More Than We Are: Phantom Bonds (Part 1)
This is the beginning of my dorkverse OT3. It is tame now but will probably become quite graphic. Be aware.
It's the alternate reality team of Moebius. You can see a nice appetizer of screencaps I posted... Here.
It basically takes place after my little S/D dorkverse fluff piece, More Than We Are, which I think will be the overall title of the series as well.
I'm hoping I didn't write something that was designed to be appealing to everyone, and instead is appealing to no one. But it's possible. However, I like it. I hope there are others who do too.
More Than We Are: Phantom Bonds
By Jennghis Kahn
Summary- They feel each other like phantom limbs. How do you miss someone you’ve never met?
Disclaimer- Don’t own nor profit from Stargate SG-1.
Rated- PG-13 for language and adult behavior
Spoilers- Moebius
Warnings- This series will contain the following: graphic sex, adult language, sexual situations, het, slash and mfm threesomes.
Pairing- Jack/Sam/Daniel
Thanks to havocthecat and amykay73 for the beta duties! You rock, dudettes!
**
The scientist geeks came back a few months later. They just appeared at his boat again one day and started talking about wormholes and that goddamn tape and getting to know one another better. This time he wasn't as nice to them. He threw them off the boat and didn't even think about trying to squeeze any money out of them. He was just that pissed off. It wasn't as if he hadn't listened to them at all. He'd been to the SGC, purely as a favor to Kowalski. He'd watched the tape. He'd talked to General Hammond and even discussed it with Charlie. He wasn't surprised that the Air Force had decided to ditch the plans for the... "stargate".
Stargate. For cryin' out loud!
Besides, even it were all true, who was to say that the reality they had now wasn't better than the one that originally had happened?
Anyway, the Air Force had scrapped the mission and he'd happily re-retired back to his boat and his nice, solitary life.
And then the geeks had shown up again. And yeah, he'd seen the familiarity between them all on the tape. He'd seen the glances and the subtle touches, the way they all stood comfortably within each other's personal space. But it was different here. As far as he was concerned, the people in that tape were different people. Their world was a different world. Nothing and no one said things had to be the same in this world.
The thing was... the geeks hadn't left.
He'd seen them at his favorite diner a few days later, eating breakfast. They'd smiled at him when he passed their table on his way to his usual seat at the counter. Smiled and said 'hi' as if he hadn't thrown them right off his boat onto the dock in front of the whole harbor only 3 days before. He'd glared and jutted his jaw out grumpily and then hissed at them as he passed.
"Don't you two have some sort of geek convention to go to or something?"
Okay, so it wasn't his best work, but he'd been taken by surprise. They hadn't replied, so he'd ignored them and had his breakfast while he talked fishing with old Norm, who quite possibly never left the diner. Ever.
The next week, Daniel had been working at the diner.
Jack had been outraged. He'd sat simmering on his stool at the counter while he watched Arlene, the head waitress, show the guy how to run the cash register and make the coffee. He'd tried to show his displeasure by glaring at the other man whenever Daniel looked his way, but Daniel hadn't seemed fazed by it.
When Jack came back for lunch, Daniel was apparently done with his shift. He was going out while Jack was coming in. He'd glanced up at Jack, startled for a moment, the blue eyes widening behind the dark framed glasses, but then the eyes had narrowed and his jaw had tightened and he'd tried to brush by Jack. Jack had suddenly grabbed his arm and yanked him sideways out of the doorway. With a little difficulty, he might add. The guy was more solid than he looked.
"What the hell are you two still doing here?" He'd practically growled at Daniel.
Daniel had given him a cold look and deliberately pulled his arm from Jack's grasp. Archeologist geek or not, the guy had some balls, Jack had to give him that. He wasn't a pushover.
"I'm working, okay?" Daniel glared right back at him.
"Not okay. SO not okay. Can't you two take no for an answer? What're you gonna do, stalk me now?"
Daniel's mouth had turned down in displeasure. "No. We're going to work and live and try to change the Air Force's collective minds about the... the... the you know what!"
Jack had rolled his eyes. "And you're going to do that in my town?"
"I didn't realize this was your town. I thought this was America, home of the free. My mistake."
Jack had raised a brow. Was Dr. Jackson getting mouthy with him? Oh yes, smart in the book sense but not too bright in the sense of being polite to someone who could kick your ass from here to kingdom come.
"You know, Jack, you didn't have to be such an asshole about all this. That tape might mean something important. I can't believe you can just walk away from it and not even wonder about us or who you were there."
"I don't want to think about it, Jackson. I want to fish and drink and watch TV without two... geeks following me around everywhere." He really had to find a new name for them. Repetition only stripped the word of its sting.
Daniel shook his head. "The entire universe doesn't revolve around you, Colonel. We have no intention of bothering you. We just like this town, that's all. Sam and I don't have the fortunate circumstances to be living the life we want to live. We aren't happy with the way things turned out. We... want more. Happy fishing. I have to go meet Sam." He pushed his way past Jack then, tucking a paper bag under his arm. Jack watched him walk down the street and turn down the main pier to the marina.
That son of a bitch. What, he thought Jack hadn't suffered in this life? It wasn't like he was living the life of Reilly, for god's sake. He lived alone because things were... easier that way. Besides, it was pretty damn unlikely that anyone else would tolerate him. Sarah had made that abundantly clear when she'd left him all those years ago. He hadn't disagreed with her.
He'd found a different diner to eat breakfast in after that.
A couple of weeks later, he'd walked into the marina prop shop to find out when Del could fix his capstan, which had been a little sticky lately. He'd seen Del's mechanic, Dwight, in the local dive the night before and didn't have high hopes that the repair would be possible soon. Dwight liked the sauce a little too much and showed up for work maybe 6 days out of every 10. It was a small coastal town. They had to take what they could get. All the good mechanics were drawn by bigger money in the bigger cities.
Surprisingly, Del gave him a big grin and told him that as long as he had the money up front, his capstan would be no problem. The man had been almost giddy with delight, as he'd told Jack he'd found another mechanic to take Dwight's place. A better one. And she worked for mere peanuts.
Jack had already been suspicious when Del had led him to the shop doorway and let him take a peek. Sure enough, there had been Carter's blond head peeking out from a huge pair of dark green overalls, hands black and greasy as she fit a spark plug into a pulled boat engine on a stand on the floor. Daniel sat on a wooden workbench a few feet away, reading. They both looked up as the door opened and glanced at each other, something unspoken passing between them. When they looked back at Jack, Sam offered him a tentative smile before turning back to her work. Daniel offered him no expression and promptly ignored him, going back to his book.
Since when did astrophysicist equal boat mechanic? Jack wondered. Then he realized that Daniel was reading aloud to Sam, and when he paid attention to the words, realized he was reading a repair manual. He glanced at Del, who shrugged.
"She only needs to be shown or told once. Then she remembers and has it down. She definitely has some type of mechanical background. Not much for talking about herself though. And I don't care. As long as she fixes boats and takes the paycheck I can offer her, that's all I care about." He motioned to Daniel. "The friend reads her the manuals and brings her lunch everyday."
“She can fix boats, but she can’t read?” Jack lifted a brow sardonically.
Del shrugged again. “I think he’s just bored. As long as he stays away from the torches and clears out when we’re pulling an engine so my insurance stays low, then what do I care?”
And she’d fixed his winch a few days later. In and out in 3 hours including the time it took to pull it.
He’d sat and played cards with Del in the corner while Carter had worked on it. He’d had to try very hard not to stare at her. She was still wearing those too-big overalls and her shoes were completely unsuitable for garage work. She kept pushing her glasses up on her nose with the back of her hand, grease-covered fingers smudging her cheeks anyway. But she’d been very intent on the work, and he and Del had looked up a few times when she’d made a soft, pleased exclamation, only to find her smiling at the repair manual or at Jack’s capstan.
Del had grinned at him. “Like a kid.” He explained. “Just lights up when she figures something out. My wife thinks she’s just precious.”
“Oh, she’s precious.” Jack muttered, but he missed two plays while distracted by that smile.
Daniel had shown up at 11:30, right after the morning shift ended at the diner, and brought her lunch. They sat together in the open garage eating sandwiches and potato chips. Jack watched Daniel wipe grease from her face and read to her from a paperback book. Jackson really liked that reading thing. It must have been a comedy because he’d sometimes read with a smile and glance at her only to have Sam laugh and then nudge him with her shoulder. He kissed her quickly on the mouth when he left, and Jack felt almost unreasonably upset that they had lied to him about being a couple. Not that it mattered to him.
Except it did.
And over the next few weeks, he found himself walking deliberately by the prop shop and gazing into the open garage door, trying to catch a glimpse of baggy green overalls and blond hair, or a dorky plaid vest and dark-framed glasses.
He watched them while they ate lunch together. Sometimes Daniel read to her. Sometimes Sam read to him. Sometimes they just talked. Sometimes they didn’t talk at all, but just sat close together and ate quietly and comfortably.
Jack had to admit, they looked like a matched pair. If their hair had been the same color, they’d have looked like siblings. Siblings didn’t look at each other the way Sam and Daniel looked at each other though. Jack watched them kiss goodbye one afternoon, Daniel’s hand holding Sam’s nape firmly as he pressed his open mouth to hers. It was an obvious promise of things to come later, and Sam had licked her lips when they’d pulled apart.
Jack had wondered fleetingly if she bit her lip when Daniel went down on her, and if Daniel grunted when he came.
Then he freaked out a little bit and drank himself into unconsciousness.
The next morning, even through a hazy hangover, the thought was still there though. It didn’t go away.
He mulled it over for the next week, trying to distract himself with a prolonged fishing trip. Instead, it had given him time to do nothing but think. He really hated that. Really.
But he did realize that things had to come to a conclusion somehow. One way or another, he had to decide what part that tape, the stargate and these two geeky, irritating, fascinating, curious people had in his life.
And that was why he found himself walking into that prop shop the next week and throwing down that figurative gauntlet.
“OK, look. You can have three hours on my boat.” He looked at Sam pointedly. “Three hours and you fix my fish finder. I listen to you. That’s the deal.”
He watched her and Daniel exchange looks; Sam’s hopeful, Daniel’s hesitant. In the end, they agreed, of course. They agreed because they hadn’t given up hope on the stargate or the Air Force. Because maybe they did just like this town and want to start over, but mostly they were here because he was here.
They showed up at his boat on time. It was a clear, warm Sunday afternoon with the clouds swift and high in the sky. One of those days that made you feel like you should be happy and social and around other people, and it felt strange to Jack to know he wasn’t going to spend it alone.
Sam had come dressed to work in jeans and a marina T-shirt. Jack had eyed her up as she slipped lithely onto the boat. She seemed like a different person than the one she’d been at the SGC or sitting on his boat a few months ago with the most uncomfortable life preserver he could find stuffed over her head. She’d gained her sea legs and moved with the boat’s motion, eyes picking out details that her mind hadn’t known to look for before. He tried to covertly shove a bucket in front of an area of dry rot on the deck.
He’d nearly rolled his eyes at Daniel’s button-up dress shirt and khaki’s. A sunny summer afternoon on a boat and the guy still looked like he belonged in a cubicle somewhere quoting insurance rates and deductibles. Daniel swayed unsteadily on the deck before letting the boat and gravity drop his rear-end onto one of the benches.
“You don’t get seasick, do you?” Jack demanded suspiciously.
Daniel furrowed his brows and thought this over. “Um, I don’t know.”
“Well, do me a favor. If you decide to lose your lunch, do it over the side instead of on deck, will ya?”
Daniel gave him a belligerent little stare before glancing off the portside and at the water below. “Sure.”
Jack made them wear the bulky life vests until they were out of the harbor just because he could. Daniel had glared daggers at him, and Jack had found that immensely satisfying for some reason. Sam finally insisted she couldn’t do any sort of delicate work on the fish finder with the bulky thing around her neck, and he finally waved his permission for them to remove them. The joke was getting old anyway.
He cruised the coastline for a little while, putting the harbor behind them. It really was one of those days, and he found he was enjoying himself, although the geeks hadn’t started in on the talking yet either. When he reached the quiet water of one of his favorite fishing spots, away from the jet skis and the party boats, he lowered anchor and jumped from the helm down to the lower deck.
Sam settled down on the deck with the finder and a set of precision tools. Daniel sat awkwardly across from Jack and seemed undecided as to when he should start talking. Jack opened a cooler and tossed him a bottle of beer. Daniel wasn’t prepared for it and it nearly hit him in the forehead before he caught it, fumbling.
“Nice hands.” Jack drawled.
“I don’t really like beer very much.” Daniel protested.
“You do for the next few hours. Carter…” He tossed a beer Sam’s way too, and, much to Daniel’s obvious irritation, she grabbed it eagerly and smiled at Jack. “I like you already, Carter.” He said with a raised brow.
She gave a rather undignified snort in reply that had him giving her a second look, gaze running down the curve of her back as she leaned over the fish finder. She had an eagerness that under-ran her naiveté. She had a brain that ran a hundred miles an hour compared to everyone else in the world, no wonder she was so fidgety. He could see how the Air Force had helped that other Carter. A little simple discipline could do wonders on the right people.
He looked up from his prolonged contemplation of Sam to find Daniel staring at him. He looked a little troubled. Jack held his gaze steadily.
“Thought you two weren’t a couple.” Jack said bluntly. He lifted his bottle of beer to his lips and took a swig. Cans would have made more sense on the boat, but he hated the taste. Aluminum stifled a good beer.
Sam stopped working, and Jack watched the two of them glance at each other.
Daniel shrugged and looked down at his bottle, still unopened. “Things have changed.” He said quietly. When he glanced at Sam again, there was a faint smile at the corner of his mouth. Sam smiled back and ducked her head.
Jack looked from one to the other and ignored the images that flashed through his mind. Jesus… maybe he needed some new porn. “Yeah?” He replied instead. “Good for you.”
“Uh… thanks.” Daniel looked completely out of place. Jack leaned forward and took his beer from him, twisting the cap off and tossing it into the corner. He held the opened bottle out for him to take again, and Daniel took it slowly, their fingers brushing. Jack was pretty sure the heat he imagined feeling in that small contact was all in his mind. Yeah… time for some new porn alright, or maybe he just needed to get laid. Either way, he was pretty sure that this freaky fascination he had with the geek twins was his mind’s way of drawing attention to his more basic needs. Something he’d been in the habit of ignoring the past few years.
Daniel took a small sip of the beer and leaned forward, elbows on knees. “Look, Jack. The thing is… “
“Ah, ah!” Jack held a finger up, stopping him. Daniel blinked at him, confused. Jack motioned toward Sam. “Not until she fixes the fish finder. That was the deal.”
Daniel looked at Sam. She sighed. “It won’t take long. I don’t think so anyway. It’s just the sonar.”
Hopefully long enough for him to get a few beers down, Jack thought. Just enough so that he had that thin, hazy fog surrounding him. Enough so the talk of stargates and aliens and teams didn’t faze him, and the images of smooth pale skin, wet with sweat and in motion above him, could be ignored.
He set his beer aside for a moment and dragged a box of fishing reels closer. “In the meantime, you and I can load these reels.”
Daniel heaved a long-suffering sigh.
**
“So, wait a minute.” Jack took another sip of beer and picked up the reel again, spinning fishing line onto it from a big spool, which Daniel held in his hands by way of a broken screwdriver thrust through the hole in the middle. The spool spun jerkily as Jack reeled the line in. “What makes you think that this reality isn’t better than the one those people were talking about on the tape?”
“Those people were us, Jack.” Sam was starting to look a bit frustrated with him. She’d lasted longer than Daniel, who was nearly in a complete sulk beside her at this point.
He really was far too easy, Jack thought.
“Yes, Sam, I know that.” Jack got a little frustrated himself. He couldn’t figure out if she had a sense of humor or not. Sometimes he threw a quip out there and he got that little smile in return. Their eyes met and he knew she got it. It made him feel warm and good and like they were sharing something just between the two of them. And then sometimes she just didn’t “get it”, and he was left hanging out there.
Daniel was in his own little world when it came to humor. Jack didn’t think they were even on the same page. Probably not the same book. Or library even.
“Jack, you know why we have to do this.” Daniel had apparently had enough time to pout. “We can’t fight the Goa’uld with the weapons we have right now.”
“But we never would have met the Go… Go-ah-oold-“ Jack fumbled the last little bit and plundered on. “-in the first place if we hadn’t found that damn stargate, right? So… let’s just leave it the hell alone and go on with our lives. No gate, no Guh… slimy aliens trying to steal our bodies.” Jack held a hand up and gave them both a look as if he couldn’t understand why they weren’t getting it.
“We can’t do that, Jack.” Daniel’s voice was tight, and he looked at Jack with hard eyes, brown tendrils of hair caught up on his glasses again.
“So you keep saying.” Jack said. He felt his own eyes getting hard. “And yet, I’m still not seeing it.”
“The Goa’uld already know about Earth. Yeah, it’s possible that leaving the gate alone would keep them away, but we can’t know that for sure. What if they do come back? Without the gate or the knowledge and allies we gained from it, we’ll have no protection at all. We’ll be at their mercy.”
“That’s a big ‘what if’.” Jack pulled a penknife and cut the line on the reel.
“Yes, but how can we not consider it? For god’s sake, Jack! This is a gate capable of traveling to other planets, other solar systems. I can’t even imagine the things, the people, we could find out there.”
“Maybe more slimy aliens.” Jack pointed out. Daniel’s face fell.
Sam wrapped her fingers around Daniel’s and leaned forward. “Look. If exploration and defense of the planet don’t worry you, then maybe history will.”
Jack eyed her suspiciously and with a little resentment at the tone in her voice. “What history? You mean this history? The history where the slimy aliens have been chased from our planet and don’t make us hosts or slaves anymore?”
Daniel’s hands curled into fists. Jack watched with amusement and resentment as Sam covered one of the fists with her own hand, thumb rubbing soothingly over the sharp slopes of Daniel’s knuckles.
“The history where we help to eradicate the Goa’uld from the galaxy.” Daniel’s voice was low and tight. “The history where we gain technology and help move Earth into the future. The history where we free the slaves of the Goa’uld and Teal’c knows who we are and is our teammate.”
“Daniel… “ Jack began to interrupt, but Daniel just went on.
“The history where I have the memory of a wife I loved, and Sam grew up with a father and you… you… “ He trailed off and some of the tightness left his face as Jack stilled, eyes growing dark.
“What about me?” Jack’s voice was dangerous.
There was heavy silence, the tension hanging between them like mist.
“Your son?” Sam asked it finally, hand gripping Daniel’s tightly, voice soft.
“Is still dead.” Jack answered angrily. “And my wife is still gone, and everything’s the same except I can’t live in peace and just retire. Instead, I’m being harassed by two… “ He waved his free hand at them, struggling to find the right word. “… misfits who can’t even pull themselves together enough to find real jobs or-” He waved a hand in their general direction, his eyes on Daniel’s shirt. “- dress themselves properly.”
More silence. The water lapped rhythmically against the hull. Daniel and Sam glanced down at Daniel’s shirt and then at each other. Jack fiddled with the reel in his hands and let out a slow breath, anger falling away.
“We need you, Jack.” Sam reached out. He watched her fingers slide onto his forearm lightly, felt the warmth although she barely touched him. He looked up at her, met her gaze. Daniel stared down at his own hands. “Daniel will make the translation and we’ll find the gate, and we need you to make the Air Force listen.”
Jack looked down at the reel and shook his head. He breathed out and in and tried to ease the tightness in his chest. “The Air Force probably has people working on it already.”
“They won’t translate the tablet.” Daniel stated, looking up. Jack glanced at him, stared at blue eyes that looked clear in the sun.
“They won’t or they can’t?”
“Can’t.” Daniel said, all the confidence in the world behind his voice. “I’m the only one who can do that translation.”
“And yet, you haven’t so far.” Jack’s voice had lost some of the sarcasm.
“It’s difficult. It’s meant to confuse and mislead. It’s a mixture of different languages, different time periods. It’s meant to keep people from reading it.”
Jack just looked at him, the unspoken question written blatantly on his features.
Daniel shrugged. “I just know that I can figure it out. The people the Air Force had working on it, they couldn’t even get one word. Not one word. But I’ve gotten several already. It’s just… it’s like a mixture of everything I’ve ever studied. I can read it. Just… it’s going to take some time.”
“And then?”
Sam licked her lips. Jack’s eyes were drawn to the movement, he pressed his own together in response. She licked them again before answering him. “And then, we go back to the Air Force. See if they’re ready to reinstate the mission and find the gate.”
“And fix it all.” Jack finished for her.
“And fix it all.” She agreed.
“They didn’t listen to you last time.”
“But we’ll have you this time. They’ll listen.”
Jack gave a sharp laugh. “You’re considerably overestimating the Air Force’s opinion of me, Sam.” The name felt a little foreign to his tongue. ‘Carter’ felt more natural for some reason.
“I don’t think I am, Jack.” She looked earnestly at him. “All of the men in that room that day held respect for you.”
Jack fiddled with the reel again, not sure what to say to that. Not sure what to say to any of it.
“It’s the right thing to do.” Daniel stated quietly.
Jack glanced around at the deck of his boat then out further to the open water and the slow, small swells that rolled inland toward them. The right thing to do, and yet he couldn’t overcome the feeling of dread that tightened his chest. He wasn’t even sure why it was there.
“How long will it take you to do the translation?”
“Well, it depends on how much time I can dedicate to it, and whether or not I can get the right text books. The Egyptian stuff won’t be a problem, but I think I recognize some ancient… “
“Daniel!” Jack barked at him, exasperated. “How much time?”
Daniel frowned. “At least a year. I mean… it’s going to be a while.”
Jack nodded. “Alright. Alright. So, I guess we’re doing this thing.”
Sam looked wide-eyed at Daniel. He raised his brows at her and then glanced at Jack. “Really?”
Jack sighed. “Yeah, what the hell. Right thing to do and all. Besides, this is all based on a whole lot of ‘ifs’.”
“I think we can do it, Colonel.” Sam smiled at him.
He winced. “Don’t call me by my rank, Carter. For cryin’ out loud, it sounds ridiculous coming from you.”
“Sorry.” She gave another embarrassed smile.
“But we do this my way.” Jack suddenly got serious and pointed a finger at them. “That means I decide how to do this and when we do it. And I don’t want you thinking that it’s a done deal. There are way too many variables going on here to make this easy. It’s possible we’ll do everything right and it still won’t work out. You have to be prepared for that.”
Daniel looked skeptical, but Sam nodded enthusiastically. “Yeah, yeah. We know. We’re okay with that.”
“Daniel?” Jack looked directly at him.
Daniel nodded. “I think we really need to find a way to do this, Jack.”
Jack shrugged. “Sure. We’ll give it our best shot.”
Daniel still chewed his lip a bit worriedly, but he seemed to relax, and Jack grinned.
So what do we do in the meantime?”
Sam shrugged. “We just keep doing what we’re doing. It’s all we can do.” She glanced at the reel in Jack’s hands. “Maybe you can show me how to fish. I’ve never gone before.”
Jack’s eyes widened and then quickly narrowed again. “Oh, Carter… “ He gave her a sly smile. “That’s just a crime. We have a lot of work to do.”
-end-
(next- Jack starts to go a little crazy. The Three draw closer.)
It's the alternate reality team of Moebius. You can see a nice appetizer of screencaps I posted... Here.
It basically takes place after my little S/D dorkverse fluff piece, More Than We Are, which I think will be the overall title of the series as well.
I'm hoping I didn't write something that was designed to be appealing to everyone, and instead is appealing to no one. But it's possible. However, I like it. I hope there are others who do too.
More Than We Are: Phantom Bonds
By Jennghis Kahn
Summary- They feel each other like phantom limbs. How do you miss someone you’ve never met?
Disclaimer- Don’t own nor profit from Stargate SG-1.
Rated- PG-13 for language and adult behavior
Spoilers- Moebius
Warnings- This series will contain the following: graphic sex, adult language, sexual situations, het, slash and mfm threesomes.
Pairing- Jack/Sam/Daniel
Thanks to havocthecat and amykay73 for the beta duties! You rock, dudettes!
**
The scientist geeks came back a few months later. They just appeared at his boat again one day and started talking about wormholes and that goddamn tape and getting to know one another better. This time he wasn't as nice to them. He threw them off the boat and didn't even think about trying to squeeze any money out of them. He was just that pissed off. It wasn't as if he hadn't listened to them at all. He'd been to the SGC, purely as a favor to Kowalski. He'd watched the tape. He'd talked to General Hammond and even discussed it with Charlie. He wasn't surprised that the Air Force had decided to ditch the plans for the... "stargate".
Stargate. For cryin' out loud!
Besides, even it were all true, who was to say that the reality they had now wasn't better than the one that originally had happened?
Anyway, the Air Force had scrapped the mission and he'd happily re-retired back to his boat and his nice, solitary life.
And then the geeks had shown up again. And yeah, he'd seen the familiarity between them all on the tape. He'd seen the glances and the subtle touches, the way they all stood comfortably within each other's personal space. But it was different here. As far as he was concerned, the people in that tape were different people. Their world was a different world. Nothing and no one said things had to be the same in this world.
The thing was... the geeks hadn't left.
He'd seen them at his favorite diner a few days later, eating breakfast. They'd smiled at him when he passed their table on his way to his usual seat at the counter. Smiled and said 'hi' as if he hadn't thrown them right off his boat onto the dock in front of the whole harbor only 3 days before. He'd glared and jutted his jaw out grumpily and then hissed at them as he passed.
"Don't you two have some sort of geek convention to go to or something?"
Okay, so it wasn't his best work, but he'd been taken by surprise. They hadn't replied, so he'd ignored them and had his breakfast while he talked fishing with old Norm, who quite possibly never left the diner. Ever.
The next week, Daniel had been working at the diner.
Jack had been outraged. He'd sat simmering on his stool at the counter while he watched Arlene, the head waitress, show the guy how to run the cash register and make the coffee. He'd tried to show his displeasure by glaring at the other man whenever Daniel looked his way, but Daniel hadn't seemed fazed by it.
When Jack came back for lunch, Daniel was apparently done with his shift. He was going out while Jack was coming in. He'd glanced up at Jack, startled for a moment, the blue eyes widening behind the dark framed glasses, but then the eyes had narrowed and his jaw had tightened and he'd tried to brush by Jack. Jack had suddenly grabbed his arm and yanked him sideways out of the doorway. With a little difficulty, he might add. The guy was more solid than he looked.
"What the hell are you two still doing here?" He'd practically growled at Daniel.
Daniel had given him a cold look and deliberately pulled his arm from Jack's grasp. Archeologist geek or not, the guy had some balls, Jack had to give him that. He wasn't a pushover.
"I'm working, okay?" Daniel glared right back at him.
"Not okay. SO not okay. Can't you two take no for an answer? What're you gonna do, stalk me now?"
Daniel's mouth had turned down in displeasure. "No. We're going to work and live and try to change the Air Force's collective minds about the... the... the you know what!"
Jack had rolled his eyes. "And you're going to do that in my town?"
"I didn't realize this was your town. I thought this was America, home of the free. My mistake."
Jack had raised a brow. Was Dr. Jackson getting mouthy with him? Oh yes, smart in the book sense but not too bright in the sense of being polite to someone who could kick your ass from here to kingdom come.
"You know, Jack, you didn't have to be such an asshole about all this. That tape might mean something important. I can't believe you can just walk away from it and not even wonder about us or who you were there."
"I don't want to think about it, Jackson. I want to fish and drink and watch TV without two... geeks following me around everywhere." He really had to find a new name for them. Repetition only stripped the word of its sting.
Daniel shook his head. "The entire universe doesn't revolve around you, Colonel. We have no intention of bothering you. We just like this town, that's all. Sam and I don't have the fortunate circumstances to be living the life we want to live. We aren't happy with the way things turned out. We... want more. Happy fishing. I have to go meet Sam." He pushed his way past Jack then, tucking a paper bag under his arm. Jack watched him walk down the street and turn down the main pier to the marina.
That son of a bitch. What, he thought Jack hadn't suffered in this life? It wasn't like he was living the life of Reilly, for god's sake. He lived alone because things were... easier that way. Besides, it was pretty damn unlikely that anyone else would tolerate him. Sarah had made that abundantly clear when she'd left him all those years ago. He hadn't disagreed with her.
He'd found a different diner to eat breakfast in after that.
A couple of weeks later, he'd walked into the marina prop shop to find out when Del could fix his capstan, which had been a little sticky lately. He'd seen Del's mechanic, Dwight, in the local dive the night before and didn't have high hopes that the repair would be possible soon. Dwight liked the sauce a little too much and showed up for work maybe 6 days out of every 10. It was a small coastal town. They had to take what they could get. All the good mechanics were drawn by bigger money in the bigger cities.
Surprisingly, Del gave him a big grin and told him that as long as he had the money up front, his capstan would be no problem. The man had been almost giddy with delight, as he'd told Jack he'd found another mechanic to take Dwight's place. A better one. And she worked for mere peanuts.
Jack had already been suspicious when Del had led him to the shop doorway and let him take a peek. Sure enough, there had been Carter's blond head peeking out from a huge pair of dark green overalls, hands black and greasy as she fit a spark plug into a pulled boat engine on a stand on the floor. Daniel sat on a wooden workbench a few feet away, reading. They both looked up as the door opened and glanced at each other, something unspoken passing between them. When they looked back at Jack, Sam offered him a tentative smile before turning back to her work. Daniel offered him no expression and promptly ignored him, going back to his book.
Since when did astrophysicist equal boat mechanic? Jack wondered. Then he realized that Daniel was reading aloud to Sam, and when he paid attention to the words, realized he was reading a repair manual. He glanced at Del, who shrugged.
"She only needs to be shown or told once. Then she remembers and has it down. She definitely has some type of mechanical background. Not much for talking about herself though. And I don't care. As long as she fixes boats and takes the paycheck I can offer her, that's all I care about." He motioned to Daniel. "The friend reads her the manuals and brings her lunch everyday."
“She can fix boats, but she can’t read?” Jack lifted a brow sardonically.
Del shrugged again. “I think he’s just bored. As long as he stays away from the torches and clears out when we’re pulling an engine so my insurance stays low, then what do I care?”
And she’d fixed his winch a few days later. In and out in 3 hours including the time it took to pull it.
He’d sat and played cards with Del in the corner while Carter had worked on it. He’d had to try very hard not to stare at her. She was still wearing those too-big overalls and her shoes were completely unsuitable for garage work. She kept pushing her glasses up on her nose with the back of her hand, grease-covered fingers smudging her cheeks anyway. But she’d been very intent on the work, and he and Del had looked up a few times when she’d made a soft, pleased exclamation, only to find her smiling at the repair manual or at Jack’s capstan.
Del had grinned at him. “Like a kid.” He explained. “Just lights up when she figures something out. My wife thinks she’s just precious.”
“Oh, she’s precious.” Jack muttered, but he missed two plays while distracted by that smile.
Daniel had shown up at 11:30, right after the morning shift ended at the diner, and brought her lunch. They sat together in the open garage eating sandwiches and potato chips. Jack watched Daniel wipe grease from her face and read to her from a paperback book. Jackson really liked that reading thing. It must have been a comedy because he’d sometimes read with a smile and glance at her only to have Sam laugh and then nudge him with her shoulder. He kissed her quickly on the mouth when he left, and Jack felt almost unreasonably upset that they had lied to him about being a couple. Not that it mattered to him.
Except it did.
And over the next few weeks, he found himself walking deliberately by the prop shop and gazing into the open garage door, trying to catch a glimpse of baggy green overalls and blond hair, or a dorky plaid vest and dark-framed glasses.
He watched them while they ate lunch together. Sometimes Daniel read to her. Sometimes Sam read to him. Sometimes they just talked. Sometimes they didn’t talk at all, but just sat close together and ate quietly and comfortably.
Jack had to admit, they looked like a matched pair. If their hair had been the same color, they’d have looked like siblings. Siblings didn’t look at each other the way Sam and Daniel looked at each other though. Jack watched them kiss goodbye one afternoon, Daniel’s hand holding Sam’s nape firmly as he pressed his open mouth to hers. It was an obvious promise of things to come later, and Sam had licked her lips when they’d pulled apart.
Jack had wondered fleetingly if she bit her lip when Daniel went down on her, and if Daniel grunted when he came.
Then he freaked out a little bit and drank himself into unconsciousness.
The next morning, even through a hazy hangover, the thought was still there though. It didn’t go away.
He mulled it over for the next week, trying to distract himself with a prolonged fishing trip. Instead, it had given him time to do nothing but think. He really hated that. Really.
But he did realize that things had to come to a conclusion somehow. One way or another, he had to decide what part that tape, the stargate and these two geeky, irritating, fascinating, curious people had in his life.
And that was why he found himself walking into that prop shop the next week and throwing down that figurative gauntlet.
“OK, look. You can have three hours on my boat.” He looked at Sam pointedly. “Three hours and you fix my fish finder. I listen to you. That’s the deal.”
He watched her and Daniel exchange looks; Sam’s hopeful, Daniel’s hesitant. In the end, they agreed, of course. They agreed because they hadn’t given up hope on the stargate or the Air Force. Because maybe they did just like this town and want to start over, but mostly they were here because he was here.
They showed up at his boat on time. It was a clear, warm Sunday afternoon with the clouds swift and high in the sky. One of those days that made you feel like you should be happy and social and around other people, and it felt strange to Jack to know he wasn’t going to spend it alone.
Sam had come dressed to work in jeans and a marina T-shirt. Jack had eyed her up as she slipped lithely onto the boat. She seemed like a different person than the one she’d been at the SGC or sitting on his boat a few months ago with the most uncomfortable life preserver he could find stuffed over her head. She’d gained her sea legs and moved with the boat’s motion, eyes picking out details that her mind hadn’t known to look for before. He tried to covertly shove a bucket in front of an area of dry rot on the deck.
He’d nearly rolled his eyes at Daniel’s button-up dress shirt and khaki’s. A sunny summer afternoon on a boat and the guy still looked like he belonged in a cubicle somewhere quoting insurance rates and deductibles. Daniel swayed unsteadily on the deck before letting the boat and gravity drop his rear-end onto one of the benches.
“You don’t get seasick, do you?” Jack demanded suspiciously.
Daniel furrowed his brows and thought this over. “Um, I don’t know.”
“Well, do me a favor. If you decide to lose your lunch, do it over the side instead of on deck, will ya?”
Daniel gave him a belligerent little stare before glancing off the portside and at the water below. “Sure.”
Jack made them wear the bulky life vests until they were out of the harbor just because he could. Daniel had glared daggers at him, and Jack had found that immensely satisfying for some reason. Sam finally insisted she couldn’t do any sort of delicate work on the fish finder with the bulky thing around her neck, and he finally waved his permission for them to remove them. The joke was getting old anyway.
He cruised the coastline for a little while, putting the harbor behind them. It really was one of those days, and he found he was enjoying himself, although the geeks hadn’t started in on the talking yet either. When he reached the quiet water of one of his favorite fishing spots, away from the jet skis and the party boats, he lowered anchor and jumped from the helm down to the lower deck.
Sam settled down on the deck with the finder and a set of precision tools. Daniel sat awkwardly across from Jack and seemed undecided as to when he should start talking. Jack opened a cooler and tossed him a bottle of beer. Daniel wasn’t prepared for it and it nearly hit him in the forehead before he caught it, fumbling.
“Nice hands.” Jack drawled.
“I don’t really like beer very much.” Daniel protested.
“You do for the next few hours. Carter…” He tossed a beer Sam’s way too, and, much to Daniel’s obvious irritation, she grabbed it eagerly and smiled at Jack. “I like you already, Carter.” He said with a raised brow.
She gave a rather undignified snort in reply that had him giving her a second look, gaze running down the curve of her back as she leaned over the fish finder. She had an eagerness that under-ran her naiveté. She had a brain that ran a hundred miles an hour compared to everyone else in the world, no wonder she was so fidgety. He could see how the Air Force had helped that other Carter. A little simple discipline could do wonders on the right people.
He looked up from his prolonged contemplation of Sam to find Daniel staring at him. He looked a little troubled. Jack held his gaze steadily.
“Thought you two weren’t a couple.” Jack said bluntly. He lifted his bottle of beer to his lips and took a swig. Cans would have made more sense on the boat, but he hated the taste. Aluminum stifled a good beer.
Sam stopped working, and Jack watched the two of them glance at each other.
Daniel shrugged and looked down at his bottle, still unopened. “Things have changed.” He said quietly. When he glanced at Sam again, there was a faint smile at the corner of his mouth. Sam smiled back and ducked her head.
Jack looked from one to the other and ignored the images that flashed through his mind. Jesus… maybe he needed some new porn. “Yeah?” He replied instead. “Good for you.”
“Uh… thanks.” Daniel looked completely out of place. Jack leaned forward and took his beer from him, twisting the cap off and tossing it into the corner. He held the opened bottle out for him to take again, and Daniel took it slowly, their fingers brushing. Jack was pretty sure the heat he imagined feeling in that small contact was all in his mind. Yeah… time for some new porn alright, or maybe he just needed to get laid. Either way, he was pretty sure that this freaky fascination he had with the geek twins was his mind’s way of drawing attention to his more basic needs. Something he’d been in the habit of ignoring the past few years.
Daniel took a small sip of the beer and leaned forward, elbows on knees. “Look, Jack. The thing is… “
“Ah, ah!” Jack held a finger up, stopping him. Daniel blinked at him, confused. Jack motioned toward Sam. “Not until she fixes the fish finder. That was the deal.”
Daniel looked at Sam. She sighed. “It won’t take long. I don’t think so anyway. It’s just the sonar.”
Hopefully long enough for him to get a few beers down, Jack thought. Just enough so that he had that thin, hazy fog surrounding him. Enough so the talk of stargates and aliens and teams didn’t faze him, and the images of smooth pale skin, wet with sweat and in motion above him, could be ignored.
He set his beer aside for a moment and dragged a box of fishing reels closer. “In the meantime, you and I can load these reels.”
Daniel heaved a long-suffering sigh.
**
“So, wait a minute.” Jack took another sip of beer and picked up the reel again, spinning fishing line onto it from a big spool, which Daniel held in his hands by way of a broken screwdriver thrust through the hole in the middle. The spool spun jerkily as Jack reeled the line in. “What makes you think that this reality isn’t better than the one those people were talking about on the tape?”
“Those people were us, Jack.” Sam was starting to look a bit frustrated with him. She’d lasted longer than Daniel, who was nearly in a complete sulk beside her at this point.
He really was far too easy, Jack thought.
“Yes, Sam, I know that.” Jack got a little frustrated himself. He couldn’t figure out if she had a sense of humor or not. Sometimes he threw a quip out there and he got that little smile in return. Their eyes met and he knew she got it. It made him feel warm and good and like they were sharing something just between the two of them. And then sometimes she just didn’t “get it”, and he was left hanging out there.
Daniel was in his own little world when it came to humor. Jack didn’t think they were even on the same page. Probably not the same book. Or library even.
“Jack, you know why we have to do this.” Daniel had apparently had enough time to pout. “We can’t fight the Goa’uld with the weapons we have right now.”
“But we never would have met the Go… Go-ah-oold-“ Jack fumbled the last little bit and plundered on. “-in the first place if we hadn’t found that damn stargate, right? So… let’s just leave it the hell alone and go on with our lives. No gate, no Guh… slimy aliens trying to steal our bodies.” Jack held a hand up and gave them both a look as if he couldn’t understand why they weren’t getting it.
“We can’t do that, Jack.” Daniel’s voice was tight, and he looked at Jack with hard eyes, brown tendrils of hair caught up on his glasses again.
“So you keep saying.” Jack said. He felt his own eyes getting hard. “And yet, I’m still not seeing it.”
“The Goa’uld already know about Earth. Yeah, it’s possible that leaving the gate alone would keep them away, but we can’t know that for sure. What if they do come back? Without the gate or the knowledge and allies we gained from it, we’ll have no protection at all. We’ll be at their mercy.”
“That’s a big ‘what if’.” Jack pulled a penknife and cut the line on the reel.
“Yes, but how can we not consider it? For god’s sake, Jack! This is a gate capable of traveling to other planets, other solar systems. I can’t even imagine the things, the people, we could find out there.”
“Maybe more slimy aliens.” Jack pointed out. Daniel’s face fell.
Sam wrapped her fingers around Daniel’s and leaned forward. “Look. If exploration and defense of the planet don’t worry you, then maybe history will.”
Jack eyed her suspiciously and with a little resentment at the tone in her voice. “What history? You mean this history? The history where the slimy aliens have been chased from our planet and don’t make us hosts or slaves anymore?”
Daniel’s hands curled into fists. Jack watched with amusement and resentment as Sam covered one of the fists with her own hand, thumb rubbing soothingly over the sharp slopes of Daniel’s knuckles.
“The history where we help to eradicate the Goa’uld from the galaxy.” Daniel’s voice was low and tight. “The history where we gain technology and help move Earth into the future. The history where we free the slaves of the Goa’uld and Teal’c knows who we are and is our teammate.”
“Daniel… “ Jack began to interrupt, but Daniel just went on.
“The history where I have the memory of a wife I loved, and Sam grew up with a father and you… you… “ He trailed off and some of the tightness left his face as Jack stilled, eyes growing dark.
“What about me?” Jack’s voice was dangerous.
There was heavy silence, the tension hanging between them like mist.
“Your son?” Sam asked it finally, hand gripping Daniel’s tightly, voice soft.
“Is still dead.” Jack answered angrily. “And my wife is still gone, and everything’s the same except I can’t live in peace and just retire. Instead, I’m being harassed by two… “ He waved his free hand at them, struggling to find the right word. “… misfits who can’t even pull themselves together enough to find real jobs or-” He waved a hand in their general direction, his eyes on Daniel’s shirt. “- dress themselves properly.”
More silence. The water lapped rhythmically against the hull. Daniel and Sam glanced down at Daniel’s shirt and then at each other. Jack fiddled with the reel in his hands and let out a slow breath, anger falling away.
“We need you, Jack.” Sam reached out. He watched her fingers slide onto his forearm lightly, felt the warmth although she barely touched him. He looked up at her, met her gaze. Daniel stared down at his own hands. “Daniel will make the translation and we’ll find the gate, and we need you to make the Air Force listen.”
Jack looked down at the reel and shook his head. He breathed out and in and tried to ease the tightness in his chest. “The Air Force probably has people working on it already.”
“They won’t translate the tablet.” Daniel stated, looking up. Jack glanced at him, stared at blue eyes that looked clear in the sun.
“They won’t or they can’t?”
“Can’t.” Daniel said, all the confidence in the world behind his voice. “I’m the only one who can do that translation.”
“And yet, you haven’t so far.” Jack’s voice had lost some of the sarcasm.
“It’s difficult. It’s meant to confuse and mislead. It’s a mixture of different languages, different time periods. It’s meant to keep people from reading it.”
Jack just looked at him, the unspoken question written blatantly on his features.
Daniel shrugged. “I just know that I can figure it out. The people the Air Force had working on it, they couldn’t even get one word. Not one word. But I’ve gotten several already. It’s just… it’s like a mixture of everything I’ve ever studied. I can read it. Just… it’s going to take some time.”
“And then?”
Sam licked her lips. Jack’s eyes were drawn to the movement, he pressed his own together in response. She licked them again before answering him. “And then, we go back to the Air Force. See if they’re ready to reinstate the mission and find the gate.”
“And fix it all.” Jack finished for her.
“And fix it all.” She agreed.
“They didn’t listen to you last time.”
“But we’ll have you this time. They’ll listen.”
Jack gave a sharp laugh. “You’re considerably overestimating the Air Force’s opinion of me, Sam.” The name felt a little foreign to his tongue. ‘Carter’ felt more natural for some reason.
“I don’t think I am, Jack.” She looked earnestly at him. “All of the men in that room that day held respect for you.”
Jack fiddled with the reel again, not sure what to say to that. Not sure what to say to any of it.
“It’s the right thing to do.” Daniel stated quietly.
Jack glanced around at the deck of his boat then out further to the open water and the slow, small swells that rolled inland toward them. The right thing to do, and yet he couldn’t overcome the feeling of dread that tightened his chest. He wasn’t even sure why it was there.
“How long will it take you to do the translation?”
“Well, it depends on how much time I can dedicate to it, and whether or not I can get the right text books. The Egyptian stuff won’t be a problem, but I think I recognize some ancient… “
“Daniel!” Jack barked at him, exasperated. “How much time?”
Daniel frowned. “At least a year. I mean… it’s going to be a while.”
Jack nodded. “Alright. Alright. So, I guess we’re doing this thing.”
Sam looked wide-eyed at Daniel. He raised his brows at her and then glanced at Jack. “Really?”
Jack sighed. “Yeah, what the hell. Right thing to do and all. Besides, this is all based on a whole lot of ‘ifs’.”
“I think we can do it, Colonel.” Sam smiled at him.
He winced. “Don’t call me by my rank, Carter. For cryin’ out loud, it sounds ridiculous coming from you.”
“Sorry.” She gave another embarrassed smile.
“But we do this my way.” Jack suddenly got serious and pointed a finger at them. “That means I decide how to do this and when we do it. And I don’t want you thinking that it’s a done deal. There are way too many variables going on here to make this easy. It’s possible we’ll do everything right and it still won’t work out. You have to be prepared for that.”
Daniel looked skeptical, but Sam nodded enthusiastically. “Yeah, yeah. We know. We’re okay with that.”
“Daniel?” Jack looked directly at him.
Daniel nodded. “I think we really need to find a way to do this, Jack.”
Jack shrugged. “Sure. We’ll give it our best shot.”
Daniel still chewed his lip a bit worriedly, but he seemed to relax, and Jack grinned.
So what do we do in the meantime?”
Sam shrugged. “We just keep doing what we’re doing. It’s all we can do.” She glanced at the reel in Jack’s hands. “Maybe you can show me how to fish. I’ve never gone before.”
Jack’s eyes widened and then quickly narrowed again. “Oh, Carter… “ He gave her a sly smile. “That’s just a crime. We have a lot of work to do.”
-end-
(next- Jack starts to go a little crazy. The Three draw closer.)