Truth Telling - Part 2
"Okay, now I'm not sure if I'm glad of that or wishing you hadn't mentioned it, because, yeah, that would be bad. But Junior would work the usual snake charm, and I'd be babbling, so he'd be doing that whole head-tipping 'you Tau'ri are so nuts' thing. Then he'd probably just jump up and hop outta here without even needing help so he could be all smug about it."
"I suppose we could at least be thankful it's been dry for a few seasons."
"Dry?" Jack asked. He'd started what he hoped was mac and cheese-not tuna noodles-heating. The package felt good, warm on his leg, so he left it and listened to Daniel talk around a cookie.
"Cisterns typically work as water collection from rain, with natural filters built into them because they're carved into porous stone."
Sitting up, Jack pulled out his canteen, unscrewed the cap and tapped Daniel's shoulder with it. "Great. So next storm means it'll get more than wet in here?"
"It should take more than one rainy season to fill this place, but I don't think we have to worry. The surrounding desert indicates a climate change, which would account for this site being abandoned. And if we're here long enough for that to change again, we'll be dead."
"Jeeze, Daniel."
"I know, I know. Too grim. But, well, Jack don't you ever feel you're...maybe here, I dunno, by accident?"
"Of course we are. Falling floor?"
"No, not here here. Here, big here."
"Oh, that. No."
"No?"
There was a pause while Daniel drank, then the canteen bumped against Jack's arm and he took a sip before putting it away. "Why the hell would you-oh, the parents thing?"
"Partly. I mean, yes, I don't think they planned on me. But I was with them when they died. And I didn't. There's been a few other times I've been overlooked by fate-more than a few. You've been there for some of that. The Greeks believed the Fates wove the thread of your life into existence, and cut it to end your days. Sometimes I feel...a loose end. Not woven into anything. And maybe I get away with things because there's no pattern to me."
Shaking his head, Jack bit back his temper, but the words came out anyway, sharp and hard. "There you go again!"
"Again?"
"Off. Tangents. Justifications. You don't belong, which gives you reason to not follow anyone's rules. Sometimes I think you work at not fitting into anything-other times I just think you've got a natural talent for it."
Daniel let out a short huff of breath. "I follow rules."
"Oh, sure. When it suits you."
"No," Daniel said, drawing out the word like he was stalling to think up even more to say. "More like when I understand the reasons why. Or when it's useful. Or when I can't see better options. I wouldn't have my degrees if I didn't have any discipline and couldn't respect structure and order."
"You mean if you have to, you can."
"When I need to, I can. But we're back to artificial constructs-that's what a rule is. And those should be challenged. Following doesn't mean questions can't be asked along the way. Just ask a Zen monk. Hmmm-I wonder if they'd answer that one?"
"Y'know, isn't that what stalled out your last career? All those challenges and being a little too Zen? And here's a question for you-why can't this hole be one of your artificial constructs?"
"Jack?"
"Yeah, what?"
"Please do not start thinking about grenades and all the good things you can do with explosives."
"Will you stop that?"
"Stop what?"
"The mind reading thing. God, I hope nothing here's doing that. Besides, not like I'm going to set anything until daylight."
"How nice, I have a few hours before you bring the rest of this place down on top of us."
Frowning, Jack stared up at the hole and pressed the heating mac and cheese down on his leg. "Oh. So...explosions bad?"
"Yes. Bad. Very."
Jack's mouth quirked at how Daniel liked to make it simple for him, then he grimaced at what the words meant. "Bad as what'll happen if we stay in here, talking like this?"
Next to him, Daniel's shoulder bumped his, tensed and hard, and Jack wondered if that was how Daniel always felt when he was thinking. "Do you think with your body, Daniel?" He tried to bite off the words and couldn't any more than he could shut off his brain. "Oh, hell, maybe I should just knock myself out with something from the med kit before I really say the wrong thing. Damnit, ignore anything-no, ignore everything I say."
"Head injury, Jack. I'll blame that. Oh, no, wait, you don't have one. But you were out. And I can give you a doctor's confidentiality even if it only comes attached to my doctorates."
Jack heard the humor lurking, dry and sparse, in Daniel's voice and shook his head. Daniel trying to cut him slack-and why the hell did the guy do that? He pressed his lips tight and fought to keep the words inside his head where they belonged.
He sat on his hands to see if that would help, and then Daniel pulled in a long breath and let it out, and said, "Yes."
"Yes, what?"
"Yes, I think with my body. Most of the time, I have to sketch thoughts with my hands, and haven't you ever had an idea come from your gut? Or had your hands shake from inspiration? Or had an insight hit you in the chest so hard you lost your breath from it?"
Daniel's hand bumped Jack's leg. Jack glanced at the impact point, saw nothing in the darkness. "I suppose. You get battle sense. Instincts you learn to trust because they're faster."
Frowning, he thought of how those instincts usually had him jumping all over Daniel's more thoughtful attempts to go at things. But thinking took time, which meant too many seconds available for dying. Jack could live with regrets for what he'd done a whole lot better than the things he'd neglected.
He pressed his lips tight to keep from saying that, but Daniel just made a soft hum, as if he knew what Jack was thinking anyway. And then Daniel went on talking, his voice soft, the tone persuasive as always. "I think our bodies always knows the truth. But it's polite to pretend otherwise. Lies smooth social discourse. Part of learning a spoken language, y'know, is learning the body language, so we can pick up all those clues. But it's not consistent from culture to culture. In some languages shaking your head left and right is not a 'no.' The basic structure of spoken grammar is actually a lot more dependable and consistent. Chomsky-you might have heard of him?"
"No."
"Well, he's well known enough as a linguist you should have. He stated that a Martian coming to Earth might assume we had one common language with a few thousand dialects."
"Oh, yeah, that sounds smart."
"It does if you look for commonalities instead of differences. Maybe that's a better approach. Y'know, you can map the migration of entire populations by-"
"Daniel, are you babbling so I won't? Or so you won't get back into anything personal?"
"Uhm...well, uh...?"
"Y'know, you might have had Carter."
"Think so? She's pretty bright."
"Yeah, but she also likes shiny objects and that includes the things you do with words."
"Is that a compliment? Did you actually say something nice about me?"
"I think we should stop talking now. Before I have to shoot one of us."
Daniel shifted on the ground, and Jack was pretty sure he had turned to face him. He had the sense of Daniel staring hard-the man could focus an unsettling intensity.
"Can you? Stop? I'm not sure I can. As soon as something comes into my head it's like a compulsion to frame it into words. I wish I were drunk. That would at least be an excuse, and this is like being drunk without the euphoria. Or the slurring. Maybe I should take that Vicodin. You'll probably get more of the same from me, but I'll be so spaced I won't care."
Jack fished out the packet. Fumbling, he put it into Daniel's hand, closed the other man's fingers around it. "Take it. Then we'll know whatever you say is the drugs."
"Will I? Know that? But what if I want undrugged truth?"
"Daniel, don't back out on me now. This isn't truth we're dishing. This is...oh, hell, I don't know. It's a dark night in a hole. This is stuff we won't remember, or won't want to, and if we do, we'll remember it didn't mean a damn thing. Nothing we say here changes anything, Daniel."
"What if we want it changed? What if I want change?"
The words came out flat, without the challenge Jack half-expected. He almost reached for the flashlight, almost switched it on. Then he decided he did not want to see the expression on Daniel's face, or read what was in Daniel's eyes, but he still couldn't stop the question in his head from getting loose. "What do you want changed?"
"How about everything?"
Jack heard the packet rip. He bumped Daniel's shoulder again with the canteen, had it taken from his hand. "Glad to see you have low expectations."
"Okay, how about me? You? This? Jack, do you think there...does it always have to be..." Daniel let the words trail, and Jack heard water slosh in the canteen as if Daniel had gestured with it.
"Might help if I knew the question," Jack said. He folded his arms, shifted, didn't look at the dark silhouette of Daniel in the darker room.
"You know."
"No. I don't. Damnit, you do this-and just how the hell is it you think anyone's caught up with you?"
"What d'you mean?"
"You. You and your questions. Sometimes I think you make 'em up just to keep busy. And you just go off with them, thinking everyone's right with you."
"What does that mean?"
Daniel sound aggravated again, annoyed. Better that than that wistful longing that just tore Jack apart from the inside.
"See-questions. I'd lay you odds you couldn't go a day without asking a dozen, but it's a sucker bet."
That shut Daniel up, but Jack could just about hear him thinking. Then a soft word came out. "Sorry."
Annoyed now, Jack shifted again. "What for now? This place? Talking?"
"How about everything? Or what I've said. Here and...oh, just take your pick. Or how about for mostly being wrong about most things?"
"So everything's all your fault now-yep, single child." He pressed his lips tight, told himself it was Daniel growing up an only kid that was making the guy talk like this. That's what he wanted at least. And the fact that that wasn't really true pissed Jack off even more. He wanted Daniel fighting him on this. Not rolling over the way he did sometimes when he was beat down hard enough. Then the rest of it spilled, "It's always all about you!"
"No-that's not...you're deliberately misunderstanding me."
"Actually, that just happens, no deliberation needed." Jack shook his head, played back those words and wished he did have a head injury, or a sock to stuff in his own his mouth. "Daniel-"
"No, you're right. We should stop talking."
"No, I'm wrong. And I'm sorry. I don't know why this stuff comes out-well, no, I do know. I like to annoy you. It's...it's...reassuring. I like to know that what I think matters to you."
"Matters? What, I'm like the kid you torment so you know you can always get a reaction?"
"Daniel, I've seen you-people you decide don't matter, don't get the time of day from you. You just go polite and turn your back on 'em. Unless, of course, you really hate them, and then god help them because you won't. And, damn it, you need annoying. You need reminders you are not Superman because...well, because you're not."
"And when have I ever thought that? What-you think I need to be slapped with my mistakes to keep me in my place? Do you mean to say-Jack, oh, god, you didn't shoot her to...that wasn't to...?"
"What the hell? You think-?"
"No. Sorry. No. Of course not. No. God. It's just...oh-maybe I shouldn't have taken those meds. I'm really not making any sense now."
"About as much as ever. You want change? I don't. We get it in buckets and it just keeps being about losing things. Change means you have to adjust. My whole life has been changes-you have to make changes to follow orders. Changes of address when your reassigned. Changes in yourself when you get the wrong orders. Changes when you...well, change pretty much sucks."
"Does it? Always? Advancement comes from change-with change. It's inevitable. Maybe it's our resistance that colors our opinion? Shapes us. Makes it difficult. Don't we court and need the stimulation from a certain amount of change? In which case, maybe it's not so much...uhm, change, as the degree of it within major shifts? Change reminds us how little control we have in life, and that's why we dig in our heels, wear ourselves out battling it. Is that noble or stupid?"
"Back to Zen again? There's no way I buy that you think we should let the bad happen and then lay down to die."
"We all die eventually. Maybe it's the struggle beforehand which defines us? The change we create? The good we do, either by accident or design? And, if so, what's better-someone with good intentions who does bad? Or someone who means harm but who does good?"
"You're right, you shouldn't have taken those meds."
"I want to do good, Jack. I try-and, well, it doesn't always work out that well. Maybe I should change my intent and mean more harm. I could screw that up instead for a change."
"And maybe you'll end up causing some real disasters if you put your mind to it. Oh, yeah, that'd be a good change."
"Okay-so if intent matters, if that's so, then is the best we can hope for that we can keep our intentions clean? That's not a lot to hope for, but maybe it is the only thing we can...can...oh, god...I think I'm going to be sick."
Daniel rolled over and up to his feet. Jack heard the scuff of his boots on the curved flooring, the miserable gut-clenching sound of retching. The smell that bloomed turned Jack's stomach. He was glad he hadn't eaten. He stuck the unopened packet of mac and cheese or whatever it was from the MRE back into Daniel's pack, then switched on the flashlight. He didn't want Daniel staggering into a wall.
Leaning against smooth rock as far away as possible, one hand braced and shaking, Daniel leaned forward, his head down. Jack waited. Not much he could do. Truth was, he had a bad feeling this wasn't a good sign.
Straightening, Daniel came back. He braced his back against the wall and slid down next to Jack. He'd looked pale before, now he'd added a sheen of sweat to his skin. He sat close enough that their shoulders brushed and Jack could feel the shivering.
With a quick move, Jack checked Daniel's pulse, found it skipping a little too fast in the man's neck. Daniel's skin was a little too cool as well. He offered some water, but Daniel shook his head. "I'd rather not find out if it'll come up again. And I'm okay for now. I think it was the Vicodin that set me off-it may not mix with whatever's in the air. Or the cookies."
"Okay, that does it." Jack started to push up to his feet, but Daniel grabbed for him, got hold of his jacket and tugged hard enough to pull Jack onto his bad ankle so he had to sit again.
"Jack, no. Please. Sam and Teal'c-give them a chance. You don't want to spoil their big rescue. It always makes Sam happy to save the day, and Teal'c likes us owing him. I think he's still trying to make up for the things he did for Apophis. Or maybe he just likes showing off. I'm never really sure about that."
Relaxing back against the wall, pain spiking up from his ankle, Jack left the flashlight on. He was done with the dark, and if he had something to look at, he could block the stench of vomit now trapped with them. So he kept his stare on Daniel's pale, drawn face. "Daniel, you better hope this wears off by the time anyone else shows up."
Rolling his head, Daniel glanced at him. A smile flickered, then he sobered and closed his eyes. "What if it's not something that leaves? What if-well, maybe this temple is a place that...that opens you? Maybe we need to talk to each other like this? Maybe that's what this place is for-purging of the body and spirit? For making uncertain connections more certain with communication?"
"Yeah-right. That'd explain why there's no people. They all started talking, wouldn't shut up, and got to the point they couldn't take it and throttled each other. I'm just sorry it's hitting you so hard. You're going to hate yourself later."
"And you won't? But terminal mortification never killed anyone. It's also not like I haven't been in embarrassing situations. I'm used to that. Well-pretty much." Daniel's eyes opened to bright slits. His mouth curved. "Maybe we should set this up as place to test SGC candidates."
"Bring them here, find out what they spill?"
"Not exactly ethical, but it would be interesting. You do know, Jack, there's nothing you've said so far that's surprised me. Nothing shocking. Of course, I've probably said more. And I suppose you could. Shock me, I mean. You could bring up something you've done in your past, but I don't think it would change how I think of you. You'd still be the person I know."
"So you don't mind stories about throats slit and villages bombed to rubble, and-" He broke off that story. Daniel knew it anyway.
Wincing, Daniel wrinkled his nose. His eyes slid closed again. "God, it stinks. Sorry about that. Very sorry since it's not doing anything to help me. And no, it's not about not minding-well, not so much. But whatever you've done, you've had your reasons. I know...and...well, you have those constructs to work within. It can't be easy, navigating within them, all things considered. I do understand that. It's your job to embrace them, enforce them on others. But you're really as bad as I am at wanting things to turn out the way you want them to. Instead of questioning rules, you bend them. You step over and on them. You sure you're not an only child, too?"
Jack gave a harsh laugh. "Right. Fine. Okay, Daniel, I can buy you telling me a few things about yourself, but when you get into telling stuff about me-not buying."
Daniel's eyes slitted open again. "Think I don't know you?"
"You know part of me. You know the part you work with. You have pieces, same way I have bits of you."
"Ah, now that's a lie. So this is not entirely about truth-it's about talking. About saying whatever we think, and thoughts are so often wrong. Particularly how we think of ourselves. It's difficult to get any...well, perspective. Too easy to think we've found it when we've only found self-delusion."
"Daniel?" Jack put a low warning into the word again, but he knew it was useless. Short of wrapping Daniel's mouth as well as his head, there wasn't anything he could do about this. But if Daniel had decided they weren't being forced into honesty, they could both hide behind that.
Daniel, of course-head back, eyes shut-kept his mouth going. "What do we know of each other? I know what you'll die for, Jack. What you'll kill for. Boy, do I know that. Your sense of honor is both admirable...and frustrating. It's a barrier at times. I'd say that's a hell of a lot to know about someone." He smiled suddenly. "I know you do terrible accents, and you love opera, and I know I can ask you for anything. But I try not to. You know that about me, I hope."
"Daniel, rambling again."
"Yes, yes-off to the races. Blame the Vicodin, even though I left most if with those cookies. Oh, not a pleasant thought. And you thought I used to talk a lot before this?"
"Trouble is, I'm talking, too, Daniel."
"No, you're not. You're working hard not to. Do you think I can't see you sweating-smell it, too. God, we stink, Jack. But that's okay. It's easier if you talk. Talk nonsense, Jack. Tell me dumb things. Tell me stories. It'll keep everything else you need to keep safe safe."
Daniel turned his head slightly, rolled it as if even that took too much effort. His eyes slitted open again, the blue edge of iris pale and glinting silver in the stark flashlight. Shadows hugged him, hid the bruising on his face. Most of the dried blood had flaked off; it looked more like dirt now. And Jack, ambushed by his own thoughts, knew the truth here just a little too late.
"You giving me an out, Daniel? What if I don't want one? That's what kills me about you-you never ask if someone wants you to dive in to the deep end for them. You assume your help's needed. Wanted. You don't ask, you just do. You offer yourself up, and it's always then that I want you to be that selfish, self-centered child instead."
"No, you don't want that. No one does. Truth is, I trained myself out of that. Or I tried to. I'm still careless. I...forget things. Overlook people. I hate that because it's nothing anyone wants or needs. It's cold to think this, but it's true-I might have grown up a horrible person if my parents had lived. Their-what happened shook me out of my self-centered world. Out of myself."
Jack shook his head, had the words pushing. "Oh, yeah-you'd be a real bastard if you'd had your own parents to raise you. That works." He bit off the rest, kept it back because it made no kind of sense. But he knew where those kind of lies came from, how they made what you had to live with bearable. And then the rest of it burst free because it had to.
"Out of yourself? Daniel, that sent you so deep no one's ever dug you out, except maybe Sha're, and I'm not even sure she found all of you. A few years and she might have had a chance. But you still think that what you are is your knowledge and language and all the stuff you've used to pave yourself over. And if we're going to do this read the other person crap, then I'm going to tell you right now, I wish the hell you were that arrogant SOB whose parents had spoilt him by keeping him the center of their world." Jack broke off, leaned his head into his hands. "Oh, hell-I don't know what I'm saying."
A hand lifted, rested on the back of his neck. "Yes, you do. And...thank you."
Keeping his head down, Jack shook out a slow no. "Don't start that. You're not going to thank me later. You're going to want to dive for cover. And, yeah, if you know me, then I know you. But that's just insane. It's not true. Just because I know what you'll die for, doesn't mean I know you. It just means I've seen you do it. That tells me nothing. And you don't have a favorite song-or if you do it's something five thousand years old that I've never heard of. Or it changes every week. See-that's what I know. And that's just crap, Daniel."
He looked up. Daniel had his eyes open and a smile creasing the corners of his eyes, but not showing anywhere else. "I like opera, too, Jack."
"No, you don't. But you'll tell me you do. You'll drink beer, too, if I give you one. And I will ask things of you. Things I shouldn't ask. I'll keep making you do things you don't want to do."
"So what else is new?" Daniel gave a casual shrug, and just about got away with looking like it didn't matter. "That's most of my life. Did I want to lose my wife? My career? Did I want to lose my parents? I'm nowhere I ever planned to be. That's just...I told you, my life has no pattern. Besides, now you're arguing against yourself because following rules is about doing things you don't want to. So how can you have it both ways-that I do what I want and talk others into it, and yet I'm this martyr to the needs of others?"
"That's because you're a walking contradiction."
Daniel's smile widened. "Who's really annoying?"
"Goes together. Package deal."
"Like you?"
"What-I'm annoying now?"
"Oh, very. Mostly because your ideas often work out better than some of the things I've come up with on my own."
"My ideas? Seems like you come up with most of them and I end up getting talked into doing them."
"Oh, yeah, sure. Like this temple? That pied piper thing? Maybe you're the one projecting. You tell me I won't settle, that I don't know my limits, but do you know and accept yours? I've never seen it."
"We all have to sometimes, Daniel. Sometimes there's no choice."
"Now that's a justification. Unfortunately, the truth is sometimes the choice isn't much of one-it's between bad and worse. We both-I mean, back when you had to...in the gate room...I mean...we made...oh, god, I wish I had a better choice now. About not getting sick again. I'm sorry, but I think it's going to get worse in here."
Jack lifted his head, met Daniel's stare. "Fine, here's a choice. Give me your wrists."
"What?"
"Come on, hands out."
Cross-legged again, Daniel stared at him. He blinked twice, then held out his hands, palms up, fingers curved as if waiting for a gift. Jack pushed up the sleeves of Daniel's jacket-right arm, then left-then wrapped his hands around Daniel's wrists.
Shifting his grip, Jack felt around, settled his thumbs over what he thought was the right spot; it'd been a long time since he'd last done this. Daniel's pulse jumped once, then steadied and he watched Jack, frowning and wary and looking ready to bolt. If he could move that fast. "What the hell are you doing?"
"Pressure points. For nausea. Amazing what the Air Force will teach you. Sara used to puke her guts out in the mornings until I started this. Main reason we never had more kids. Pregnancy was a bitch on her-hard to make happen and then even harder to get through. No way was I risking her on a second time."
Part 3
"I suppose we could at least be thankful it's been dry for a few seasons."
"Dry?" Jack asked. He'd started what he hoped was mac and cheese-not tuna noodles-heating. The package felt good, warm on his leg, so he left it and listened to Daniel talk around a cookie.
"Cisterns typically work as water collection from rain, with natural filters built into them because they're carved into porous stone."
Sitting up, Jack pulled out his canteen, unscrewed the cap and tapped Daniel's shoulder with it. "Great. So next storm means it'll get more than wet in here?"
"It should take more than one rainy season to fill this place, but I don't think we have to worry. The surrounding desert indicates a climate change, which would account for this site being abandoned. And if we're here long enough for that to change again, we'll be dead."
"Jeeze, Daniel."
"I know, I know. Too grim. But, well, Jack don't you ever feel you're...maybe here, I dunno, by accident?"
"Of course we are. Falling floor?"
"No, not here here. Here, big here."
"Oh, that. No."
"No?"
There was a pause while Daniel drank, then the canteen bumped against Jack's arm and he took a sip before putting it away. "Why the hell would you-oh, the parents thing?"
"Partly. I mean, yes, I don't think they planned on me. But I was with them when they died. And I didn't. There's been a few other times I've been overlooked by fate-more than a few. You've been there for some of that. The Greeks believed the Fates wove the thread of your life into existence, and cut it to end your days. Sometimes I feel...a loose end. Not woven into anything. And maybe I get away with things because there's no pattern to me."
Shaking his head, Jack bit back his temper, but the words came out anyway, sharp and hard. "There you go again!"
"Again?"
"Off. Tangents. Justifications. You don't belong, which gives you reason to not follow anyone's rules. Sometimes I think you work at not fitting into anything-other times I just think you've got a natural talent for it."
Daniel let out a short huff of breath. "I follow rules."
"Oh, sure. When it suits you."
"No," Daniel said, drawing out the word like he was stalling to think up even more to say. "More like when I understand the reasons why. Or when it's useful. Or when I can't see better options. I wouldn't have my degrees if I didn't have any discipline and couldn't respect structure and order."
"You mean if you have to, you can."
"When I need to, I can. But we're back to artificial constructs-that's what a rule is. And those should be challenged. Following doesn't mean questions can't be asked along the way. Just ask a Zen monk. Hmmm-I wonder if they'd answer that one?"
"Y'know, isn't that what stalled out your last career? All those challenges and being a little too Zen? And here's a question for you-why can't this hole be one of your artificial constructs?"
"Jack?"
"Yeah, what?"
"Please do not start thinking about grenades and all the good things you can do with explosives."
"Will you stop that?"
"Stop what?"
"The mind reading thing. God, I hope nothing here's doing that. Besides, not like I'm going to set anything until daylight."
"How nice, I have a few hours before you bring the rest of this place down on top of us."
Frowning, Jack stared up at the hole and pressed the heating mac and cheese down on his leg. "Oh. So...explosions bad?"
"Yes. Bad. Very."
Jack's mouth quirked at how Daniel liked to make it simple for him, then he grimaced at what the words meant. "Bad as what'll happen if we stay in here, talking like this?"
Next to him, Daniel's shoulder bumped his, tensed and hard, and Jack wondered if that was how Daniel always felt when he was thinking. "Do you think with your body, Daniel?" He tried to bite off the words and couldn't any more than he could shut off his brain. "Oh, hell, maybe I should just knock myself out with something from the med kit before I really say the wrong thing. Damnit, ignore anything-no, ignore everything I say."
"Head injury, Jack. I'll blame that. Oh, no, wait, you don't have one. But you were out. And I can give you a doctor's confidentiality even if it only comes attached to my doctorates."
Jack heard the humor lurking, dry and sparse, in Daniel's voice and shook his head. Daniel trying to cut him slack-and why the hell did the guy do that? He pressed his lips tight and fought to keep the words inside his head where they belonged.
He sat on his hands to see if that would help, and then Daniel pulled in a long breath and let it out, and said, "Yes."
"Yes, what?"
"Yes, I think with my body. Most of the time, I have to sketch thoughts with my hands, and haven't you ever had an idea come from your gut? Or had your hands shake from inspiration? Or had an insight hit you in the chest so hard you lost your breath from it?"
Daniel's hand bumped Jack's leg. Jack glanced at the impact point, saw nothing in the darkness. "I suppose. You get battle sense. Instincts you learn to trust because they're faster."
Frowning, he thought of how those instincts usually had him jumping all over Daniel's more thoughtful attempts to go at things. But thinking took time, which meant too many seconds available for dying. Jack could live with regrets for what he'd done a whole lot better than the things he'd neglected.
He pressed his lips tight to keep from saying that, but Daniel just made a soft hum, as if he knew what Jack was thinking anyway. And then Daniel went on talking, his voice soft, the tone persuasive as always. "I think our bodies always knows the truth. But it's polite to pretend otherwise. Lies smooth social discourse. Part of learning a spoken language, y'know, is learning the body language, so we can pick up all those clues. But it's not consistent from culture to culture. In some languages shaking your head left and right is not a 'no.' The basic structure of spoken grammar is actually a lot more dependable and consistent. Chomsky-you might have heard of him?"
"No."
"Well, he's well known enough as a linguist you should have. He stated that a Martian coming to Earth might assume we had one common language with a few thousand dialects."
"Oh, yeah, that sounds smart."
"It does if you look for commonalities instead of differences. Maybe that's a better approach. Y'know, you can map the migration of entire populations by-"
"Daniel, are you babbling so I won't? Or so you won't get back into anything personal?"
"Uhm...well, uh...?"
"Y'know, you might have had Carter."
"Think so? She's pretty bright."
"Yeah, but she also likes shiny objects and that includes the things you do with words."
"Is that a compliment? Did you actually say something nice about me?"
"I think we should stop talking now. Before I have to shoot one of us."
Daniel shifted on the ground, and Jack was pretty sure he had turned to face him. He had the sense of Daniel staring hard-the man could focus an unsettling intensity.
"Can you? Stop? I'm not sure I can. As soon as something comes into my head it's like a compulsion to frame it into words. I wish I were drunk. That would at least be an excuse, and this is like being drunk without the euphoria. Or the slurring. Maybe I should take that Vicodin. You'll probably get more of the same from me, but I'll be so spaced I won't care."
Jack fished out the packet. Fumbling, he put it into Daniel's hand, closed the other man's fingers around it. "Take it. Then we'll know whatever you say is the drugs."
"Will I? Know that? But what if I want undrugged truth?"
"Daniel, don't back out on me now. This isn't truth we're dishing. This is...oh, hell, I don't know. It's a dark night in a hole. This is stuff we won't remember, or won't want to, and if we do, we'll remember it didn't mean a damn thing. Nothing we say here changes anything, Daniel."
"What if we want it changed? What if I want change?"
The words came out flat, without the challenge Jack half-expected. He almost reached for the flashlight, almost switched it on. Then he decided he did not want to see the expression on Daniel's face, or read what was in Daniel's eyes, but he still couldn't stop the question in his head from getting loose. "What do you want changed?"
"How about everything?"
Jack heard the packet rip. He bumped Daniel's shoulder again with the canteen, had it taken from his hand. "Glad to see you have low expectations."
"Okay, how about me? You? This? Jack, do you think there...does it always have to be..." Daniel let the words trail, and Jack heard water slosh in the canteen as if Daniel had gestured with it.
"Might help if I knew the question," Jack said. He folded his arms, shifted, didn't look at the dark silhouette of Daniel in the darker room.
"You know."
"No. I don't. Damnit, you do this-and just how the hell is it you think anyone's caught up with you?"
"What d'you mean?"
"You. You and your questions. Sometimes I think you make 'em up just to keep busy. And you just go off with them, thinking everyone's right with you."
"What does that mean?"
Daniel sound aggravated again, annoyed. Better that than that wistful longing that just tore Jack apart from the inside.
"See-questions. I'd lay you odds you couldn't go a day without asking a dozen, but it's a sucker bet."
That shut Daniel up, but Jack could just about hear him thinking. Then a soft word came out. "Sorry."
Annoyed now, Jack shifted again. "What for now? This place? Talking?"
"How about everything? Or what I've said. Here and...oh, just take your pick. Or how about for mostly being wrong about most things?"
"So everything's all your fault now-yep, single child." He pressed his lips tight, told himself it was Daniel growing up an only kid that was making the guy talk like this. That's what he wanted at least. And the fact that that wasn't really true pissed Jack off even more. He wanted Daniel fighting him on this. Not rolling over the way he did sometimes when he was beat down hard enough. Then the rest of it spilled, "It's always all about you!"
"No-that's not...you're deliberately misunderstanding me."
"Actually, that just happens, no deliberation needed." Jack shook his head, played back those words and wished he did have a head injury, or a sock to stuff in his own his mouth. "Daniel-"
"No, you're right. We should stop talking."
"No, I'm wrong. And I'm sorry. I don't know why this stuff comes out-well, no, I do know. I like to annoy you. It's...it's...reassuring. I like to know that what I think matters to you."
"Matters? What, I'm like the kid you torment so you know you can always get a reaction?"
"Daniel, I've seen you-people you decide don't matter, don't get the time of day from you. You just go polite and turn your back on 'em. Unless, of course, you really hate them, and then god help them because you won't. And, damn it, you need annoying. You need reminders you are not Superman because...well, because you're not."
"And when have I ever thought that? What-you think I need to be slapped with my mistakes to keep me in my place? Do you mean to say-Jack, oh, god, you didn't shoot her to...that wasn't to...?"
"What the hell? You think-?"
"No. Sorry. No. Of course not. No. God. It's just...oh-maybe I shouldn't have taken those meds. I'm really not making any sense now."
"About as much as ever. You want change? I don't. We get it in buckets and it just keeps being about losing things. Change means you have to adjust. My whole life has been changes-you have to make changes to follow orders. Changes of address when your reassigned. Changes in yourself when you get the wrong orders. Changes when you...well, change pretty much sucks."
"Does it? Always? Advancement comes from change-with change. It's inevitable. Maybe it's our resistance that colors our opinion? Shapes us. Makes it difficult. Don't we court and need the stimulation from a certain amount of change? In which case, maybe it's not so much...uhm, change, as the degree of it within major shifts? Change reminds us how little control we have in life, and that's why we dig in our heels, wear ourselves out battling it. Is that noble or stupid?"
"Back to Zen again? There's no way I buy that you think we should let the bad happen and then lay down to die."
"We all die eventually. Maybe it's the struggle beforehand which defines us? The change we create? The good we do, either by accident or design? And, if so, what's better-someone with good intentions who does bad? Or someone who means harm but who does good?"
"You're right, you shouldn't have taken those meds."
"I want to do good, Jack. I try-and, well, it doesn't always work out that well. Maybe I should change my intent and mean more harm. I could screw that up instead for a change."
"And maybe you'll end up causing some real disasters if you put your mind to it. Oh, yeah, that'd be a good change."
"Okay-so if intent matters, if that's so, then is the best we can hope for that we can keep our intentions clean? That's not a lot to hope for, but maybe it is the only thing we can...can...oh, god...I think I'm going to be sick."
Daniel rolled over and up to his feet. Jack heard the scuff of his boots on the curved flooring, the miserable gut-clenching sound of retching. The smell that bloomed turned Jack's stomach. He was glad he hadn't eaten. He stuck the unopened packet of mac and cheese or whatever it was from the MRE back into Daniel's pack, then switched on the flashlight. He didn't want Daniel staggering into a wall.
Leaning against smooth rock as far away as possible, one hand braced and shaking, Daniel leaned forward, his head down. Jack waited. Not much he could do. Truth was, he had a bad feeling this wasn't a good sign.
Straightening, Daniel came back. He braced his back against the wall and slid down next to Jack. He'd looked pale before, now he'd added a sheen of sweat to his skin. He sat close enough that their shoulders brushed and Jack could feel the shivering.
With a quick move, Jack checked Daniel's pulse, found it skipping a little too fast in the man's neck. Daniel's skin was a little too cool as well. He offered some water, but Daniel shook his head. "I'd rather not find out if it'll come up again. And I'm okay for now. I think it was the Vicodin that set me off-it may not mix with whatever's in the air. Or the cookies."
"Okay, that does it." Jack started to push up to his feet, but Daniel grabbed for him, got hold of his jacket and tugged hard enough to pull Jack onto his bad ankle so he had to sit again.
"Jack, no. Please. Sam and Teal'c-give them a chance. You don't want to spoil their big rescue. It always makes Sam happy to save the day, and Teal'c likes us owing him. I think he's still trying to make up for the things he did for Apophis. Or maybe he just likes showing off. I'm never really sure about that."
Relaxing back against the wall, pain spiking up from his ankle, Jack left the flashlight on. He was done with the dark, and if he had something to look at, he could block the stench of vomit now trapped with them. So he kept his stare on Daniel's pale, drawn face. "Daniel, you better hope this wears off by the time anyone else shows up."
Rolling his head, Daniel glanced at him. A smile flickered, then he sobered and closed his eyes. "What if it's not something that leaves? What if-well, maybe this temple is a place that...that opens you? Maybe we need to talk to each other like this? Maybe that's what this place is for-purging of the body and spirit? For making uncertain connections more certain with communication?"
"Yeah-right. That'd explain why there's no people. They all started talking, wouldn't shut up, and got to the point they couldn't take it and throttled each other. I'm just sorry it's hitting you so hard. You're going to hate yourself later."
"And you won't? But terminal mortification never killed anyone. It's also not like I haven't been in embarrassing situations. I'm used to that. Well-pretty much." Daniel's eyes opened to bright slits. His mouth curved. "Maybe we should set this up as place to test SGC candidates."
"Bring them here, find out what they spill?"
"Not exactly ethical, but it would be interesting. You do know, Jack, there's nothing you've said so far that's surprised me. Nothing shocking. Of course, I've probably said more. And I suppose you could. Shock me, I mean. You could bring up something you've done in your past, but I don't think it would change how I think of you. You'd still be the person I know."
"So you don't mind stories about throats slit and villages bombed to rubble, and-" He broke off that story. Daniel knew it anyway.
Wincing, Daniel wrinkled his nose. His eyes slid closed again. "God, it stinks. Sorry about that. Very sorry since it's not doing anything to help me. And no, it's not about not minding-well, not so much. But whatever you've done, you've had your reasons. I know...and...well, you have those constructs to work within. It can't be easy, navigating within them, all things considered. I do understand that. It's your job to embrace them, enforce them on others. But you're really as bad as I am at wanting things to turn out the way you want them to. Instead of questioning rules, you bend them. You step over and on them. You sure you're not an only child, too?"
Jack gave a harsh laugh. "Right. Fine. Okay, Daniel, I can buy you telling me a few things about yourself, but when you get into telling stuff about me-not buying."
Daniel's eyes slitted open again. "Think I don't know you?"
"You know part of me. You know the part you work with. You have pieces, same way I have bits of you."
"Ah, now that's a lie. So this is not entirely about truth-it's about talking. About saying whatever we think, and thoughts are so often wrong. Particularly how we think of ourselves. It's difficult to get any...well, perspective. Too easy to think we've found it when we've only found self-delusion."
"Daniel?" Jack put a low warning into the word again, but he knew it was useless. Short of wrapping Daniel's mouth as well as his head, there wasn't anything he could do about this. But if Daniel had decided they weren't being forced into honesty, they could both hide behind that.
Daniel, of course-head back, eyes shut-kept his mouth going. "What do we know of each other? I know what you'll die for, Jack. What you'll kill for. Boy, do I know that. Your sense of honor is both admirable...and frustrating. It's a barrier at times. I'd say that's a hell of a lot to know about someone." He smiled suddenly. "I know you do terrible accents, and you love opera, and I know I can ask you for anything. But I try not to. You know that about me, I hope."
"Daniel, rambling again."
"Yes, yes-off to the races. Blame the Vicodin, even though I left most if with those cookies. Oh, not a pleasant thought. And you thought I used to talk a lot before this?"
"Trouble is, I'm talking, too, Daniel."
"No, you're not. You're working hard not to. Do you think I can't see you sweating-smell it, too. God, we stink, Jack. But that's okay. It's easier if you talk. Talk nonsense, Jack. Tell me dumb things. Tell me stories. It'll keep everything else you need to keep safe safe."
Daniel turned his head slightly, rolled it as if even that took too much effort. His eyes slitted open again, the blue edge of iris pale and glinting silver in the stark flashlight. Shadows hugged him, hid the bruising on his face. Most of the dried blood had flaked off; it looked more like dirt now. And Jack, ambushed by his own thoughts, knew the truth here just a little too late.
"You giving me an out, Daniel? What if I don't want one? That's what kills me about you-you never ask if someone wants you to dive in to the deep end for them. You assume your help's needed. Wanted. You don't ask, you just do. You offer yourself up, and it's always then that I want you to be that selfish, self-centered child instead."
"No, you don't want that. No one does. Truth is, I trained myself out of that. Or I tried to. I'm still careless. I...forget things. Overlook people. I hate that because it's nothing anyone wants or needs. It's cold to think this, but it's true-I might have grown up a horrible person if my parents had lived. Their-what happened shook me out of my self-centered world. Out of myself."
Jack shook his head, had the words pushing. "Oh, yeah-you'd be a real bastard if you'd had your own parents to raise you. That works." He bit off the rest, kept it back because it made no kind of sense. But he knew where those kind of lies came from, how they made what you had to live with bearable. And then the rest of it burst free because it had to.
"Out of yourself? Daniel, that sent you so deep no one's ever dug you out, except maybe Sha're, and I'm not even sure she found all of you. A few years and she might have had a chance. But you still think that what you are is your knowledge and language and all the stuff you've used to pave yourself over. And if we're going to do this read the other person crap, then I'm going to tell you right now, I wish the hell you were that arrogant SOB whose parents had spoilt him by keeping him the center of their world." Jack broke off, leaned his head into his hands. "Oh, hell-I don't know what I'm saying."
A hand lifted, rested on the back of his neck. "Yes, you do. And...thank you."
Keeping his head down, Jack shook out a slow no. "Don't start that. You're not going to thank me later. You're going to want to dive for cover. And, yeah, if you know me, then I know you. But that's just insane. It's not true. Just because I know what you'll die for, doesn't mean I know you. It just means I've seen you do it. That tells me nothing. And you don't have a favorite song-or if you do it's something five thousand years old that I've never heard of. Or it changes every week. See-that's what I know. And that's just crap, Daniel."
He looked up. Daniel had his eyes open and a smile creasing the corners of his eyes, but not showing anywhere else. "I like opera, too, Jack."
"No, you don't. But you'll tell me you do. You'll drink beer, too, if I give you one. And I will ask things of you. Things I shouldn't ask. I'll keep making you do things you don't want to do."
"So what else is new?" Daniel gave a casual shrug, and just about got away with looking like it didn't matter. "That's most of my life. Did I want to lose my wife? My career? Did I want to lose my parents? I'm nowhere I ever planned to be. That's just...I told you, my life has no pattern. Besides, now you're arguing against yourself because following rules is about doing things you don't want to. So how can you have it both ways-that I do what I want and talk others into it, and yet I'm this martyr to the needs of others?"
"That's because you're a walking contradiction."
Daniel's smile widened. "Who's really annoying?"
"Goes together. Package deal."
"Like you?"
"What-I'm annoying now?"
"Oh, very. Mostly because your ideas often work out better than some of the things I've come up with on my own."
"My ideas? Seems like you come up with most of them and I end up getting talked into doing them."
"Oh, yeah, sure. Like this temple? That pied piper thing? Maybe you're the one projecting. You tell me I won't settle, that I don't know my limits, but do you know and accept yours? I've never seen it."
"We all have to sometimes, Daniel. Sometimes there's no choice."
"Now that's a justification. Unfortunately, the truth is sometimes the choice isn't much of one-it's between bad and worse. We both-I mean, back when you had to...in the gate room...I mean...we made...oh, god, I wish I had a better choice now. About not getting sick again. I'm sorry, but I think it's going to get worse in here."
Jack lifted his head, met Daniel's stare. "Fine, here's a choice. Give me your wrists."
"What?"
"Come on, hands out."
Cross-legged again, Daniel stared at him. He blinked twice, then held out his hands, palms up, fingers curved as if waiting for a gift. Jack pushed up the sleeves of Daniel's jacket-right arm, then left-then wrapped his hands around Daniel's wrists.
Shifting his grip, Jack felt around, settled his thumbs over what he thought was the right spot; it'd been a long time since he'd last done this. Daniel's pulse jumped once, then steadied and he watched Jack, frowning and wary and looking ready to bolt. If he could move that fast. "What the hell are you doing?"
"Pressure points. For nausea. Amazing what the Air Force will teach you. Sara used to puke her guts out in the mornings until I started this. Main reason we never had more kids. Pregnancy was a bitch on her-hard to make happen and then even harder to get through. No way was I risking her on a second time."
Part 3