Daddy's Little Girl -- Stargate SG-1 Fan Fic
A plot bunny that is growing even as I write this:
Title: Daddy's Little Girl
Fandom: Stargate SG-1
Rating: PG (might ramp up to R at some point, but not for a while)
Characters/Pairings: General Team fic, with appearances by Jack, Landry, Lamm and original characers
Disclaimer: Ain't mine, don't own um...just like playing with them...especially that Danny Boy...
Summary: On a trip to Washington, Daniel discovers that he has a daughter, but is she too good to be true?
Daddy’s Little Girl
“Dr. Jackson?”
The tentative voice somehow managed to cut through the general din of conversation to reach through to Daniel as he was slipping an arm around Sam to direct her out of a clump of aging archeologists acting as if they hadn’t seen a woman since college. Knowing the work habits of some of them, that could be true. He turned to find a young woman smiling at him with the tiniest shrug of her shoulders that transmitted a certain nervous excitement. “Yes?”
She seemed relieved and stuck out her hand. “I’m Dr. DJ Moore.” He took her hand and squinted. Her upturned nose was smattered with faint freckles. Her soft brown hair just dusted her shoulders and her blue eyes seemed to be trying to impress his face into her memory. She didn’t look old enough to be a doctor. She bit her lip and nodded, as if she’d read his mind. “I know. I’m young. Not quite twenty even. I skipped ahead a time or two.”
Daniel smiled and Sam cleared her throat. “Ah, yes, Dr. Moore, my colleague Dr. Samantha Carter.”
The young woman held out her hand again, shaking Sam’s with a smile. “A pleasure, Dr.”
“So…” Daniel really wanted out of the lecture hall, now that his duty was done. He didn’t do the lecture circuit much anymore, and today was reminding him of why, with the clinging and questioning groups that had stopped him every two steps and the faces that had once derided him as clearly insane..
“Oh, yes. I’ve been looking for you.” She closed her eyes and shook her head. “I can’t believe I just said that that way. I’m sorry.” She took a deep breath and seemed to gather herself. “My area of expertise is Britain and Gaul, not Egypt. I came today to see you.”
“Daniel, I’m…going to step outside, and get some air.” Sam said beside him and he nodded. He could tell Dr. Phillen was trying to draw her back into the conversation he had rescued her from. It was nice of her to have come with him, even if her ulterior motives had more to do with Jack and talking him into some project she wanted to play with than spending time with him.
Dr. Moore refocused herself again. “You know, I have played out this moment so many times in my head, and here I am making a compete fool out of myself.”
“No, you’re not-“
She smiled, and something in it reminded him of his youth. “You’re being very kind. I-maybe this would be easier on me if we went somewhere a little more private. Could I interest you in a cup of coffee?”
It was Daniel’s turn to smile. “Almost always.”
“There’s a cart in the atrium.” She gestured and turned, looking over her shoulder at him to make sure he was coming with her.
“So, you’ve been looking for me?”
She laughed nervously. “I’m not a stalker or anything. I promise. But, yes. You aren’t an easy man to find these days.”
“No, I guess I’m not.”
“I can understand why, I guess. Though anyone who doesn’t see the value of your work is crazy.”
“You’ve read my work?”
“Egypt isn’t my specialty, but…yes, I have. All of it.”
Daniel nodded, though he was still lost. They reached the coffee cart and she ordered for both of them. He arched an eyebrow that Teal’c would have been proud of as she handed him his cup.
Her tongue found its way between her teeth and she laughed again. “Busted.”
“Not a stalker, but you know how I like my coffee?”
“My mother,” she said, gesturing to a table beside a window. “Colleen Moore. You knew her in college.”
Daniel nodded, the image very clear in his mind. Colleen Moore. Their relationship had lasted exactly 6 months. It had been intense. He had been seventeen, no eighteen and she had been the first female archeology student who hadn’t rejected him for his age before he’d even opened his mouth. She had been older by a few years. They shared a desk in Professor Lanlin’s class. She had introduced him to Emily Bronte and given him his first sexual relationship. He had given her the chicken pox and a book of sappy love poems. It had ended at the end of the semester when they both got jobs on opposite ends of the earth for their summer projects. He’d gone to Cairo, she’d gone to England. “I remember her. She told you how I take my coffee?”
She sipped at hers and bobbled her head a bit. “She told me a lot of things.”
“I haven’t seen her…in a long time. How is she?”
DJ looked away. “Dead, unfortunately.”
“Oh, I’m sorry.” He pursed his lips and quashed a feeling of loss he had no business to. Their goodbye had been a lifetime ago and as amicable as any he’d ever had. She was a distant memory, a sweet one, but a memory.
“No worries. It was quite a few years ago. I’m good now.” She smiled as if it demonstrated her point. “But, before she died we talked…a lot. She asked me to find you.”
He tried not to look surprised, but he was and didn’t hide it well. “Oh? Why?”
“A couple of reasons, actually.” Her hand went into her jacket pocket. It came back out with a small package. “She wanted to give you this. She said you would want it. She found it on a dig in Greece.” Her hand went inside her jacket and pulled out an envelope. “And she wrote you a letter. But wanted you to read it after.”
“After?” He took the letter from her, brushing one long finger over the looping letters of his name.
She exhaled slowly. “Boy, there’s just no easy way to say this. So…yeah….Here’s the thing. She’d never said anything before…the whole time I was growing up. She never married, she was married to her work…and then raising me…so who had time…and I really never wondered, I was too busy trying to impress her and learning…but, before she died she wanted me to know.”
Daniel met her eyes, his mind already forming denials. She exhaled again, then inhaled and held it for a moment before letting it out as she spoke. “She said that you…that you’re my father.”
“What?” Sam asked in hushed tones as Daniel finished. They were huddled together near their rental car. She looked over his shoulder to where the young doctor waited for them.
He held the letter between them, having ripped through the words as soon as he could kick start his brain again after her declaration. “Apparently, she never told me because she didn’t want to derail my career,” he said dryly. “She says I was too young and had too much ahead of me.” He snorted at the thought.
“A daughter?” Sam said incredulously. “What…what are you going to do?”
Daniel shrugged, pulling at his tie. “I don’t know. What do you do? I mean, someone walks into your life and tells you that you’re her father. How do you react?”
“She looks like you.” Sam said with a half smile. “I didn’t see it before, but she’s got your eyes, and nose.”
“And her mother’s freckles.” Daniel said, shaking his head. “Why don’t you go ahead and meet Jack for dinner. I’m going to talk with her for a while, try to figure this out.”
“Okay, but call if you need anything.”
“Like what, a son?” He grinned and held the door for her.
She shook her head and climbed in before looking up at him quizzically. “Didn’t you say she’s an expert on ancient Britain?”
He nodded, seeing where her mind was going. “Maybe you should recruit her for the cause.” Sam said, starting the car. “We could use the expertise.”
“I can’t think right now, Sam. Go have dinner. I’ll catch up with you later.” He closed the door of the car and turned to look at…his daughter. “So, it’s just you and me. What do you say we find some place to talk?”
She nodded, pulling up her shoulders in a gesture he recognized as his own. He shook his head and tried not to think too much about the unexpected turn his life had just taken.
Several hours later he was buzzing with caffeine and excitement on the couch of her small apartment. It was filled with boxes and artifacts as she prepared to leave her study behind and head back to Glastonbury for a new position on a project with the British museum. In the hours they had spent talking they had finished off three pots of coffee and he had learned about her childhood in England, her mother’s illness that pulled them home where her grandparents could care for them. She had been largely home schooled in the early years, and graduated high school in the States by 13, getting a Master’s degree by 17 and finishing her PhD only the month before.
In return he’d offered sketchy details of his life since he’d fallen basically off the academic map. She didn’t pry, at least not once he’d said the words “military” and “classified”, but she absorbed every bit of information he offered her. When he looked at her, he could see Colleen looking back at him. It didn’t seem like it had been twenty years since they had been together, but doing the math proved him wrong.
“So, if I’m doing the figures right…you must be close to turning twenty.” Daniel said, rubbing tired eyes.
She nodded. “A little less than a week, actually.” She looked away, suddenly shy. “It was my deadline for finding you. I promised her I would try for at least five years.”
“You would have given up?”
She got up to empty her cold coffee cup. “I wasn’t kidding when I said I never really thought much about not having a father. I didn’t have the most normal of childhoods and no real two parent families as role models, so it just never occurred to me to ask. I figured that knowing your name, and that you were a brilliant professional in my own chosen career path, would serve me if I couldn’t find you.”
“So, how did you?”
She came back into the living room from the kitchen. The sheepish smile was back. “My student advisor did for me.” She chuckled. “I had mentioned your name a while back, dropped some of your early work by his office for him to read. I wanted to use some of it in my thesis.”
“I though your area was Britain.”
“It is.” She nodded. “But, my thesis was dealing with the similarities of cultures. Some of your work supported that. So, when he started putting together this Egyptology thing, he asked if I thought you would make a good speaker. I challenged him to find you.”
She smiled, her tongue protruding between her teeth again. “He doesn’t like to lose…so I owe him $20…but he found you for me.”
Daniel had to smile. “I wondered why in the world I was invited. It’s not like I’ve been actively lecturing…not in academia anyway. Interesting turn out too. Almost like they were expecting me to show up with two heads or something.
She came back to the couch. “Most of the old fogies only came out when your name got added to the lecture list. You are quite the mystery in the circles of academic anthropology. Speculation abounds.”
“I could tell. They came at me like vultures with their questions.”
They both yawned and then laughed. “I should let you get some rest…and get back to Sam before she sends out the guard to find me.”
He stood. “I’ve enjoyed getting to know you.”
She smiled, bright and beautiful. “I have enjoyed it too.”
He paused at the door. “How long until you leave for England?”
“Two weeks.”
He stopped and considered what Sam said. He couldn’t tell yet what he felt about having a daughter, or even if he believed she was his daughter. He knew how to find out for sure though. “Would you be willing to come back to Colorado with me for a few days?”
She seemed stunned by the suggestion. “Why?”
He chewed on his lip as he thought about it. “A couple of reasons, actually. One, I have friends there who can confirm if I-if you-if we’re related, like your mother says. Two, I have people I would love for you to meet.”
“Is there a three?”
“There might be. But why don’t we let that one wait for a while. Will you come?”
“How about I sleep on it and let you know tomorrow?”
“Fair enough.” Daniel pulled a card out of his pocket. It had his name and cell phone number on it and he turned it over to right down the name of the hotel where he and Sam were staying. “Our flight leaves at 2pm, and I have some business I need to do, but maybe we could meet for breakfast? Say 10ish?”
She smiled and took the card. “That sounds good.”
Daniel held the door to the restaurant for DJ, and gestured toward the table where he could see Jack and Sam waiting, both in dress uniform. He smiled, and touched her shoulder in reassurance. “DJ, you remember Dr. Carter? I didn’t mention yesterday she’s also a Lt. Colonel in the Air Force.”
DJ nodded at Sam, and flicked her eyes to Jack. Daniel took the hint. “This is Brigadier General Jack O’Neill. Jack, I’d like you to meet, my daughter, Dr. DJ Moore.”
Both of Jack’s eyebrows lifted and his eyes got big. “Ah, your-did you just say daughter?”
Daniel smiled and held the nearest chair out for DJ. “Yes, Jack I did.”
“And I didn’t know about this because…”
“Well, in his defense, sir,” Sam cut in, “he didn’t know either until yesterday.”
“And we’re certain?”
Daniel shrugged. “The timing is right, she’s got a lot of interesting similarities. Haven’t checked DNA yet, but I’m hoping to convince her to come with me to Colorado so we can have Dr. Lamm do some checking.”
Jack nodded, looked at DJ, blinked and looked back at Daniel. “Daughter?”
Sam laughed and sipped at her coffee. “Don’t mind, the General, Dr. You’ll get used to him.”
“I’m just saying.” Jack said. He looked at DJ again. “Aren’t you a little young….to be a doctor, I mean.”
“She takes after her mother.” Daniel answered.
“She said I took after you, in the brains department.” DJ answered. “I’m young, yes. I just got my PhD.”
“That’s gotta make you…what…”
“She’ll be twenty next week, Jack.”
Jack smiled and looked at Daniel. “That means that you were…eighteen? You dog you.”
“Jack.” Daniel’s tone was irritated, but his expression was embarrassed. “Do you mind?”
“What?”
The waitress came then and they ordered. “So, what are you a doctor of, Dr.?” Jack asked, wiggling his eyebrows.
“I, seem to have followed in my father’s footsteps, actually…my mother’s too. I’m an archeologist, sir.”
“Jack. Call me Jack. Only person at this table that calls me sir is Carter.”
DJ smiled and Jack echoed it. “Her doctorate thesis is very impressive.” Daniel said. “She has a specialization in ancient Celtic culture, England, Wales, Ireland, Scotland.”
“You’ve read my thesis?” DJ asked, looking surprised.
“Last night, after I left you. I found it on the University’s web site.”
“Celtic, eh?”
Sam cleared her throat. “She could be a valuable source of information…with regard to the stuff…from England.”
Jack looked at Sam for a long minute before understanding apparently dawned on him. “So more than just blood samples in Colorado?”
“She’s got the credentials. I was going to talk to Landry about it.” Daniel said, lifting his mug of coffee.
“Okay, you have lost me. About what?” DJ asked.
Daniel shook his head. “I was going to wait until I had talked to my boss, DJ, but I was considering asking you if you wanted a different kind of job.”
Her face lit up as she looked at him. “Would it involve research and travel?”
He had to chuckle. So much of the conversation the night before had been about how she was dreading the amount of time her new job would require her to teach and keep her out of the field. “A fair amount of both actually. To places you have never seen.” Jack looked at him with a those wide eyes. Daniel gave the look back to him. “I can’t tell you much about it right now, but…we’d get to spend some time getting to know one another…and the work would be challenging.”
“Well, color me intrigued then,” she replied. “And excuse me for a moment. I need to make a quick call.”
She got up and bustled outside, pulling a cell phone from her pocket as she went.
“Daniel?”
“Jack.”
“Daughter?”
Daniel shrugged. “What can I say? I’ve checked her story out as much as I can and she seems legitimate. She just completed her doctorate, she has two master’s degrees. She lived with her grandparents before college, only her grandmother is alive anymore. Her mother died four and a half years ago.”
“You’ve been busy.” Sam said.
“I-I didn’t sleep.” Daniel confessed. “I called in a few favors, and had her background run. I went by the college this morning and talked to a few of her professors.”
“Worried about something?” Jack asked, suddenly serious.
“Not really.” Daniel answered, though his face said he wasn’t being entirely truthful. “Its just…you know how sometimes something is just too good to be true?” They both nodded. “She knew how I liked my coffee. She had my brand in her apartment. She just happens to have the expertise we need.”
“Are you thinking a plant of some kind?” Sam asked.
Daniel shrugged. “I don’t know. It feels so…real. She has so many of my mannerisms…which is weird, let me tell you…She studies dead languages and ancient societies. You should see her apartment. It could have been mine…mine twenty years ago…but…I feel connected with her already…like I’ve known her forever…”
“Daniel, you’re rambling.”
“I know.”
“So, you’re going to take her to Colorado and have Lamm figure out if its true. Seems like the right thing to do.” Jack said, moving his hands off the table as the waitress approached with their food.
“I know.”
“So what’s the problem?”
“He’s already connecting, sir.” Sam said with a smile. “He’s already feeling the proud father…just look at him.”
The both looked at him then until he rolled his eyes. “Stop. Eat.”
“Just in time, I see.” DJ dropped back into her seat and picked up her fork. “I’ve just told my Nana that I found you. She asked if you were a psycho-killer or a nincompoop.”
“We’ve had him tested. He’s clean.” Jack said straight-faced.
“Don’t mind him.” Daniel whispered and she grinned. “Incidentally, what did you tell her?”
“I told her that you seemed like a pretty nice guy, even if you didn’t look like most archeologist geeks I normally hang around with.”
“He gets that from me. Hanging out with the cool kids, some of the cool just rubs off on you.” Jack said, shaking his bacon at Daniel.
“I also told her that I was going to visit you in Colorado before I go to England, make sure Mom knew what she was saying. Her response to that was that her daughter wasn’t a floozy, and if you were a gentleman, you’d have known that.”
Sam almost spit coffee as she laughed. When she’d finally swallowed. “You know, DJ, you may get along better with the General than I originally thought.”
“What?” Jack looked up, his innocent face set on high beam.
“Eat.” Daniel said, hiding his amusement behind his coffee mug. He couldn’t help but feel happy, watching his two closest friends welcome her into their conversation as if she belonged there…as if she had always been there.
He tried to remind himself that they had no proof, only the word of a woman dead and gone for four years, but just looking at her made him smile. She was vibrant and beautiful and probably more intelligent than anyone he knew…well except maybe for Sam. He’d never given a lot of thought to kids, certainly not since Shar’e, but how could anyone not be proud-
“Daniel.”
“Jack?”
“Eat.”
Daniel looked up to see the three of them watching him. Apparently he’d wandered off into his own head again. “Yes Jack.”
Title: Daddy's Little Girl
Fandom: Stargate SG-1
Rating: PG (might ramp up to R at some point, but not for a while)
Characters/Pairings: General Team fic, with appearances by Jack, Landry, Lamm and original characers
Disclaimer: Ain't mine, don't own um...just like playing with them...especially that Danny Boy...
Summary: On a trip to Washington, Daniel discovers that he has a daughter, but is she too good to be true?
Daddy’s Little Girl
“Dr. Jackson?”
The tentative voice somehow managed to cut through the general din of conversation to reach through to Daniel as he was slipping an arm around Sam to direct her out of a clump of aging archeologists acting as if they hadn’t seen a woman since college. Knowing the work habits of some of them, that could be true. He turned to find a young woman smiling at him with the tiniest shrug of her shoulders that transmitted a certain nervous excitement. “Yes?”
She seemed relieved and stuck out her hand. “I’m Dr. DJ Moore.” He took her hand and squinted. Her upturned nose was smattered with faint freckles. Her soft brown hair just dusted her shoulders and her blue eyes seemed to be trying to impress his face into her memory. She didn’t look old enough to be a doctor. She bit her lip and nodded, as if she’d read his mind. “I know. I’m young. Not quite twenty even. I skipped ahead a time or two.”
Daniel smiled and Sam cleared her throat. “Ah, yes, Dr. Moore, my colleague Dr. Samantha Carter.”
The young woman held out her hand again, shaking Sam’s with a smile. “A pleasure, Dr.”
“So…” Daniel really wanted out of the lecture hall, now that his duty was done. He didn’t do the lecture circuit much anymore, and today was reminding him of why, with the clinging and questioning groups that had stopped him every two steps and the faces that had once derided him as clearly insane..
“Oh, yes. I’ve been looking for you.” She closed her eyes and shook her head. “I can’t believe I just said that that way. I’m sorry.” She took a deep breath and seemed to gather herself. “My area of expertise is Britain and Gaul, not Egypt. I came today to see you.”
“Daniel, I’m…going to step outside, and get some air.” Sam said beside him and he nodded. He could tell Dr. Phillen was trying to draw her back into the conversation he had rescued her from. It was nice of her to have come with him, even if her ulterior motives had more to do with Jack and talking him into some project she wanted to play with than spending time with him.
Dr. Moore refocused herself again. “You know, I have played out this moment so many times in my head, and here I am making a compete fool out of myself.”
“No, you’re not-“
She smiled, and something in it reminded him of his youth. “You’re being very kind. I-maybe this would be easier on me if we went somewhere a little more private. Could I interest you in a cup of coffee?”
It was Daniel’s turn to smile. “Almost always.”
“There’s a cart in the atrium.” She gestured and turned, looking over her shoulder at him to make sure he was coming with her.
“So, you’ve been looking for me?”
She laughed nervously. “I’m not a stalker or anything. I promise. But, yes. You aren’t an easy man to find these days.”
“No, I guess I’m not.”
“I can understand why, I guess. Though anyone who doesn’t see the value of your work is crazy.”
“You’ve read my work?”
“Egypt isn’t my specialty, but…yes, I have. All of it.”
Daniel nodded, though he was still lost. They reached the coffee cart and she ordered for both of them. He arched an eyebrow that Teal’c would have been proud of as she handed him his cup.
Her tongue found its way between her teeth and she laughed again. “Busted.”
“Not a stalker, but you know how I like my coffee?”
“My mother,” she said, gesturing to a table beside a window. “Colleen Moore. You knew her in college.”
Daniel nodded, the image very clear in his mind. Colleen Moore. Their relationship had lasted exactly 6 months. It had been intense. He had been seventeen, no eighteen and she had been the first female archeology student who hadn’t rejected him for his age before he’d even opened his mouth. She had been older by a few years. They shared a desk in Professor Lanlin’s class. She had introduced him to Emily Bronte and given him his first sexual relationship. He had given her the chicken pox and a book of sappy love poems. It had ended at the end of the semester when they both got jobs on opposite ends of the earth for their summer projects. He’d gone to Cairo, she’d gone to England. “I remember her. She told you how I take my coffee?”
She sipped at hers and bobbled her head a bit. “She told me a lot of things.”
“I haven’t seen her…in a long time. How is she?”
DJ looked away. “Dead, unfortunately.”
“Oh, I’m sorry.” He pursed his lips and quashed a feeling of loss he had no business to. Their goodbye had been a lifetime ago and as amicable as any he’d ever had. She was a distant memory, a sweet one, but a memory.
“No worries. It was quite a few years ago. I’m good now.” She smiled as if it demonstrated her point. “But, before she died we talked…a lot. She asked me to find you.”
He tried not to look surprised, but he was and didn’t hide it well. “Oh? Why?”
“A couple of reasons, actually.” Her hand went into her jacket pocket. It came back out with a small package. “She wanted to give you this. She said you would want it. She found it on a dig in Greece.” Her hand went inside her jacket and pulled out an envelope. “And she wrote you a letter. But wanted you to read it after.”
“After?” He took the letter from her, brushing one long finger over the looping letters of his name.
She exhaled slowly. “Boy, there’s just no easy way to say this. So…yeah….Here’s the thing. She’d never said anything before…the whole time I was growing up. She never married, she was married to her work…and then raising me…so who had time…and I really never wondered, I was too busy trying to impress her and learning…but, before she died she wanted me to know.”
Daniel met her eyes, his mind already forming denials. She exhaled again, then inhaled and held it for a moment before letting it out as she spoke. “She said that you…that you’re my father.”
“What?” Sam asked in hushed tones as Daniel finished. They were huddled together near their rental car. She looked over his shoulder to where the young doctor waited for them.
He held the letter between them, having ripped through the words as soon as he could kick start his brain again after her declaration. “Apparently, she never told me because she didn’t want to derail my career,” he said dryly. “She says I was too young and had too much ahead of me.” He snorted at the thought.
“A daughter?” Sam said incredulously. “What…what are you going to do?”
Daniel shrugged, pulling at his tie. “I don’t know. What do you do? I mean, someone walks into your life and tells you that you’re her father. How do you react?”
“She looks like you.” Sam said with a half smile. “I didn’t see it before, but she’s got your eyes, and nose.”
“And her mother’s freckles.” Daniel said, shaking his head. “Why don’t you go ahead and meet Jack for dinner. I’m going to talk with her for a while, try to figure this out.”
“Okay, but call if you need anything.”
“Like what, a son?” He grinned and held the door for her.
She shook her head and climbed in before looking up at him quizzically. “Didn’t you say she’s an expert on ancient Britain?”
He nodded, seeing where her mind was going. “Maybe you should recruit her for the cause.” Sam said, starting the car. “We could use the expertise.”
“I can’t think right now, Sam. Go have dinner. I’ll catch up with you later.” He closed the door of the car and turned to look at…his daughter. “So, it’s just you and me. What do you say we find some place to talk?”
She nodded, pulling up her shoulders in a gesture he recognized as his own. He shook his head and tried not to think too much about the unexpected turn his life had just taken.
Several hours later he was buzzing with caffeine and excitement on the couch of her small apartment. It was filled with boxes and artifacts as she prepared to leave her study behind and head back to Glastonbury for a new position on a project with the British museum. In the hours they had spent talking they had finished off three pots of coffee and he had learned about her childhood in England, her mother’s illness that pulled them home where her grandparents could care for them. She had been largely home schooled in the early years, and graduated high school in the States by 13, getting a Master’s degree by 17 and finishing her PhD only the month before.
In return he’d offered sketchy details of his life since he’d fallen basically off the academic map. She didn’t pry, at least not once he’d said the words “military” and “classified”, but she absorbed every bit of information he offered her. When he looked at her, he could see Colleen looking back at him. It didn’t seem like it had been twenty years since they had been together, but doing the math proved him wrong.
“So, if I’m doing the figures right…you must be close to turning twenty.” Daniel said, rubbing tired eyes.
She nodded. “A little less than a week, actually.” She looked away, suddenly shy. “It was my deadline for finding you. I promised her I would try for at least five years.”
“You would have given up?”
She got up to empty her cold coffee cup. “I wasn’t kidding when I said I never really thought much about not having a father. I didn’t have the most normal of childhoods and no real two parent families as role models, so it just never occurred to me to ask. I figured that knowing your name, and that you were a brilliant professional in my own chosen career path, would serve me if I couldn’t find you.”
“So, how did you?”
She came back into the living room from the kitchen. The sheepish smile was back. “My student advisor did for me.” She chuckled. “I had mentioned your name a while back, dropped some of your early work by his office for him to read. I wanted to use some of it in my thesis.”
“I though your area was Britain.”
“It is.” She nodded. “But, my thesis was dealing with the similarities of cultures. Some of your work supported that. So, when he started putting together this Egyptology thing, he asked if I thought you would make a good speaker. I challenged him to find you.”
She smiled, her tongue protruding between her teeth again. “He doesn’t like to lose…so I owe him $20…but he found you for me.”
Daniel had to smile. “I wondered why in the world I was invited. It’s not like I’ve been actively lecturing…not in academia anyway. Interesting turn out too. Almost like they were expecting me to show up with two heads or something.
She came back to the couch. “Most of the old fogies only came out when your name got added to the lecture list. You are quite the mystery in the circles of academic anthropology. Speculation abounds.”
“I could tell. They came at me like vultures with their questions.”
They both yawned and then laughed. “I should let you get some rest…and get back to Sam before she sends out the guard to find me.”
He stood. “I’ve enjoyed getting to know you.”
She smiled, bright and beautiful. “I have enjoyed it too.”
He paused at the door. “How long until you leave for England?”
“Two weeks.”
He stopped and considered what Sam said. He couldn’t tell yet what he felt about having a daughter, or even if he believed she was his daughter. He knew how to find out for sure though. “Would you be willing to come back to Colorado with me for a few days?”
She seemed stunned by the suggestion. “Why?”
He chewed on his lip as he thought about it. “A couple of reasons, actually. One, I have friends there who can confirm if I-if you-if we’re related, like your mother says. Two, I have people I would love for you to meet.”
“Is there a three?”
“There might be. But why don’t we let that one wait for a while. Will you come?”
“How about I sleep on it and let you know tomorrow?”
“Fair enough.” Daniel pulled a card out of his pocket. It had his name and cell phone number on it and he turned it over to right down the name of the hotel where he and Sam were staying. “Our flight leaves at 2pm, and I have some business I need to do, but maybe we could meet for breakfast? Say 10ish?”
She smiled and took the card. “That sounds good.”
Daniel held the door to the restaurant for DJ, and gestured toward the table where he could see Jack and Sam waiting, both in dress uniform. He smiled, and touched her shoulder in reassurance. “DJ, you remember Dr. Carter? I didn’t mention yesterday she’s also a Lt. Colonel in the Air Force.”
DJ nodded at Sam, and flicked her eyes to Jack. Daniel took the hint. “This is Brigadier General Jack O’Neill. Jack, I’d like you to meet, my daughter, Dr. DJ Moore.”
Both of Jack’s eyebrows lifted and his eyes got big. “Ah, your-did you just say daughter?”
Daniel smiled and held the nearest chair out for DJ. “Yes, Jack I did.”
“And I didn’t know about this because…”
“Well, in his defense, sir,” Sam cut in, “he didn’t know either until yesterday.”
“And we’re certain?”
Daniel shrugged. “The timing is right, she’s got a lot of interesting similarities. Haven’t checked DNA yet, but I’m hoping to convince her to come with me to Colorado so we can have Dr. Lamm do some checking.”
Jack nodded, looked at DJ, blinked and looked back at Daniel. “Daughter?”
Sam laughed and sipped at her coffee. “Don’t mind, the General, Dr. You’ll get used to him.”
“I’m just saying.” Jack said. He looked at DJ again. “Aren’t you a little young….to be a doctor, I mean.”
“She takes after her mother.” Daniel answered.
“She said I took after you, in the brains department.” DJ answered. “I’m young, yes. I just got my PhD.”
“That’s gotta make you…what…”
“She’ll be twenty next week, Jack.”
Jack smiled and looked at Daniel. “That means that you were…eighteen? You dog you.”
“Jack.” Daniel’s tone was irritated, but his expression was embarrassed. “Do you mind?”
“What?”
The waitress came then and they ordered. “So, what are you a doctor of, Dr.?” Jack asked, wiggling his eyebrows.
“I, seem to have followed in my father’s footsteps, actually…my mother’s too. I’m an archeologist, sir.”
“Jack. Call me Jack. Only person at this table that calls me sir is Carter.”
DJ smiled and Jack echoed it. “Her doctorate thesis is very impressive.” Daniel said. “She has a specialization in ancient Celtic culture, England, Wales, Ireland, Scotland.”
“You’ve read my thesis?” DJ asked, looking surprised.
“Last night, after I left you. I found it on the University’s web site.”
“Celtic, eh?”
Sam cleared her throat. “She could be a valuable source of information…with regard to the stuff…from England.”
Jack looked at Sam for a long minute before understanding apparently dawned on him. “So more than just blood samples in Colorado?”
“She’s got the credentials. I was going to talk to Landry about it.” Daniel said, lifting his mug of coffee.
“Okay, you have lost me. About what?” DJ asked.
Daniel shook his head. “I was going to wait until I had talked to my boss, DJ, but I was considering asking you if you wanted a different kind of job.”
Her face lit up as she looked at him. “Would it involve research and travel?”
He had to chuckle. So much of the conversation the night before had been about how she was dreading the amount of time her new job would require her to teach and keep her out of the field. “A fair amount of both actually. To places you have never seen.” Jack looked at him with a those wide eyes. Daniel gave the look back to him. “I can’t tell you much about it right now, but…we’d get to spend some time getting to know one another…and the work would be challenging.”
“Well, color me intrigued then,” she replied. “And excuse me for a moment. I need to make a quick call.”
She got up and bustled outside, pulling a cell phone from her pocket as she went.
“Daniel?”
“Jack.”
“Daughter?”
Daniel shrugged. “What can I say? I’ve checked her story out as much as I can and she seems legitimate. She just completed her doctorate, she has two master’s degrees. She lived with her grandparents before college, only her grandmother is alive anymore. Her mother died four and a half years ago.”
“You’ve been busy.” Sam said.
“I-I didn’t sleep.” Daniel confessed. “I called in a few favors, and had her background run. I went by the college this morning and talked to a few of her professors.”
“Worried about something?” Jack asked, suddenly serious.
“Not really.” Daniel answered, though his face said he wasn’t being entirely truthful. “Its just…you know how sometimes something is just too good to be true?” They both nodded. “She knew how I liked my coffee. She had my brand in her apartment. She just happens to have the expertise we need.”
“Are you thinking a plant of some kind?” Sam asked.
Daniel shrugged. “I don’t know. It feels so…real. She has so many of my mannerisms…which is weird, let me tell you…She studies dead languages and ancient societies. You should see her apartment. It could have been mine…mine twenty years ago…but…I feel connected with her already…like I’ve known her forever…”
“Daniel, you’re rambling.”
“I know.”
“So, you’re going to take her to Colorado and have Lamm figure out if its true. Seems like the right thing to do.” Jack said, moving his hands off the table as the waitress approached with their food.
“I know.”
“So what’s the problem?”
“He’s already connecting, sir.” Sam said with a smile. “He’s already feeling the proud father…just look at him.”
The both looked at him then until he rolled his eyes. “Stop. Eat.”
“Just in time, I see.” DJ dropped back into her seat and picked up her fork. “I’ve just told my Nana that I found you. She asked if you were a psycho-killer or a nincompoop.”
“We’ve had him tested. He’s clean.” Jack said straight-faced.
“Don’t mind him.” Daniel whispered and she grinned. “Incidentally, what did you tell her?”
“I told her that you seemed like a pretty nice guy, even if you didn’t look like most archeologist geeks I normally hang around with.”
“He gets that from me. Hanging out with the cool kids, some of the cool just rubs off on you.” Jack said, shaking his bacon at Daniel.
“I also told her that I was going to visit you in Colorado before I go to England, make sure Mom knew what she was saying. Her response to that was that her daughter wasn’t a floozy, and if you were a gentleman, you’d have known that.”
Sam almost spit coffee as she laughed. When she’d finally swallowed. “You know, DJ, you may get along better with the General than I originally thought.”
“What?” Jack looked up, his innocent face set on high beam.
“Eat.” Daniel said, hiding his amusement behind his coffee mug. He couldn’t help but feel happy, watching his two closest friends welcome her into their conversation as if she belonged there…as if she had always been there.
He tried to remind himself that they had no proof, only the word of a woman dead and gone for four years, but just looking at her made him smile. She was vibrant and beautiful and probably more intelligent than anyone he knew…well except maybe for Sam. He’d never given a lot of thought to kids, certainly not since Shar’e, but how could anyone not be proud-
“Daniel.”
“Jack?”
“Eat.”
Daniel looked up to see the three of them watching him. Apparently he’d wandered off into his own head again. “Yes Jack.”