the head or something so they could communicate.
Sam watched with mild trepidation as Daniel placed his hand flat on the top of the Colonel’s furry head, looking a little uncomfortable in doing so. A small smile of amusement quirked at her lips. She waited patiently, watching them, but nothing seemed to be happening.
Daniel sent her a confused look. “I don’t hear anything.” He frowned and turned back to the Colonel, who was staring directly at him, the archaeologist’s hand still atop his head. “Are you trying?”
Sam caught O’Neill’s eyes rolling and he barked, giving a quick nod. “Maybe that stage of the transition is over?” she offered, unsure.
“You try,” Daniel suggested, taking a step back.
Shrugging, Sam crouched down and put her hand at the Colonel’s shoulder.
Carter? she heard almost immediately.
“Yes, sir.” Sam nodded, then glanced back at Daniel.
“You can still hear him?” he asked, eyebrows raising above the frame of his glasses.
“Yeah.” Sam pursed her lips, feeling a little self-conscious all of a sudden.
Daniel babbled on as though he’d had a revelation. “That means he can only communicate with you.” He tapped his chin thoughtfully. “Huh.”
She detected the hint of amusement in his tone, and glared. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Ah, uh… I dunno, I was just-“ Daniel fumbled with a grimace, shrugging. “I don’t really…know.”
Carter!
Her attention snapped back to the Colonel’s face. “Sir?”
Ask Daniel if he found out more about what’s gonna happen to me. O’Neill’s dark chocolate eyes peered at her intently.
“Oh, right.” Sam didn’t want to spend too much time thinking why only she could communicate with the Colonel, but the thought was still there in the back of her mind. She turned around to find Daniel looking at her expectantly. “Colonel O’Neill wants to know if you have any information concerning what stages the boy went through before becoming human again,” she said, using her own phrasing.
Daniel heaved a sigh, looking a little nervous, his eyes shifty. “Uh, no. Sorry.”
The Colonel growled with irritation, then pushed himself up from the floor and limped away, heading back for his pile of blankets in front of the couch. Sam watched him go with apprehension, his gait staggering as he went.
“Uh… Is he okay?” Daniel pointed after O’Neill, following Sam’s line of sight.
“Colonel?” Sam got out of her chair and rounded the sofa in time to see O’Neill slump to the floor without warning before he reached his makeshift bed. She gasped. “Daniel! Come over here, the Colonel’s collapsed!”
“What?” Daniel scrambled off his own seat and ran over. He took one look at the Colonel and knelt down as she did the same. “What happened?”
“I don’t know! I don’t…I…” Sam just shook her head, gingerly touching O’Neill’s side. It was still rising and falling, indicating he was breathing, but his breaths were shallow and rapid. She leaned over his head to find the dark brown pools were just barely open. He was still conscious. “Sir?” Sam lightly stroked his side, expecting to get something from him-anything.
C’rrter… Don’t feel-can’t…breathe…s’good, the Colonel thought, sounding weak and muddled.
“We need to get him in the car. NOW,” Sam practically commanded, desperately looking at Daniel who seemed just as frantic.
Together, she and Daniel carefully got him on one of the blankets on the floor and lifted him gingerly, using the blanket as a type of stretcher. “Are we taking him back to the vet clinic?”
Sam bit down on her lower lip, hesitating for a moment. “I don’t know. What do you think? I’m afraid they’ll want to keep him overnight and we could be risking national security.” She glanced down at the Colonel; he didn’t look well at all. What if it was the medicine from the vet messing with him in the first place? Or maybe this was all part of the ceremony. Who knew? She sucked in a deep breath as they carried Colonel O’Neill out the door, having made her decision. “The base is closer.”
Daniel nodded as they carried O’Neill toward the front door. “I’ll drive. You call Janet.”
Once the Colonel was settled across the back seat of Daniel’s car, Sam ran back inside to grab the medication from the vet’s office in case Janet wanted to know what he’d been taking.
Back in the car, Sam decided to sit in the backseat with Colonel O’Neill as she made the call to Janet, wanting to keep in physical contact with him so she would know the second his condition changed.
She was frantic on the phone, but Janet had been fairly confident that the Colonel was suffering some kind of allergic reaction from the vet’s medication. The sooner they got him to base, the sooner she could treat him and make him well.
While Daniel drove like a madman, Sam lightly stroked behind the Colonel’s ears, his big furry head in her lap. She knew she was taking a risk being so close to his face, if he were to snap to full wolf mode she’d be in trouble, but Sam was willing to chance it to be able to offer him some comfort.
The Colonel’s breaths became more labored as they neared the mountain, the raspy sound in his chest making Sam cringe. She could sense his fear, on the verge of panic, and whispered nonsense to soothe him, worried that she was receiving no thoughts and wondering if he was making an effort to hide them from her or if he was going wolf.
.
Combined with a failing ability to breathe properly, and the bumping and jarring from Daniel’s driving, Jack was starting to feel nauseous. He tried to convey this mentally, to Sam, but his thoughts weren’t forming correctly at the moment and he could only hope that she could ‘sense’ the nauseous feeling as it came over him.
Hearing Sam’s tranquil mutterings along with the feeling of her hand gently massaging his scalp was a balm to Jack’s raw anxiety, but it didn’t suppress the sick feeling as it continued to come over him in waves.
“It’s going to be okay, sir; we’re almost there.” She began to lightly stroke along his chest as a particularly strained breath hissed in and then out of his constricting lungs, causing his whole body to shudder.
By the time Daniel’s car came to a jolting stop (had they gone through the security checkpoints already?), Jack’s vision was blackening around the edges and he knew he was dangerously close to both vomiting and passing out.
.
Sam and Daniel got O’Neill out of the car the same way they’d gotten him in, on the blanket. Sam went to lift the edges of the blanket by his head, warning Daniel that the Colonel had a tendency to lose control of his wolf instincts and snap when he was in pain.
“Well, I don’t want him biting you, either,” Daniel argued.
Sam hesitated for a moment, unsure if she really ought to mention that Colonel O’Neill might be a little more used to her by now, wolfy mind or not. Biting her lip, she conceded, allowing Daniel to take the heavier, business end.
As soon as they switched positions and got the Colonel out of the car, however, Sam’s hand brushed O’Neill and she suddenly got a flash of sensation. “Daniel, you might want to-“
Before she was able to complete the warning, the Colonel heaved suddenly, vomit spewing on Daniel’s khaki pants and worn brown loafers. “Agh.” Daniel looked down in disgust, then half-jokingly muttered, “Thanks a lot, Jack.”
Grimacing in sympathy, Sam adjusted her hold on the blanket and let go with one hand to lightly touch the Colonel’s hip. She frowned at what she sensed from him, and glanced back up at her still-disgusted archaeologist. “He can’t breathe that well, Daniel. Let’s hurry up and get inside.”
Seeing her distress, Daniel nodded. “Janet should be waiting with a gurney at the first elevator,” he said optimistically. They were both well-versed with how the doctor responded to medical emergencies, having been involved in enough of them themselves. Sam just wanted to get the Colonel in her care as soon as possible.
.
Part Five
Summary: Jack gets in touch with his animal side after accidently participating in a ritual off-world.
Timeframe: Mid-season two-ish
Characters/Pairing: Team, Sam/Jack, Janet
Genre: Humor, Drama, Hurt/Comfort, Friendship, UST to RST
Rating: G
Part Four
Later in the afternoon, Sam left the computer in her office to answer a knock on the front door. She heard the Colonel bark instinctively a scant second before the knock sounded. He limped down the hall ahead of her and stuck his nose in the crack under the door with a sniff before turning and giving her an approving look. Sam smiled and patted him on the head with a “Good boy,” without thinking. The Colonel’s ears quirked with amusement as her cheeks burned in embarrassment and she immediately apologized. “I’m so sorry, sir.”
Sam didn’t touch him, but the look he was giving her seemed to indicated an It’s okay. She opened the door to find Daniel standing there with a timid smile on his face. “Hi, Daniel.”
“Hey, Sam.” He looked down and nodded in greeting. “Jack.”
Ruff. Colonel O’Neill bowed his head slightly, then turned and limped back to the living room where he’d come from.
“Come on in.” Sam waved Daniel inside and walked with him into the kitchen. “Want something to drink?”
“Ah, no thanks, I’m good.” He sat at the breakfast bar, then waved a hand vaguely toward the open living room where the Colonel had gone to lie down again. “How’s he doing…with the bullet wound thing?”
Sam smiled wanly. “I can tell his leg is painful, slowing him down a bit, even if he won’t admit it. But it only happened last night so I’m not expecting any miraculous improvement quite yet.” She shrugged.
A few loud, disgruntled barks from the Colonel on the other side of the couch caught Sam and Daniel’s attention, and Sam grimaced. There was no barrier between the kitchen and the living room, and with O’Neill’s super-sharp hearing at the moment, she quickly realized the barking was akin to a sarcastic, “I can hear you, ya know.” Sam had even imagined her commander’s voice in her head.
“Sorry, Jack,” Daniel called out his apology, shifting uncomfortably in the tall chair at the breakfast bar. “Oh, so Jack,” he turned, but was unable to see his friend who lay on the other side of the couch. “I’ve got some news from the planet. You might want to hear this.”
Sam swiveled in her own chair, looking at Daniel with interest. She heard the Colonel struggling to get up, his claws tapping on the wooden floor as he gingerly made his way over and sat down.
“The young man that went through the ceremony while you were there-he’s back; human again.”
The Colonel cocked his head, his pointed ears sticking up with interest.
Daniel continued, suddenly looking a little uncomfortable, and Sam noticed his cheeks turning a little red. “He found his, uh, his soul mate I guess. A young woman in the tribe. I don’t really know what else had to take place for him to turn back, but…well, he did.” Daniel lifted his hands up in a helpless gesture.
Colonel O’Neill snorted, and Sam could have sworn she saw his eyes roll.
“Daniel, if you’re touching the Colonel you can hear his thoughts. He might have some questions for you.”
“Really?” the archaeologist exclaimed with surprise. “When did this happen? We couldn’t before.”
“I know.” Sam shrugged. “It happened late last night. And after he was shot I could touch him and sense emotions and I was even getting flashes of images from his memory. That’s how I knew how he’d gotten shot.”
“Really?” Daniel glanced down at the Colonel and he nodded. He got off his chair and held out one hand. “Could I?”
The Colonel gave another nod and didn’t move, waiting for Daniel to pat him on the head or something so they could communicate.
Sam watched with mild trepidation as Daniel placed his hand flat on the top of the Colonel’s furry head, looking a little uncomfortable in doing so. A small smile of amusement quirked at her lips. She waited patiently, watching them, but nothing seemed to be happening.
Daniel sent her a confused look. “I don’t hear anything.” He frowned and turned back to the Colonel, who was staring directly at him, the archaeologist’s hand still atop his head. “Are you trying?”
Sam caught O’Neill’s eyes rolling and he barked, giving a quick nod. “Maybe that stage of the transition is over?” she offered, unsure.
“You try,” Daniel suggested, taking a step back.
Shrugging, Sam crouched down and put her hand at the Colonel’s shoulder.
Carter? she heard almost immediately.
“Yes, sir.” Sam nodded, then glanced back at Daniel.
“You can still hear him?” he asked, eyebrows raising above the frame of his glasses.
“Yeah.” Sam pursed her lips, feeling a little self-conscious all of a sudden.
Daniel babbled on as though he’d had a revelation. “That means he can only communicate with you.” He tapped his chin thoughtfully. “Huh.”
She detected the hint of amusement in his tone, and glared. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Ah, uh… I dunno, I was just-“ Daniel fumbled with a grimace, shrugging. “I don’t really…know.”
Carter!
Her attention snapped back to the Colonel’s face. “Sir?”
Ask Daniel if he found out more about what’s gonna happen to me. O’Neill’s dark chocolate eyes peered at her intently.
“Oh, right.” Sam didn’t want to spend too much time thinking why only she could communicate with the Colonel, but the thought was still there in the back of her mind. She turned around to find Daniel looking at her expectantly. “Colonel O’Neill wants to know if you have any information concerning what stages the boy went through before becoming human again,” she said, using her own phrasing.
Daniel heaved a sigh, looking a little nervous, his eyes shifty. “Uh, no. Sorry.”
The Colonel growled with irritation, then pushed himself up from the floor and limped away, heading back for his pile of blankets in front of the couch. Sam watched him go with apprehension, his gait staggering as he went.
“Uh… Is he okay?” Daniel pointed after O’Neill, following Sam’s line of sight.
“Colonel?” Sam got out of her chair and rounded the sofa in time to see O’Neill slump to the floor without warning before he reached his makeshift bed. She gasped. “Daniel! Come over here, the Colonel’s collapsed!”
“What?” Daniel scrambled off his own seat and ran over. He took one look at the Colonel and knelt down as she did the same. “What happened?”
“I don’t know! I don’t…I…” Sam just shook her head, gingerly touching O’Neill’s side. It was still rising and falling, indicating he was breathing, but his breaths were shallow and rapid. She leaned over his head to find the dark brown pools were just barely open. He was still conscious. “Sir?” Sam lightly stroked his side, expecting to get something from him-anything.
C’rrter… Don’t feel-can’t…breathe…s’good, the Colonel thought, sounding weak and muddled.
“We need to get him in the car. NOW,” Sam practically commanded, desperately looking at Daniel who seemed just as frantic.
Together, she and Daniel carefully got him on one of the blankets on the floor and lifted him gingerly, using the blanket as a type of stretcher. “Are we taking him back to the vet clinic?”
Sam bit down on her lower lip, hesitating for a moment. “I don’t know. What do you think? I’m afraid they’ll want to keep him overnight and we could be risking national security.” She glanced down at the Colonel; he didn’t look well at all. What if it was the medicine from the vet messing with him in the first place? Or maybe this was all part of the ceremony. Who knew? She sucked in a deep breath as they carried Colonel O’Neill out the door, having made her decision. “The base is closer.”
Daniel nodded as they carried O’Neill toward the front door. “I’ll drive. You call Janet.”
Once the Colonel was settled across the back seat of Daniel’s car, Sam ran back inside to grab the medication from the vet’s office in case Janet wanted to know what he’d been taking.
Back in the car, Sam decided to sit in the backseat with Colonel O’Neill as she made the call to Janet, wanting to keep in physical contact with him so she would know the second his condition changed.
She was frantic on the phone, but Janet had been fairly confident that the Colonel was suffering some kind of allergic reaction from the vet’s medication. The sooner they got him to base, the sooner she could treat him and make him well.
While Daniel drove like a madman, Sam lightly stroked behind the Colonel’s ears, his big furry head in her lap. She knew she was taking a risk being so close to his face, if he were to snap to full wolf mode she’d be in trouble, but Sam was willing to chance it to be able to offer him some comfort.
The Colonel’s breaths became more labored as they neared the mountain, the raspy sound in his chest making Sam cringe. She could sense his fear, on the verge of panic, and whispered nonsense to soothe him, worried that she was receiving no thoughts and wondering if he was making an effort to hide them from her or if he was going wolf.
.
Combined with a failing ability to breathe properly, and the bumping and jarring from Daniel’s driving, Jack was starting to feel nauseous. He tried to convey this mentally, to Sam, but his thoughts weren’t forming correctly at the moment and he could only hope that she could ‘sense’ the nauseous feeling as it came over him.
Hearing Sam’s tranquil mutterings along with the feeling of her hand gently massaging his scalp was a balm to Jack’s raw anxiety, but it didn’t suppress the sick feeling as it continued to come over him in waves.
“It’s going to be okay, sir; we’re almost there.” She began to lightly stroke along his chest as a particularly strained breath hissed in and then out of his constricting lungs, causing his whole body to shudder.
By the time Daniel’s car came to a jolting stop (had they gone through the security checkpoints already?), Jack’s vision was blackening around the edges and he knew he was dangerously close to both vomiting and passing out.
.
Sam and Daniel got O’Neill out of the car the same way they’d gotten him in, on the blanket. Sam went to lift the edges of the blanket by his head, warning Daniel that the Colonel had a tendency to lose control of his wolf instincts and snap when he was in pain.
“Well, I don’t want him biting you, either,” Daniel argued.
Sam hesitated for a moment, unsure if she really ought to mention that Colonel O’Neill might be a little more used to her by now, wolfy mind or not. Biting her lip, she conceded, allowing Daniel to take the heavier, business end.
As soon as they switched positions and got the Colonel out of the car, however, Sam’s hand brushed O’Neill and she suddenly got a flash of sensation. “Daniel, you might want to-“
Before she was able to complete the warning, the Colonel heaved suddenly, vomit spewing on Daniel’s khaki pants and worn brown loafers. “Agh.” Daniel looked down in disgust, then half-jokingly muttered, “Thanks a lot, Jack.”
Grimacing in sympathy, Sam adjusted her hold on the blanket and let go with one hand to lightly touch the Colonel’s hip. She frowned at what she sensed from him, and glanced back up at her still-disgusted archaeologist. “He can’t breathe that well, Daniel. Let’s hurry up and get inside.”
Seeing her distress, Daniel nodded. “Janet should be waiting with a gurney at the first elevator,” he said optimistically. They were both well-versed with how the doctor responded to medical emergencies, having been involved in enough of them themselves. Sam just wanted to get the Colonel in her care as soon as possible.
.
Part Five