Crossing the Rift: Affairs of Cardiff and the Kawoosh - Chapter 3
Title: Crossing the Rift: Affairs of Cardiff and the Kawoosh
Author: sinisterx18
Rating: PG-13
Crack!Pairings: Capt. Jack H./Daniel Jackson, Col. Jack O./Ianto Jones, Teal'c/OC, Owen Harper/Anise
Final Pairings: Capt. Jack H./Ianto Jones, Col. Jack O./Samantha Carter
Warnings: Spoilers for TW season 1 and SG-1 through season 4. Also massive amounts of crack.
Summary: Simultaneous accidents bring Torchwood and SG-1 together, but their attempts to fix the problem brings them together in ways they never expected.
AN: If you missed Chapter 1, you can read it here.
Last time on CR:ACK
Conspicuously not answering that question, Jack continued his musings. "There's no way, though... I'd have known if humans were going into space by 2004." He frowned again. "Unless..."
"We're in another dimension," Sam explained.
Teal'c raised an eyebrow and said nothing. He was very shocked. (No, really, he was.)
"Major, is there any reason you didn't tell us this earlier? Say, before when I asked why we didn't just stroll up to an air base and hop on some F-16s?" Jack didn't like not knowing things like when he was in an alternate universe. Neither Jack did, but Jack O'Neill was especially touchy about it in this particular situation.
"I did, sir. With all due respect, you just weren't listening. I said, 'Despite the numerous similarities, Tosh and I have discovered that we - SG-1 - are not in our dimension. The blue buttons appear to have formed a sort of highway between realities and we got pulled through.'" Crossing her arms, she glared at everyone.
"Well," said Daniel, "it's not like we've never dealt with alternate universes before." Sometimes even he spoke with an almost boring sentence construction.
"Carter, are we gonna start doing that face-jumping thing that the you with the hair did?"
"You mean temporal entropic cascade failure, like what happened when Dr. Carter and Major Kawalski used the quantum mirror? Unlikely. We would have already experienced symptoms. It's doubtful we even have duplicates in this universe."
The Torchwood team stood looking up at SG-1. No, SG-1 did not grow to enormous proportions, Jack had lent SG-1 the meeting room so they could plan how to get home. Torchwood was simply standing on the main level, and having no rift activity to keep them occupied, had taken up spying on their unexpected guests.
"They look right unhappy," Owen pointed out what was quite obvious to all.
"I expect they're talking about how to get home." Tosh was sorry for the team, it wouldn't be easy.
"Can't they just hop a jet? Or call their people?" Gwen couldn't figure out how it could be so difficult to get to America. Sure, she'd never done it, but Banana Boat had, and if he could do it...
"It won't be that easy," Jack sighed. He suspected the only thing that could help the lost team was the right kind of doctor, and since Gallifrey's destruction, they may be stuck even then.
"What do you mean, sir?" Ianto's mind started whirring. If SG-1 had lied and were spying on Torchwood, or was wanted by their government... There were too many possibilities that ended quite poorly for the group of people he'd begun to like, not to mention for members of Torchwood 3. It was evident the members of SG-1 were highly trained military personnel.
Jack glanced at him knowingly. "Toshiko, you want to take this?" he asked the scientist.
Sighing, she did. "If you had been listening, you would have known that SG-1 was from another dimension. They came through because of the blue buttons. Apparently, Dr. Jackson and Ianto pressed them at almost the exact same moment, pulling them from their universe in to ours."
"So, not to sound unwelcoming or anything," here Owen punctured his words with a well-placed glance at Sam, who was ignoring him, "But how do we get them back?"
There was an uncomfortable pause. As they normally did during uncomfortable pauses, the entire team looked directly at Jack.
He shook his head. He might have sighed again, but that would have been repetitive. "I don't know," he admitted. "I don't think the Rift will take them back through to their universe. Even if it would, then we wouldn't have any way of controlling it. They could very well wind up in an entirely different universe, that isn't ours or theirs, and is probably much more hostile."
"Other universe?" Owen addressed his question to the room in general. "How many are there?"
Toshiko sighed. Since she hadn't been the one sighing earlier, it wasn't repetitive. "It's uncountable, Owen," she told him, for what might have been the millionth time since they started working together. "There's one for every possibility in every situation that has occurred throughout history."
"So, that's a lot, then?" Owen was clueless to the extent that it was little more than a (hilarious) caricature.
"Yes, it's a lot!" Tosh was getting impatient. "There could be a universe with nothing but shrimp! Only shrimp! And everything in between!"
The rift was quiet, and SG-1 didn't even have anything they were supposed to be doing. Once Jack O'Neill had discovered that this universe had Guinness (which he found a refreshing alternative to food), he was dead-set on finding a nice pub. Something above ground and hopefully had fries, but the fries were negotiable. In all honesty, Jack just wanted to get out, and beer was as good a reason as any.
Jack quickly convinced Jack to accompany him. Not that O'Neill really needed company, but drinking was just so much nicer if one got drunk with someone. Daniel was easily persuaded as well. He could quiz the locals about historical events (what had changed and what hadn't were of particular interest to Daniel) and probably get too drunk too quickly. The Jack who was a captain of nothing in particular also convinced Owen and Gwen a pub would be a nice place to spend the afternoon. Teal'c was a hard sell, but eventually gave in when the Jack who would know this told him his assistance would be required to get Daniel back in one piece. Ianto was harder to convince than Gwen and Owen, but acquiesced because Captain Jack Harkness threatened to rearrange the archives if he didn't go.
No amount of cajoling could get Sam and Tosh out of the HUB, however. They were busy poking and prodding Torchwood's button with various probes and muttering about complex equations no one else could hope to comprehend. Neither Jack made going to the pub an order (had they, Tosh and Sam would have gone) because at least the two were being social.
Sort of.
"Does anyone else feel like in this alternate universe, Sam was born on the wrong continent, but otherwise didn't change at all?" Jack (O'Neill) asked.
Daniel blinked at him. "How so?" he asked.
"She and Tosh," the previously mentioned Jack explained. "They just seem... exactly the same."
"There are remarkable similarities between the two," Teal'c remarked. "It is, in fact, remarkable." Teal'c tended to be remarkably redundant when drunk, and also when being written by someone sleep-deprived.
With the fourth wall suitably broken, thus condemning this story to the annals of horrible fanfic forever, the gang continued their conversation.
"So basically we've got a pair of hot geeks on our hands," Owen mused. "Great."
"Well, I think she's a dear," retorted Gwen. Since it was not immediately apparent who she was referring to, everyone pretty much ignored her.
"Hey, do you think we could be the same team, only in different universes?" Daniel suggested drunkenly.
"No, there are five of us and only four of you." Ianto was quite literal, especially when drunk. He also had a point.
"And you only have one token woman. We have two," No one could figure out if Gwen was referring to herself in the third person or not.
"Do ya' 'gate to other worlds?" Daniel was slurring his words at this point. He was a beer and a half into the evening and many several pints behind the others.
"Bloody hell! You mean to tell me you visit other planets?" Owen yelled this much too loud and drew odd looks from the few patrons that didn't work for covert military units.
"That would be classified." Drunk or not, Col. O'Neill didn't like spilling military secrets.
Interrupting Owen, who was about to press for details, Harkness suggested saving that conversation for somewhere that wasn't a public place. All agreed, some more readily than others.
That kibosh caused an unfortunate lull in conversation. Lulls in conversation are generally to be expected when two groups of people have been awkwardly foisted together, and are thus not usually unfortunate. This one warranted that particular adjective, however, because Gwen hated when no one was talking. So she always took it upon herself to fill the silence, but she rarely had anything to say during such times. Saying the first thing that came to mind (and popped out of her mouth), she suggested truth or dare. Everyone was too drunk to disagree.
"Alright," she decided. "I'll go first." She eyed the others curiously. "Teal'c," she said suddenly. "Truth or dare?"
Teal'c pondered this. His teammates had explained to him the intricacies of the game Truth or Dare, which was oddly popular in teenage parties, bad fanfiction, and, apparently, ordinarily mature (ish) adults who happened to be intoxicated at the moment. He had yet to see the appeal, but O'Neill had informed him more than once that someone who refused to partake in this odd ritual would be branded a horrible form of traitor known as a "Party-Pooper." He answered "Dare."
"You single?"
He looked at her suspiciously. "Indeed, I am romantically unattached, Detective PC Gwen Cooper," he acquiesced after a moment. "What inspired this inquiry?"
With a mischievous glint in her eye, Gwen nodded towards a woman sitting at the bar alone. "That poor girl's been all alone all night. I dare you to go ask her out."
"On a date," Teal'c's Jack explained quickly. "It's a human ritual, it means that you want to be, uhh..." he remembered Teal'c's words from about a paragraph earlier, "be romantically attached to her."
Teal'c raised his eyebrow. "But I do not wish to be so attached to her, O'Neill," he protested. "In fact, I do not even know this woman."
"Yeah, but it's a dare," Daniel explained.
"Yeah," Owen echoed.
The two shared a happy grin of agreement. Both Jacks found this extremely disturbing.
This horribly disturbing development went unnoticed by Teal'c, who instead raised his eyebrow while thinking about his options. "I believe I choose to decline this dare," he decided.
"You can't do that!" Owen complained.
"Yeah," Daniel echoed.
The level of disturbedness suffered by the Jacks was increased exponentially.
"Indeed, Doctor Owen Harper and Daniel Jackson, I may," Teal'c disagreed. "I may exclaim Poultry."
"It's 'Cry foul,' T." Jack (O'Neill) could never tell when Teal'c was trying to get things wrong and when he was just misunderstanding.
"No, I do not believe so, O'Neill."
"No, Jack! He means 'Cry chicken', ya' know, the rule Sam likes to play with." Daniel may have been drunk, but he knows culture.
"Never heard of it; doesn't count," ruled Owen.
"Then I have no choice. Failure to comply would not be honorable." Jaffa warriors value honor over everything.
While Teal'c was getting up, Gwen yelled, "Oi! Before you go, you have to pick someone! Otherwise we can't keep playing!"
"If you insist, Detective PC Gwen Cooper. Daniel Jackson, truth or dare?" That question was truly terrifying when posed by the imposing Jaffa.
"Dare!" Daniel could be talked into doing anything if you gave him enough beer (two or three would usually do the trick).
Solemnly, Teal'c revealed the young archeologist's challenge. "You must kiss someone at this table." He then walked off to complete his mission.
Daniel looked around. Feeling adventurous (or drunk), Daniel set his sights on Captain Jack Harkness.
"Jack!" he proclaimed, to everyone's surprise.
"What?!" demanded Jack, in shock.
But Daniel waved him away. "Other Jack," he explained.
O'Neill sighed, more relieved than jealous, he was pleased to find. But he was quickly distracted from his non-complicated platonic feelings for his friend when Daniel turned around to face the Jack on his other side.
Characteristically, Harkness didn't seem at all surprised or displeased by this new development. He grinned widely and leaned forwards a little bit, then stopped, waiting for the younger man to move the rest of the way.
Daniel was struck by a sudden burst of doubt. He glanced over his shoulder at Teal'c, who was talking to the young woman with more ease than anyone would expect.
People always thought that the Jaffa would be more awkward around people, especially humans, since he was so alien. But Teal'c wasn't. He was comfortable in his alien-ness, in a way that Daniel had never seen before.
Really, it was Daniel, the one who was supposed to be the expert on people, who was supposed to understand their culture and their societies, who didn't know what to do or say in situations like this. He cursed his drunken decision to act on the impulsive attraction he felt to the strange Captain.
Jack (the other Jack, although Daniel wasn't thinking of him as such as much anymore) had that same sort of comfortable alien-ness that Teal'c did. But he carried it differently. More sexual, sure, but it wasn't just that. He had an unnameable quality that had attracted Daniel from the moment they had first laid eyes on each other.
Emboldened by this memory, Daniel closed the gap between them. Their lips brushed, and he felt Jack's lips part slightly, either in pleasure or in surprise that the archaeologist had followed through on the dare, Daniel didn't know.
For once, he didn't care about that. Instead, he just parted his own lips in answer, leaning in closer than he would have ever thought was possible for two people to be to each other. He was usually straight, he didn't know anything about Jack, he was in another universe, and for all he knew, could even be kissing another version of himself. But he didn't care about that either.
It could have been that alcohol that attracted him to this strange new man, but Daniel didn't think so. He'd never felt more sober in his life.
Everyone still at the table froze and watched the pair. Torchwood was fairly used to Jack's antics, but the sole member of SG-1 was rather astonished. Woman on every planet, man in every universe, thought the Jack that wasn't making out with Daniel. Gwen, Owen, and (a slightly jealous) Ianto saw how surprised the colonel was, and realized maybe this sort of behavior was more unusual in SG-1's universe.
Owen, after finishing half a pint in one go, kicked Jack's chair hard enough to jar the Captain and the younger man out of their spit-sharing fun.
"What was that for?" Harkness had been quite enjoying himself.
"I'm a cad, I'm drunk, I look like a fish, and you two were irritating me. What wasn't that for?"
"Besides," Gwen added, "we can't keep playing if Daniel doesn't pick anyone to go next!" As the initiator, it was Gwen's self-appointed duty to assure the game continued.
"Jack! The... The... The one I didn't kiss! Truth or dare?"
Colonel Jack O'Neill was terrified. His socio-political nerd was making out with other men (having never seemed to have any interest in them before) and it just wasn't done to pick truth if everyone else had picked dare. But with Daniel in such a state, the dare was bound to be awful. With no good option available, Jack reminded himself that everyone was drunk enough to probably not remember in the morning, and spoke a word he regretted the instant it left his mouth. "Dare."
The elated grin on Daniel's face could have powered a Goa'uld mothership all the way from Chu'lak to Earth. It chilled Jack to his very core. "Pick someone."
"Why?" Jack was very, very, very suspicious.
With a sigh, Daniel issued the command, "Just do it, Jack."
"Fine," the disgruntled colonel gave in. "Ianto," happened to be sitting directly across from him.
"Now you gotta kiss 'im!" Daniel giggled. The man had really had too much to drink.
Jack's selection method proved to cause logistical challenges. The table being round, Jack had literally picked the person farthest from him. Getting up, he grumbled something no one quite caught about liking women and blonde majors with great legs.
Ianto, always proper at work, was not at work. He was 25 and drunk. A fairly attractive man had (albeit accidentally) chosen to kiss him, and Ianto wasn't going to complain. Ianto stood up to avoid the awkward that would have arisen if he had he not.
Jack leaned in and kissed him full on the mouth. Whether it was the beer, the alternate universe, or the '60s talking, Jack didn't know. What he did know is that he found he was enjoying himself and deepened the kiss accordingly.
Gwen squeaked and fell out of her chair.
Meanwhile, back at Torchwood, Sam and Toshiko were enjoying themselves just as much, although slightly differently than their drunker counterparts.
"And the Andorian says," Tosh explained, "That's not my antenna!" She finished to shrieks of laughter. "Your turn."
Sam grinned, turning fully away from her computer. "Alright," she said. "Well. So this guy walks into a bar. He's got a hamster on his shoulder, and a frog with a little top hat and cane in his pocket. And he says..."
But Toshiko never did get to find out what he said, because just then, the base's intruder alarms went off. Sam jumped to her feet. "What is that?" she demanded.
"Intruder alert," Tosh replied. She turned swiftly to her console and brought up an image of the base, searching for the location of the alleged intruder. Sam leaned over her shoulder to look along with her.
"Unauthorized incoming wormhole," announced a familiar voice.
Sam looked away from Tosh's screen to find herself standing in the gateroom. As the wormhole closed behind the iris, the computer, the desk, and everything else around them from Torchwood disappeared.
Except for Toshiko, who said the first thing that she thought of.
"What the hell?"
"Barnes here, General. What's the hold up with the iris?" the team-leader of SG-6 could be heard over the speakers in the gateroom.
"Hold your position, SG-6. We have a situation on our end." The appearance of Sam and Tosh hadn't gone unnoticed by the general or the airmen who were unwittingly reenacting SG-1's first encounter with the members of Torchwood.
"Understood," was the reply as SG-6 settled down on the planet SG-1 had disappeared from - a blue button in their scientist's pack.
Sam held up her hands and tried to look as non-threatening as possible. The airmen guarding the gateroom always did a remarkably good job of not shooting unexpected friendlies, but one could never be too careful. Tosh followed her lead. "I am Major Samantha Carter, US Air Force. I am a current member of SG-1 based at Stargate Command." Slowly pulling out her tags, she added, "My team and I were in an alternate universe; I don't know how I ended up there or back here any more than any of you do."
Hammond sighed. He was going to have to lock both the woman who appeared to be Sam and her as-yet-unidentified companion up, run a full battery of DNA tests, and X-ray them both for symbiotes. They really needed a faster (and easier) way to verify identities. "Supposing you are Major Carter, who's that next to you, and where's the rest of your team?" he asked, still in the control room.
Tosh looked uncomfortable and squeaked, so Sam answered for her. "This is Toshiko Sato. The rest of SG-1 and I ended up in her secret alien-fighting base in the alternate universe. To be honest, General, sir, I have no idea where the colonel, Daniel and Teal'c are." Their absence had Sam visibly worried.
With wonderful timing and a dash of comedy, Daniel poked his head out from behind the 'gate. "We're all back here, General! Tosh's team too!" He then attempted to jump enthusiastically out from behind the 'gate, but tripped over himself and fell. Unfortunately, travel between alternate universes didn't sober the drunk archeologist up one bit.
Luckily, Colonel O'Neill held his liquor much better than a certain light-weight team-member. Hauling Daniel up by one arm, the Jack this paragraph started out talking about walked out into the open of the gateroom to stand more or less next to Sam and Tosh. He was followed by Teal'c, Ianto, Gwen, Owen, and the other Jack. "Yes, General, it's us. If you want to know anything you should ask Carter - way too science-y for me. All I know is Daniel poked something, we ended up in Wales, of all places, in some alternate universe, and then we were suddenly behind the 'gate. Speaking of which, someone really should dust back there..." Hey, just because Jack was in better shape than Daniel didn't mean he was sober enough not to be snarky in situations where a room full of airmen had their guns trained on him.
Harkness whistled. "You got more people, I'll give you that. Little military for my tastes though."
"Says the man in the World War II era greatcoat..." Ianto muttered under his breath.
"But we're under a mountain! And it's huge!" Daniel Jackson, always forthcoming.
"That's straight out of the movies!" Gwen always doubted things that sounded like science fiction, even though in her line of work that was a completely ridiculous view.
"Daniel Jackson does indeed speak the truth, Detective PC Gwen Cooper."
"Airman," knowing someone would comply, Hammond addressed no one in particular, "please take anyone who seemingly appeared in the gateroom to the infirmary. I want Doctor Frasier to verify that's actually SG-1 and clear the others." To Colonel Barnes, he added, "We'll lower the iris in just a few minutes, Major. Sorry for the delay. I'll brief you upon your return."
Chapter 4
Author: sinisterx18
Rating: PG-13
Crack!Pairings: Capt. Jack H./Daniel Jackson, Col. Jack O./Ianto Jones, Teal'c/OC, Owen Harper/Anise
Final Pairings: Capt. Jack H./Ianto Jones, Col. Jack O./Samantha Carter
Warnings: Spoilers for TW season 1 and SG-1 through season 4. Also massive amounts of crack.
Summary: Simultaneous accidents bring Torchwood and SG-1 together, but their attempts to fix the problem brings them together in ways they never expected.
AN: If you missed Chapter 1, you can read it here.
Last time on CR:ACK
Conspicuously not answering that question, Jack continued his musings. "There's no way, though... I'd have known if humans were going into space by 2004." He frowned again. "Unless..."
"We're in another dimension," Sam explained.
Teal'c raised an eyebrow and said nothing. He was very shocked. (No, really, he was.)
"Major, is there any reason you didn't tell us this earlier? Say, before when I asked why we didn't just stroll up to an air base and hop on some F-16s?" Jack didn't like not knowing things like when he was in an alternate universe. Neither Jack did, but Jack O'Neill was especially touchy about it in this particular situation.
"I did, sir. With all due respect, you just weren't listening. I said, 'Despite the numerous similarities, Tosh and I have discovered that we - SG-1 - are not in our dimension. The blue buttons appear to have formed a sort of highway between realities and we got pulled through.'" Crossing her arms, she glared at everyone.
"Well," said Daniel, "it's not like we've never dealt with alternate universes before." Sometimes even he spoke with an almost boring sentence construction.
"Carter, are we gonna start doing that face-jumping thing that the you with the hair did?"
"You mean temporal entropic cascade failure, like what happened when Dr. Carter and Major Kawalski used the quantum mirror? Unlikely. We would have already experienced symptoms. It's doubtful we even have duplicates in this universe."
The Torchwood team stood looking up at SG-1. No, SG-1 did not grow to enormous proportions, Jack had lent SG-1 the meeting room so they could plan how to get home. Torchwood was simply standing on the main level, and having no rift activity to keep them occupied, had taken up spying on their unexpected guests.
"They look right unhappy," Owen pointed out what was quite obvious to all.
"I expect they're talking about how to get home." Tosh was sorry for the team, it wouldn't be easy.
"Can't they just hop a jet? Or call their people?" Gwen couldn't figure out how it could be so difficult to get to America. Sure, she'd never done it, but Banana Boat had, and if he could do it...
"It won't be that easy," Jack sighed. He suspected the only thing that could help the lost team was the right kind of doctor, and since Gallifrey's destruction, they may be stuck even then.
"What do you mean, sir?" Ianto's mind started whirring. If SG-1 had lied and were spying on Torchwood, or was wanted by their government... There were too many possibilities that ended quite poorly for the group of people he'd begun to like, not to mention for members of Torchwood 3. It was evident the members of SG-1 were highly trained military personnel.
Jack glanced at him knowingly. "Toshiko, you want to take this?" he asked the scientist.
Sighing, she did. "If you had been listening, you would have known that SG-1 was from another dimension. They came through because of the blue buttons. Apparently, Dr. Jackson and Ianto pressed them at almost the exact same moment, pulling them from their universe in to ours."
"So, not to sound unwelcoming or anything," here Owen punctured his words with a well-placed glance at Sam, who was ignoring him, "But how do we get them back?"
There was an uncomfortable pause. As they normally did during uncomfortable pauses, the entire team looked directly at Jack.
He shook his head. He might have sighed again, but that would have been repetitive. "I don't know," he admitted. "I don't think the Rift will take them back through to their universe. Even if it would, then we wouldn't have any way of controlling it. They could very well wind up in an entirely different universe, that isn't ours or theirs, and is probably much more hostile."
"Other universe?" Owen addressed his question to the room in general. "How many are there?"
Toshiko sighed. Since she hadn't been the one sighing earlier, it wasn't repetitive. "It's uncountable, Owen," she told him, for what might have been the millionth time since they started working together. "There's one for every possibility in every situation that has occurred throughout history."
"So, that's a lot, then?" Owen was clueless to the extent that it was little more than a (hilarious) caricature.
"Yes, it's a lot!" Tosh was getting impatient. "There could be a universe with nothing but shrimp! Only shrimp! And everything in between!"
The rift was quiet, and SG-1 didn't even have anything they were supposed to be doing. Once Jack O'Neill had discovered that this universe had Guinness (which he found a refreshing alternative to food), he was dead-set on finding a nice pub. Something above ground and hopefully had fries, but the fries were negotiable. In all honesty, Jack just wanted to get out, and beer was as good a reason as any.
Jack quickly convinced Jack to accompany him. Not that O'Neill really needed company, but drinking was just so much nicer if one got drunk with someone. Daniel was easily persuaded as well. He could quiz the locals about historical events (what had changed and what hadn't were of particular interest to Daniel) and probably get too drunk too quickly. The Jack who was a captain of nothing in particular also convinced Owen and Gwen a pub would be a nice place to spend the afternoon. Teal'c was a hard sell, but eventually gave in when the Jack who would know this told him his assistance would be required to get Daniel back in one piece. Ianto was harder to convince than Gwen and Owen, but acquiesced because Captain Jack Harkness threatened to rearrange the archives if he didn't go.
No amount of cajoling could get Sam and Tosh out of the HUB, however. They were busy poking and prodding Torchwood's button with various probes and muttering about complex equations no one else could hope to comprehend. Neither Jack made going to the pub an order (had they, Tosh and Sam would have gone) because at least the two were being social.
Sort of.
"Does anyone else feel like in this alternate universe, Sam was born on the wrong continent, but otherwise didn't change at all?" Jack (O'Neill) asked.
Daniel blinked at him. "How so?" he asked.
"She and Tosh," the previously mentioned Jack explained. "They just seem... exactly the same."
"There are remarkable similarities between the two," Teal'c remarked. "It is, in fact, remarkable." Teal'c tended to be remarkably redundant when drunk, and also when being written by someone sleep-deprived.
With the fourth wall suitably broken, thus condemning this story to the annals of horrible fanfic forever, the gang continued their conversation.
"So basically we've got a pair of hot geeks on our hands," Owen mused. "Great."
"Well, I think she's a dear," retorted Gwen. Since it was not immediately apparent who she was referring to, everyone pretty much ignored her.
"Hey, do you think we could be the same team, only in different universes?" Daniel suggested drunkenly.
"No, there are five of us and only four of you." Ianto was quite literal, especially when drunk. He also had a point.
"And you only have one token woman. We have two," No one could figure out if Gwen was referring to herself in the third person or not.
"Do ya' 'gate to other worlds?" Daniel was slurring his words at this point. He was a beer and a half into the evening and many several pints behind the others.
"Bloody hell! You mean to tell me you visit other planets?" Owen yelled this much too loud and drew odd looks from the few patrons that didn't work for covert military units.
"That would be classified." Drunk or not, Col. O'Neill didn't like spilling military secrets.
Interrupting Owen, who was about to press for details, Harkness suggested saving that conversation for somewhere that wasn't a public place. All agreed, some more readily than others.
That kibosh caused an unfortunate lull in conversation. Lulls in conversation are generally to be expected when two groups of people have been awkwardly foisted together, and are thus not usually unfortunate. This one warranted that particular adjective, however, because Gwen hated when no one was talking. So she always took it upon herself to fill the silence, but she rarely had anything to say during such times. Saying the first thing that came to mind (and popped out of her mouth), she suggested truth or dare. Everyone was too drunk to disagree.
"Alright," she decided. "I'll go first." She eyed the others curiously. "Teal'c," she said suddenly. "Truth or dare?"
Teal'c pondered this. His teammates had explained to him the intricacies of the game Truth or Dare, which was oddly popular in teenage parties, bad fanfiction, and, apparently, ordinarily mature (ish) adults who happened to be intoxicated at the moment. He had yet to see the appeal, but O'Neill had informed him more than once that someone who refused to partake in this odd ritual would be branded a horrible form of traitor known as a "Party-Pooper." He answered "Dare."
"You single?"
He looked at her suspiciously. "Indeed, I am romantically unattached, Detective PC Gwen Cooper," he acquiesced after a moment. "What inspired this inquiry?"
With a mischievous glint in her eye, Gwen nodded towards a woman sitting at the bar alone. "That poor girl's been all alone all night. I dare you to go ask her out."
"On a date," Teal'c's Jack explained quickly. "It's a human ritual, it means that you want to be, uhh..." he remembered Teal'c's words from about a paragraph earlier, "be romantically attached to her."
Teal'c raised his eyebrow. "But I do not wish to be so attached to her, O'Neill," he protested. "In fact, I do not even know this woman."
"Yeah, but it's a dare," Daniel explained.
"Yeah," Owen echoed.
The two shared a happy grin of agreement. Both Jacks found this extremely disturbing.
This horribly disturbing development went unnoticed by Teal'c, who instead raised his eyebrow while thinking about his options. "I believe I choose to decline this dare," he decided.
"You can't do that!" Owen complained.
"Yeah," Daniel echoed.
The level of disturbedness suffered by the Jacks was increased exponentially.
"Indeed, Doctor Owen Harper and Daniel Jackson, I may," Teal'c disagreed. "I may exclaim Poultry."
"It's 'Cry foul,' T." Jack (O'Neill) could never tell when Teal'c was trying to get things wrong and when he was just misunderstanding.
"No, I do not believe so, O'Neill."
"No, Jack! He means 'Cry chicken', ya' know, the rule Sam likes to play with." Daniel may have been drunk, but he knows culture.
"Never heard of it; doesn't count," ruled Owen.
"Then I have no choice. Failure to comply would not be honorable." Jaffa warriors value honor over everything.
While Teal'c was getting up, Gwen yelled, "Oi! Before you go, you have to pick someone! Otherwise we can't keep playing!"
"If you insist, Detective PC Gwen Cooper. Daniel Jackson, truth or dare?" That question was truly terrifying when posed by the imposing Jaffa.
"Dare!" Daniel could be talked into doing anything if you gave him enough beer (two or three would usually do the trick).
Solemnly, Teal'c revealed the young archeologist's challenge. "You must kiss someone at this table." He then walked off to complete his mission.
Daniel looked around. Feeling adventurous (or drunk), Daniel set his sights on Captain Jack Harkness.
"Jack!" he proclaimed, to everyone's surprise.
"What?!" demanded Jack, in shock.
But Daniel waved him away. "Other Jack," he explained.
O'Neill sighed, more relieved than jealous, he was pleased to find. But he was quickly distracted from his non-complicated platonic feelings for his friend when Daniel turned around to face the Jack on his other side.
Characteristically, Harkness didn't seem at all surprised or displeased by this new development. He grinned widely and leaned forwards a little bit, then stopped, waiting for the younger man to move the rest of the way.
Daniel was struck by a sudden burst of doubt. He glanced over his shoulder at Teal'c, who was talking to the young woman with more ease than anyone would expect.
People always thought that the Jaffa would be more awkward around people, especially humans, since he was so alien. But Teal'c wasn't. He was comfortable in his alien-ness, in a way that Daniel had never seen before.
Really, it was Daniel, the one who was supposed to be the expert on people, who was supposed to understand their culture and their societies, who didn't know what to do or say in situations like this. He cursed his drunken decision to act on the impulsive attraction he felt to the strange Captain.
Jack (the other Jack, although Daniel wasn't thinking of him as such as much anymore) had that same sort of comfortable alien-ness that Teal'c did. But he carried it differently. More sexual, sure, but it wasn't just that. He had an unnameable quality that had attracted Daniel from the moment they had first laid eyes on each other.
Emboldened by this memory, Daniel closed the gap between them. Their lips brushed, and he felt Jack's lips part slightly, either in pleasure or in surprise that the archaeologist had followed through on the dare, Daniel didn't know.
For once, he didn't care about that. Instead, he just parted his own lips in answer, leaning in closer than he would have ever thought was possible for two people to be to each other. He was usually straight, he didn't know anything about Jack, he was in another universe, and for all he knew, could even be kissing another version of himself. But he didn't care about that either.
It could have been that alcohol that attracted him to this strange new man, but Daniel didn't think so. He'd never felt more sober in his life.
Everyone still at the table froze and watched the pair. Torchwood was fairly used to Jack's antics, but the sole member of SG-1 was rather astonished. Woman on every planet, man in every universe, thought the Jack that wasn't making out with Daniel. Gwen, Owen, and (a slightly jealous) Ianto saw how surprised the colonel was, and realized maybe this sort of behavior was more unusual in SG-1's universe.
Owen, after finishing half a pint in one go, kicked Jack's chair hard enough to jar the Captain and the younger man out of their spit-sharing fun.
"What was that for?" Harkness had been quite enjoying himself.
"I'm a cad, I'm drunk, I look like a fish, and you two were irritating me. What wasn't that for?"
"Besides," Gwen added, "we can't keep playing if Daniel doesn't pick anyone to go next!" As the initiator, it was Gwen's self-appointed duty to assure the game continued.
"Jack! The... The... The one I didn't kiss! Truth or dare?"
Colonel Jack O'Neill was terrified. His socio-political nerd was making out with other men (having never seemed to have any interest in them before) and it just wasn't done to pick truth if everyone else had picked dare. But with Daniel in such a state, the dare was bound to be awful. With no good option available, Jack reminded himself that everyone was drunk enough to probably not remember in the morning, and spoke a word he regretted the instant it left his mouth. "Dare."
The elated grin on Daniel's face could have powered a Goa'uld mothership all the way from Chu'lak to Earth. It chilled Jack to his very core. "Pick someone."
"Why?" Jack was very, very, very suspicious.
With a sigh, Daniel issued the command, "Just do it, Jack."
"Fine," the disgruntled colonel gave in. "Ianto," happened to be sitting directly across from him.
"Now you gotta kiss 'im!" Daniel giggled. The man had really had too much to drink.
Jack's selection method proved to cause logistical challenges. The table being round, Jack had literally picked the person farthest from him. Getting up, he grumbled something no one quite caught about liking women and blonde majors with great legs.
Ianto, always proper at work, was not at work. He was 25 and drunk. A fairly attractive man had (albeit accidentally) chosen to kiss him, and Ianto wasn't going to complain. Ianto stood up to avoid the awkward that would have arisen if he had he not.
Jack leaned in and kissed him full on the mouth. Whether it was the beer, the alternate universe, or the '60s talking, Jack didn't know. What he did know is that he found he was enjoying himself and deepened the kiss accordingly.
Gwen squeaked and fell out of her chair.
Meanwhile, back at Torchwood, Sam and Toshiko were enjoying themselves just as much, although slightly differently than their drunker counterparts.
"And the Andorian says," Tosh explained, "That's not my antenna!" She finished to shrieks of laughter. "Your turn."
Sam grinned, turning fully away from her computer. "Alright," she said. "Well. So this guy walks into a bar. He's got a hamster on his shoulder, and a frog with a little top hat and cane in his pocket. And he says..."
But Toshiko never did get to find out what he said, because just then, the base's intruder alarms went off. Sam jumped to her feet. "What is that?" she demanded.
"Intruder alert," Tosh replied. She turned swiftly to her console and brought up an image of the base, searching for the location of the alleged intruder. Sam leaned over her shoulder to look along with her.
"Unauthorized incoming wormhole," announced a familiar voice.
Sam looked away from Tosh's screen to find herself standing in the gateroom. As the wormhole closed behind the iris, the computer, the desk, and everything else around them from Torchwood disappeared.
Except for Toshiko, who said the first thing that she thought of.
"What the hell?"
"Barnes here, General. What's the hold up with the iris?" the team-leader of SG-6 could be heard over the speakers in the gateroom.
"Hold your position, SG-6. We have a situation on our end." The appearance of Sam and Tosh hadn't gone unnoticed by the general or the airmen who were unwittingly reenacting SG-1's first encounter with the members of Torchwood.
"Understood," was the reply as SG-6 settled down on the planet SG-1 had disappeared from - a blue button in their scientist's pack.
Sam held up her hands and tried to look as non-threatening as possible. The airmen guarding the gateroom always did a remarkably good job of not shooting unexpected friendlies, but one could never be too careful. Tosh followed her lead. "I am Major Samantha Carter, US Air Force. I am a current member of SG-1 based at Stargate Command." Slowly pulling out her tags, she added, "My team and I were in an alternate universe; I don't know how I ended up there or back here any more than any of you do."
Hammond sighed. He was going to have to lock both the woman who appeared to be Sam and her as-yet-unidentified companion up, run a full battery of DNA tests, and X-ray them both for symbiotes. They really needed a faster (and easier) way to verify identities. "Supposing you are Major Carter, who's that next to you, and where's the rest of your team?" he asked, still in the control room.
Tosh looked uncomfortable and squeaked, so Sam answered for her. "This is Toshiko Sato. The rest of SG-1 and I ended up in her secret alien-fighting base in the alternate universe. To be honest, General, sir, I have no idea where the colonel, Daniel and Teal'c are." Their absence had Sam visibly worried.
With wonderful timing and a dash of comedy, Daniel poked his head out from behind the 'gate. "We're all back here, General! Tosh's team too!" He then attempted to jump enthusiastically out from behind the 'gate, but tripped over himself and fell. Unfortunately, travel between alternate universes didn't sober the drunk archeologist up one bit.
Luckily, Colonel O'Neill held his liquor much better than a certain light-weight team-member. Hauling Daniel up by one arm, the Jack this paragraph started out talking about walked out into the open of the gateroom to stand more or less next to Sam and Tosh. He was followed by Teal'c, Ianto, Gwen, Owen, and the other Jack. "Yes, General, it's us. If you want to know anything you should ask Carter - way too science-y for me. All I know is Daniel poked something, we ended up in Wales, of all places, in some alternate universe, and then we were suddenly behind the 'gate. Speaking of which, someone really should dust back there..." Hey, just because Jack was in better shape than Daniel didn't mean he was sober enough not to be snarky in situations where a room full of airmen had their guns trained on him.
Harkness whistled. "You got more people, I'll give you that. Little military for my tastes though."
"Says the man in the World War II era greatcoat..." Ianto muttered under his breath.
"But we're under a mountain! And it's huge!" Daniel Jackson, always forthcoming.
"That's straight out of the movies!" Gwen always doubted things that sounded like science fiction, even though in her line of work that was a completely ridiculous view.
"Daniel Jackson does indeed speak the truth, Detective PC Gwen Cooper."
"Airman," knowing someone would comply, Hammond addressed no one in particular, "please take anyone who seemingly appeared in the gateroom to the infirmary. I want Doctor Frasier to verify that's actually SG-1 and clear the others." To Colonel Barnes, he added, "We'll lower the iris in just a few minutes, Major. Sorry for the delay. I'll brief you upon your return."
Chapter 4