AND SO IT BEGINS...

By: Suisan "Sue" R.

Written for AllGen Press

Zine Title: All The Roses Falling

Debuted: June 2003 @ Media West Con

Beta Reader: Ruth FL

Editor: BethB

*Medical Team to Alpha 2 -- Repeat, Medical Team to Alpha 2* 

*Warning -- Extreme Levels of Radiation have been detected in the Gate Room*

The overhead announcements come a little late, I'm already moving down the ramp, my hands raised in front of me.  One reason is to show the security folks that I'm unarmed and the other reason, to hopefully prevent people from bumping into me and getting a dose of what I got.

"Clear the way! Don't touch me!"  Damn, that sounded harsh.  I don't give a rip.  I just managed to save an alien world from it's own stupidity, but for how long?  I push past SGC members, trying not to touch them as I walk rapidly down the ramp from the stargate and hurry toward the medical section. 

*Medical Team to Alpha 2* 

No, I'm past Alpha 2, moving over to Charlie Hall, folks.  Trying to get to medical.  Come on, damn it; you can track me better than that!

I glance over my shoulder to see Sam walking, no, almost running, behind me, concern all over her face.  A small group of white-clad medics are rushing toward me, their hands stretching out to assist.  "Don't touch me."  I announce as I manage to get by the Air Force Medics without touching them.  Last thing the SGC needs right now is to lose a second member.

Dr. Frasier, Janet, is waiting for me in the doorway to her medical treatment bays.  "Let's get him scrubbed down."  Someone must have warned her I was coming and what may have happened.  Either that or, after the Geiger counters in the Gate Room went haywire when I stepped through the event horizon some bright Sergeant, probably Simonson, figured it out and called ahead.  From the expression on Janet's face … Oh yeah, someone warned her.

~o~0~o~

I never wanted to face this kind of situation.  Oh, I trained for it, as much as medical school and the United States Air Force could train you for something like this, but I never wanted to face it.  Not when the patient is someone I've come to know, both professionally and personally, and care about. 

Staff Sergeant Simonson had called me, reporting the readings from the Geiger counters and that Daniel had just arrived through the gate when the warning klaxons started.  The last time those particular klaxons had sounded was when General Hammond had been relieved and a strictly by-the-book oaf had decided to send a nuclear bomb through the gate and the event horizon had refused to close.  Even then, the amount of radiation leakage had been -- thankfully -- minimal.  This time?  Hell, it'll take well over a week of scrubbing and testing before I, or any member of my staff, can clear the halls and the gate room for regular use.  Unless General Hammond can pull a miracle out of his hat.  Speaking of miracles…

Daniel steps out of the shower barely wearing a towel around his waist -- no sense in modesty now -- and I wave the portable Geiger in his direction.  The needle climbs up over the 'acceptable' mark in a hurry.  "Sorry, Daniel.  Back in again."

"Shit.  All right."  He drops the towel into the biohazard bin and disappears back into the small shower stall.  One of my medics, TSgt. Laszlo, rushes forward to slam the lead-lined lid back on the bin and roll it out of the way just as Airman Reagan, another fresh-faced medic, maneuvers another one into place.  Daniel's uniform has already hit the base's incinerator, along with five other towels, and I fear this is just the beginning of a very long decontamination process. 

Once the residual radiation has been reduced to acceptable levels I'll be able to assess Daniel's condition, but…

Don't go there yet, Janet.  Yes, it's taken longer than it should've to get the levels down, and the readings from the gate room are scary, but there's still a chance that Danny didn't get a lethal dose …right?  I barely hold back the frustration-inspired desire to pound my fist into the nearest inanimate object.  After all, if I turn my hand into a maraca I can't help Daniel. 

~o~0~o~

What in the hell happened?  According to the Colonel, the Kelownan government is already making noises like they think Daniel was trying to destroy something.  But that's ridiculous.  Daniel has to be one of the more peaceful people I know.  It doesn't make sense.  And all this damn waiting … 

The door of the shower room opens up in the room below and I watch, trying not to feel like a peeping Thomasina, as Frasier waves the wand end of a radiation detector over Daniel's towel-clad body and then waves him over to a bed.  A patient gown waits on top of the covers, which have been turned down.  I turn away from the window, even as I watch Janet turn her back on Daniel, to give him some semblance of privacy as he exchanges his flimsy towel for an even flimsier piece of clothing. 

By the time I turn back around, Daniel's dressed and Janet is already drawing blood from his arm.  She's treating each vial of garnet-colored fluid like it's pure, unstable nitroglycerine as she hands them off to one of the field medics, who packs them in a foam padded case.  I don't blame them; the radiation levels I saw on the readouts were beyond terrifying. 

Theoretically, I know there is no way in hell that any person could survive exposure to such high levels of radiation, but Daniel walked into Frasier's territory under his own steam.  Unlike the scientists who had, according to the bare bone sketchy reports we've gotten from Kelownan, dropped dead on the spot.  That means there's a chance Daniel didn't get a full dose, right?

Keep dreaming, Sammie.  You know better than that.  You helped dress the burn on his hand; you know he touched the device…  My hand slams on the windowsill of it's own volition as the frustration and, yes, fear I'm feeling finds a small outlet.

~o~0~o~

Okay, this is beyond silly.  Something happened on P3X-4C3 that had the radiation warnings going berserk when Danny came home through the gate and no one seems to know exactly what.  Or they simply aren't talking.  We're still connected to the planet via the MALP.  We're keeping the iris closed but the telemetry features of the MALP have kept the lines of communications open.  For all the good it's doing us. 

According to Carter, Frasier isn't done examining Danny – and hasn’t cleared him for visitations -- so I can't ask him what the hell happened.  All I know, all I care to know, is that somehow a member of my team may have been exposed to massive levels of some kind of radiation and I'm NOT about to just sit here and do nothing. 

I need to do something, I have to do something.  But what?   

The missile techs from some of the nearby, and supposedly defunct, missile silos around the area have done a bang-up job of reducing the radiation levels in the Gate Room.  Hammond didn't even bother with a pre-mission debrief on them, just called their stations, arranged clearance for them to enter NORAD and then personally escorted them, with their equipment haulers, to the room and gave them free reign.  Once they're done, they'll be thoroughly debriefed and required to sign additional paperwork beyond what they already signed as missile techs that basically states that should they breathe a word of what they saw in the bowels of NORAD they'll face a lifetime vacation in the US Government's most secure prison.  In the meantime, all SGC personnel have been advised to get the techs whatever they need, or want, to fully decontaminate the Gate Room. 

All I'm currently doing is just sitting here in the base cantina, twiddling my thumbs instead of inserting them up my ass … thinking.  Something Danny would tell me I need to do more of, but he's always telling me that I tend to act first, think last and that one day my brain will shut down due to lack of proper stretching. 

Well, I'm thinking, Danny.  Happy?  Those assholes on Kelownan are stonewalling us, I know they are, but once we get access to the gate … I'd like to see them throw up a brick wall when faced with my wrath.  I feel a small, probably feral looking, smile creep across my face.  The idea, the anticipation of giving the Kelownans a piece of my mind is deeply satisfyi…

*Colonel O'Neill, please report to General Hammond*

*Colonel O'Neill, please report to General Hammond*

The loudspeaker on the wall behind me blares to life, causing me to jump out of my chair, and the words spur me into movement.  George wants my butt in his office.  Maybe that means the missile techs are done and he's going to clear it for me to go back and talk to the Kelownans face to face! 

Amazing how two little silver birds on the collar of your uniform can clear your path.  I met no resistance in the halls between the cantina and the control room.  Of course, there's a chance that it's not my rank clearing my way, but the SGC's grapevine.  By now, nearly everyone in the command has got to know that something potentially BAD has happened to one of my team members.  Besides, I've heard the rumors, who hasn't?  I'm supposed to have one hell of a temper and no one here wants to find out if the rumor is true.  I just hope I get a chance to show the government of P3X-4C3 just how bad my black Irish temper is…

~o~0~o~

Okay, this is not fun.  Never knew a person could feel so bad, yet oddly energized at the same time.  Janet's reading over my latest lab results, she had the tech expedite them, and from the look on her face … yeah, this is not going to be a cakewalk. 

"Janet?"  I softly call out to her, getting her attention.  Her warm brown eyes have always been expressive, and the concern I see in them now… "I know.  I may not be a medical doctor or an astrophysicist, but I know what happened on Kelownan and what's happening to me."

She drops the medical chart onto a nearby table and carefully hitches her hip onto my bed as she fishes her penlight out of her pocket.  Janet's not fooling me, but I let her shine the overly-bright light into each of my eyes before I try to prompt her into responding to me.  "Janet, don't shut me out, not now."

That's when I notice it, the small pooling of tears building up in her eyes, just before she turns away for a brief moment.  "Daniel, I'm not going to lie to you…" She turns to face me once more. "You've taken a lethal dose of radiation and are in the first stages of terminal radiation poisoning."

"In other words, I'm dying."  I'm not surprised, after all, I watched the Kelownan scientists drop dead before they could even get close to shutting down the damn bomb's uncontrolled reaction.  An overactive runaway reaction I barely managed to stop, even when I knew it would mean my life.

"Yes--" Janet pauses to look around the treatment bay, as if to make sure her words are truly private and I wonder why, until she speaks the words I never thought I'd hear from her.  "Daniel … Danny, the process is going to be very painful, I won't lie to you about that.  If you want, I can give you what we call 'comfort measures' to keep the pain at reasonable levels--"

"No,"  I nearly snap at her, and then smile to soften the blow.  "I appreciate the thought, I really do, Janet, but I don't want to spend my last hours on Earth in a drug induced fog." 

"Are you sure, Danny?"  I nod, not trusting my voice at the moment.  "Okay.  I need to go report to General Hammond and let your team members know they can come visit with you.  If you need anything, anything at all, let Laszlo or Reagan know, all right?"

"I'll be fine.  I am tired and a few Z’s sound good.”  I'm not really tired, but I don't want her hovering over me.  Janet nods as she gets up from my bed; straightening her jacket before picking up my chart from the table she dropped it on.  I reach up to remove my glasses, not my normal pair but my backup ones, and become aware of the bone-deep ache in my shoulders and joints.  And so it begins.  My last hours are going to be full of pain, but until I can’t stand it I refuse to take the painkillers.  Besides, it'd be too tempting to try to convince Janet to slip a little extra juice into the syringe and help me kick the bucket. 

~o~0~o~

How in the blue blazes am I going to be able to tell Jack what the Kelownan government representatives are trying to say about Doctor Jackson?  I may not have liked Daniel when he first pushed his way into my command, but things change.  And O'Neill can be one stubborn mule; it was at his insistence that Doctor Jackson was included in the initial setup of the SGC. 

I wanted Jackson for his expertise, his valuable experiences on Abydos, but O'Neill insisted on Jackson being a part of SG-1.   For all of Jack's grousing, bitching and otherwise moaning about having a "touchy-feely" social scientist on his team, screwing up the sheer military dynamics of SG-1… He cares about Jackson.  I've seen it. 

Every time the team has come back from a mission where Daniel managed to hurt himself, Jack would display an almost brotherly -- older brother at that -- affection and concern for the Archaeologist/Linguist's welfare.  Often making sure he got his scholarly butt down to medical before allowing myself, or the debriefing team, to even look at Dr. Jackson. 

I look up from the file in my hand when my door is practically shoved into the wall and the storm known as Colonel John "Jack" Patrick O'Neill blows in.  "General, I don't care what the damn Kelownans are saying, there's no way in hell Danny tried to sabotage anything!"

So much for my having to tell him what's being said about Jackson…  "Colonel, call your team together for a briefing.  It'll just be me and your team, minus Dr. Jackson -- unless Dr. Frasier clears him to join us -- and I'll want to hear everyone's account of what happened."

Watching Jack deflate, literally shedding his righteous anger like a curtain of water, isn't a nice picture.  I've never seen a twenty-plus year officer of O'Neill's caliber slump.  Stomp off, stiffen like a granite slab, but never slump in defeat.  It's disquieting and damn disturbing.  I watch as Jack leaves my office, following my orders to assemble his team, knowing he wants to bring Daniel along…

<ring!>

Not the red phone that sits on my desk, but the black 'in house' one with the direct line from medical lit up and flashing at me.  Damn, this probably won't be good, not after what Carter told me in the Gate Room.  "Hammond."  I bark into the handset when I lift it off its cradle.  Doctor Frasier's voice drones on in my ear, almost sounding as if she's talking to me though three feet of water or biting back tears…  "I understand, Doctor.  Do what you can for him and keep me apprised of his condition."

Damn it all to hell…  Well, look on the bright side, George … at least this time you won't have to write one of those dreaded letters to the parents and family of the deceased. 

SHIT! 

The pain from my fist, which has somehow managed to slam into the hard top of my oak desk, shoots up my arm before I realize what I've done.  I thought we'd lost Dr. Jackson once before, even held a damn memorial service for him only to have him 'return from the dead' shortly afterwards.  This time?  Awww, hell. 

~o~0~o~

About to seat myself at the large conference table, I stop when General Hammond enters the room from the door, which leads to his office.  I nod in greeting, rising to my full height when his words belay my actions. 

"As you were."  I sit at my place even as Hammond assumes the chair at his appointed location at the table. "Dr. Frasier tells me there is nothing more we can do for Dr. Jackson at the moment."  An expression of sadness quickly crosses his face, but it removes itself before I can fully identify it.  But for a fleeting moment of time I had goaded myself into believing in the impossible.  My heart lies heavy in my chest, but I have been called here with the remainder of my team for a purpose and the General reminds us of our duty.  "In the meantime, tell me what happened." 

O'Neill gestures to Major Carter, who begins to tell what we observed while Daniel Jackson took his fateful tour of the research facility where we had seen the Kelownan scientists building their bomb. 

I know only what I felt when I realized what they were doing.  I heard Daniel Jackson's reaction as well.  I was, and still am, a fighter, a warrior.  Not a scientist, like Major Carter or even Daniel Jackson, but I felt utter horror when I realized the magnitude of the destructive potential of the device being manufactured.  Naqahdria, a vastly unstable version of naquada, was known to the Goa'uld researchers and prohibited because of its instability.  The inhabitants of Kelownan were toying with it.  

Suppressing my disdain, I return my thoughts and attention to the words being spoken in the briefing room. Major Carter is speaking, "…far from achieving a deliverable weapon but, if successful, it would have been as powerful as a naquada enhanced nuclear warhead."  She speaks the truth, but such a device is an abomination -- not the weapon of a true warrior.  

I turn to face Hammond, "The Kelownans claim they were under threat of oppression from their neighboring nations and the weapon would have been used only to ensure their freedom."  A lame excuse, one I have heard before, from other races -- including in the history visuals of the Tau'ri.  Even as the Kelownan representative uttered the words, I knew he was omitting the truth at his heart.

Conversation buzzes around me, like annoying insects in my ears, but I am reviewing what I overheard as we evacuated Daniel Jackson.  Harsh words, hateful words, accusations being thrown at my friend who had clearly sacrificed his own safety to ensure that of others.  Even now, safe in the confines of the SGC, my anger at the words spoken to my friend builds in my heart and I wish to dismember someone.  Drawing on the calming rituals from some Tau’rian meditations I have learned over the years, I attempt to pull in the fiery furnace of my heated emotions.

"Sir," Major Carter draws my attention, as she speaks to General Hammond.  "They're claiming Daniel sabotaged their research."

"They're lying, General."  The heat behind O'Neill's words is evident, however respectful his tone of voice.

I once again step into the oral fray. "I also do not believe this to be true."  General Hammond nods, taking my words as fact.  There is no way Daniel Jackson could ever seek to destroy another scientist's work, even if he disagreed with it, simply because I know how hard he works on his own researches.  It would not be correct.

Unless the Tau'ri have a technology I am unaware of, there is little hope for my friend's recovery.  Many is the time I have watched brave Jaffa warriors slowly die from exposure to various forms of radiation.  More than once I have been called upon to take the suffering warrior out of his misery, if only to spare the other warriors from seeing the results of such poisoning. 

And I will do the same for Daniel Jackson, should he ask it of me…

~o~0~o~

Frasier finally gave permission for us to visit with Danny, but only one at a time, and only for short periods.  I didn't even have to fight Sam and Teal'c for the right to be the first one in with Danny; they just nodded and quietly accompanied me until we reached the door to Sick Bay.  Then Sam gave me a little push…

"…brain tissue and internal organs will inflame and degrade, I believe that's called necrosis."  Danny's talking like this isn't HIM we're talking about.  And like I don't know what he's going to be going through.  How can he be so damn calm?  "Now, based on the dose of radiation I got, all that will happen in the next 10-15 hours, and if I don't drown in my own fluids first, I will bleed to death and there is no medical treatment to prevent that."

I want to slug him, hard, anything to make him shut up or at least react like he's scared.  He is scared, but he's either refusing to show it or he's trying to be strong in front of me.  Okay, time to try to give him a little hope.  "That we know of."  Damn, that sounded lame.

Oookay, from the look he just shot my way, he's not buying that line of hooey.  "Jack, we don't go running off to our off-world allies every time an individual's life is at stake."  Nope, he's not buying it.  If he starts quoting Star Trek's Spock, that damn line about the needs of the many outweighing the needs of the few or the one, I WILL slug him.  Sick or not, dying or not, I'll slug him.  "No good telling me that this is any different, because my life is no more valuable than anybody else's."  That was too close.

Time to get down to business, I don't want to ask this, but I have to.  "What happened?"

Danny sits there on the bed, his shoulders rounded a little, as if he's in pain… "That doesn't matter."

Damn it, Danny!  I strangle the impulse to reach out and shake him.  "Yes, it does.  You didn't try to sabotage anything." 

The shrug speaks louder than he does, and I have to move in close to the bed to hear him.  "There was an accident.  I guess the scientists were afraid the government would blame them. I guess they figured it would be easier to blame me."

Well, fuck that!  "And you're okay with this?"  He better not be.

"No."  Atta'boy, Danny!  "But there's not much I can do about it."

Bullshit.  "Yes, there is."  Aww, damn.  He's looking at me with those eyes of his.  The ones that make me think of a little Bassett hound.  

"If they really want to blame me, denying it isn't going to change anything."  Danny, Danny, Danny…  "Ten thousand years ago, a Goa'uld tried the same experiments they're trying and he nearly blew the entire planet to bits."  What?!  Why didn't he tell me this after he'd learned about it?  "I tried telling them that, they wouldn't listen."  I could've helped you make them listen… "They're going to build that bomb and nothing we say is going to stop them." 

He's probably right.  Hell, he usually is right.  No matter how stupid it would be for the Kelownans to continue their work on their damn doomsday weapon, they'll do just that.  After all, even after the sheer magnitude of the atom bomb was proven in the early '40s here on earth, the US government didn’t shut down the Manhattan Project.  And the resulting "cold war" between the United States, Russia and the rest of the world is already thoroughly entrenched, strangely and horrifyingly mirrored on Kelownan -- P3X-4C3 to the technical geeks. 

My visitation with Danny is cut off when Frasier quietly appears and gives me her look, the one that's been known to send hardened fighter jocks cowering.  She looks awful, worn out and beyond tired.  So does Danny.  Damn, this is going to be a long day.

~o~0~o~

Without telling anyone, other than Colonel O'Neill, I have been busting my stars trying to contact our various allies; the Tok'ra, the Asgards… anyone I think might have a snowball's chance in hell of having the technology to save Daniel Jackson.   I calmly place the handset of my phone back in its cradle. Sgt. Davis just gave me the update on the search for help.  A series of rapid knocks on my door are followed by O'Neill walking in.  The look on his face… Yeah, he's been to see Daniel in the infirmary. 

Might as well tell him.  "The Asgard are still not responding, Jack."  I watch as my best team leader's face crumples.  "We've tried to reach Jacob Carter, but the last we heard he's on a mission to recover the last remaining undercover Tok'ra."  Not the best thing to tell a commander who has a member of his immediate command dying.

"General, we do have intelligence on a sarcophagus." 

I'm more than a little stunned.  I knew Jack read the reports of the other SG Teams, but I never realized just how much he must have studied them.  To recall information… "SG-3's mission report two months ago." 

"Yes, Sir."

"We both know the negative affects of that technology, Colonel."  That's it, George, remind him of the consequences of what he's hinting at…

Jack has started to pace the area in front of my desk.  "But Daniel's been in one of those things a dozen times.  Once more won't hurt." 

Dear God, he's grasping at straws!  Anything to possibly save Daniel.  He is not making my job any easier… "However, SG-3's report clearly indicated the sarcophagus is heavily guarded and likely retrieving it would result in significant casualties." Better to crush this insane idea of Jack's before he does something stupid, like disobey orders.  Again.  "Which is why I did not order a recovery mission at the time."  Oh yeah, that sounded like a hard-line, by the book commanding officer. 

"Sir…"

I don't blame Jack, grasping at any straw that might possibly be able to save his team member.  His friend.  My friend.  But I cannot allow it.  The risk involved is too high.  If I were in Jack's shoes right now, I'd be fighting like hell to do whatever it took to save my friend.  But even I have to answer to a higher authority and am 100% responsible, not only for the safety of the men and women under my command, but also for safeguarding Earth as well.  I've known O'Neill too long, we've served the United States Air Force and the US Government together too long, and I can see he's getting ready to launch into a protest.  "Colonel, please don't think you're alone in your feelings on this matter."

Again, I'm witness to a very un-Jack-like reaction to my words.  His shoulders sag, rounding in defeat -- or acceptance -- and he shuffles toward the door.  "Yes, Sir."

Damn it, Jack.  Don't you think I'd move Heaven and Hell with my bare hands if it meant saving Daniel's life?  Don't you DARE think I care less about Dr. Jackson than you do!  I reach for the phone, intending to call the Control Room to ask Davis the status of his search for help, only to realize I just spoke to him not more than ten minutes ago.  When will this damnable day end?

I pick up the phone anyway, not to call Davis, but to call my family in Texas.  For some reason, I need to hear my granddaughters' voices, if only to remind myself that life does go on, that it's precious and we should never forget to tell those we love that we care about them. 

~o~0~o~

I'd needed something to do, other than worry and fret worthlessly over Daniel's bedside, and researching the possible uses of naqahdria was the only thing I could think of at the time.  After all, if I understand the element better, I might be able to help Janet help Daniel live long enough for the Tok'ra or the Asgards to respond to our calls for assistance. 

Yes, I know about the calls.  Davis had asked me to come to the Control Room to double check his figures on the gate-address for the Tok'ra's current base of operations.  No, Davis didn't tell me, outright, what he was doing, but it didn't take a PhD in astrophysics to solve the conundrum.

I was just finishing up my calculations on the potential usefulness of naqahdria when the Colonel stormed into my work area.  After allowing him to vent, I guess his visit with Daniel and the subsequent one with General Hammond didn't go like he wanted it to, I followed through with what I thought he needed to hear from me and tried to get back to work on my research.  Then, in an off-the-wall tangent, the Colonel had asked me what I was working on.  I told him.  Now he's dragging me through the halls after placing a very curt phone call to the General, requesting him to meet us in Briefing. 

All I was looking for in my calculations was a way to, maybe, power the generators I've designed in my head for the defense shields I've dreamed of building ever since I realized what the Goa'uld used to ward off physical attacks.  Right.  What I really was doing was avoiding thinking about Daniel. 

Now, thanks to my avoidance techniques, I'm sitting in the Briefing Room with Colonel O'Neill and General Hammond, listening to them bicker about the Kelownans.

"By now their Government believes Dr. Jackson was trying to sabotage their research."

"It's a lie.  They're using Daniel as a scapegoat."

"Still, you said he was vocal in his disapproval of their project before the accident.  None of this bodes well for diplomatic relations."

"Why are you talking about diplomatic relations?"  Whoa, that was a little heated, Colonel.  "This is Daniel's LIFE we're talking about!"

Enough of this back and forth browbeating… I turn in my seat to face Colonel O'Neill. "Sir, I know you feel, because I feel the same way, but I cannot stress enough how valuable this element could be."  It's the truth, so why do I feel like I've just sentenced my team member, colleague and friend to a horrible, painful death?

"I will draft a letter to the Kelownan Leader…" Jack isn't going to like that.

"General," Yeah, there it is.  The clenched jaw, the barely respectful tone, the stiffened body language.  "You cannot capitulate to these people.  They're lying bastards!"

Hammond's glare at Jack is intense.  "Their Government doesn't know the truth…"

"So we tell them!"  Uh-oh, that's one of the few times the Colonel's ever interrupted the General.  Good thing I'm the only witness. 

"They will have little reason to believe us over their own people, especially when what we're forcing them to admit would be a major embarrassment. It would put them at too great a disadvantage in further negotiations."  The General has a valid point, I just hope Jack sees it without displaying more of his Irish temper.  I watch him carefully, almost trying to will him to settle down, to reign in his anger and see what Hammond and I are trying to tell him.  Yes, it hurts, knowing that by continuing to pursue relations with the government of P3X-4C3 we're basically signing Daniel's death warrant…

"Sir," Good start, Colonel.  Nice tone down of the temper.  "You cannot admit Daniel's guilty." 

I look over in time to see Hammond quirk an odd little grin, not a smile, before he answers the Colonel.  "Give me some credit, Jack." His expression hardens, but not quite reaching the state I've seen it hit in the past when dealing with a distasteful subject.  "I will tell them that we did not order any such action and do not condone its obvious intentions. Both of which are true." Sounds like a good start to me and, from the look on Jack's face, maybe he's starting to realize it too.  "Hopefully we can lay the groundwork for further diplomatic negotiations, which will eventually result in an amicable trade for the naqahdria."  Yes!  Oh hell…  Sorry, Daniel.  

Hammond looks at Jack, his expression turning sly, like he's trying to tell the Colonel something while not saying it aloud.  "I'm ordering you to deliver the letter."  What?

"Yes, sir."  Oh, I get it… sneaky covert, maybe even overt, stuff.  Besides, it'll give the Colonel something to do other than hover around the base, good move.  I let my thoughts wander off, thinking of the possibility of getting my hands on even a small quantity of naqahdria, and how to store it to reduce the exposure to radiation, which brings my thoughts back to Daniel.  Realizing that my commanding officers have left the room, probably to get ready for the colonel’s upcoming trip through the gate, I make the decision to finally go see how Daniel is doing. 

~o~0~o~

His condition is deteriorating faster than I expected it to.  Wherever his body touched the bed or bed clothing, he's developed weeping debicuti -- bedsores -- and the site of his first IV interface has broken down so completely that I had to move it.   To make matters worse, he's still refusing to let me administer anything stronger than Darvocet for the pain.  Establishing the new IV site wasn't a picnic, for either of us, since I couldn't find a decent vein in his hands or arm and had to do what is known as a 'cut-down' procedure so I could insert the IV catheter in his subclavian. 

After slapping a rather crude dressing on the new IV site, I step back from Daniel's side to let Lieutenant Ekcoff redress the site -- she's much better at it than I am -- and I start making notations in his medical chart.  Ekcoff must have accidentally jostled a particularly tender spot while changing the dressings on Daniel's hip, for he whimpered.  Not much, just loud enough to grab my attention, and without thinking, I reach out to the IV pump and key in a bolus of Darvocet.  Without telling him, I add a hefty dose of Valium to his medications -- merely to help him sleep and relax.

I hear Daniel sigh in relief and glance up in time to see him weakly smile at me.  He may not be ready to move on to stronger painkillers, but that doesn't mean he doesn't appreciate the dulling of his pain.  I maintain eye contact with him until he closes his and turns his head away from me.  Danny, I wish you would let me help you.  Let me give the full course of comfort measures that I know will help your passage…

Even as I watch him, getting up from where I sat down to write my notes and moving around to look at his face, the most peaceful expression settles onto his rather expressive features.  That peace fills me with dread, for I've seen it before, during my internship when doing my rotations through the oncology unit at John Hopkins.  Usually right before the patient expired. 

Closing Daniel's chart, I look away and upwards for some strange reason and see that Sam has finally decided to stop by to check on her, our, friend.  She hasn't come into the Infirmary proper, but is watching from the observation bay as if she's afraid to come closer.

"Katie, I'm going upstairs for a few minutes."  I advise Lt. Ekcoff as I start moving across my domain to the stairs that lead up to where Samantha stands, staring down at Daniel.  I hear Katlynn acknowledge my words, but I'm already trying to think of what to tell Sam to get her down from the observation room to talk to Daniel.

I push open the door of the observation room, cross the floor to stand next to Sam and struggle for the right phrase…

"He looks awful."  Trust Sam to note the obvious and give me an opening. 

I nod. "It's going to get a lot worse and it's going to happen fast."  No sense in hiding the truth from Daniel's other friends since, for all intents and purposes, they're the closest things he has to a family.

Sam crosses her arms over her chest, not looking at me, but rather staring down at her friend through the glass.  "You sure you're doing everything you can?"

Only as much as he'll allow me to do … and at least one thing he hasn't figured out yet.  "Sedatives and painkillers.  That's all we really can do."  I take a deep breath, realizing as I do so that I've become accustomed to the scents of my Infirmary.  "You have no idea how painful this is going to get."  I need to talk, to tell someone what's been going through my head ever since Daniel came back from P3X-4C3 and Sam's always been a good sounding board.  "You know, I would never normally say this; it goes against everything I've been trained to do, but the truth is he'd be a lot better off if I…." Shrugging, I break off as Sam faces me, understanding in her eyes, and we share a few quiet moments of mutual anguish. 

After what feels like a lifetime of silence, Sam's face lights up and I wonder what's going through her head as she leaves the observation room.  Not to go downstairs to see and talk with Daniel, but out into the hallway.  Damn it, Samantha Carter, don't you DARE abandon Daniel at this time!  My anger is irrational, I know, but I'm living for the moment and all I can see is one friend seemingly turning her back on another. 

Biting back a curse and trying to shake off my bitchy attitude, I kick a chair out of my way and head back to my patient's bedside.  I won’t leave him, not for more than a few minutes, until this ordeal is over.  One way or the other, Daniel, I'll be right by your side.

~o~0~o~

The idea struck me, almost from out of the blue, even as Janet nearly spoke of the unthinkable for a doctor of medicine.  Why hadn't I thought this earlier?  I push pass several members of the SGC, my thoughts centered on how to use it once I get my hands on it, but first I have to get to the damn safe. 

For once, the elevator at the central core of the Cheyenne Mountain complex is where I need it to be -- on the level I'm at instead of several levels above.  The doors slid open and I quick step into the car, spinning around to hit the button to take me from the infirmary level to command, practically bouncing on my toes as I start thinking. 

Kendra, a former Goa'uld host who had been freed of her Goa'uld parasite on Cimmeria, had left behind a device that could heal people and Gairwyn had given it to me.  A Goa'uld device, much like the ribbon hand one that I'd been gifted with from Joli'nar, devices I can use only because Joli’nar had left behind certain trace elements in my body when she willingly gave up her life while still inside of me.  

Numbers flash by on the elevator's level indicator as it drops, seemingly at a snail's pace, the six floors to the Command Level.  By the time the damn doors slide open again, I'm raring to go and practically take off at a run down the long, gray hall.  Skidding to a halt, I throw open the door to the SGC conference room and beeline my way across the dark blue-gray carpeting to the wall safe. 

Only three people know the combination to this particular safe; myself, General Hammond and Colonel O'Neill.  I start punching in the eight-digit code to unlock the heavy door, even as the memory of my telling Daniel the safe combo rises in my mind. 

I told him the combination several times, never allowing him to write it down, and for all his brilliance, he never could recall the last two numbers in the right sequence.  I gave up, so did the Colonel, and General Hammond decided to change the code after that so there are only three who know it again.  Last number entered, I swing open the titanium and steel reinforced front of the safe, reach in, and pull out the devices stored in its depths. 

The first one I pull out is the ribbon device.  Not what I'm after, so I shove it aside and look for the round, beautiful and functional tool from Kendra.  Soon, I'm cupping the oddly warm, round crystal tool in my hands and closing the door of the safe with a heavy tap from my shoulder.  I never really realized how the metal and crystal device seemed to pulsate in my grip, as if it were a living, breathing entity and, for the first time in hours, I feel a glimmer of hope rise in my heart. 

Pushing aside my fascination with this new feature of the healing device, I shove it deep into my BDU pants pocket and, stopping only long enough to make sure the safe is secure, I hurry out of the room to find General Hammond and Jack.  I have to tell them what I intend to do before I try it.  Otherwise the sensors we've hard-wired into the SGC will set off alarms when I activate the Goa'uld healing device. 

Just a little longer, Danny.  Hang on just a little longer until I can be sure I can do this.  I don't want to fuck up, not with your life, and I need to see if Dad and Selmac have been located yet.

~o~0~o~

Returning from the gymnasium, I happen across Major Carter, General Hammond and O'Neill.  They are walking the hall toward the medical area, having what Daniel Jackson would call "a heated discussion." 

I fall into step behind them, silently, in such a way they don't seem to realize I've joined them.  Listening in, I discern their plan and wish them luck.  I should return to my quarters, but curiosity draws me along with them, separating from Major Carter as she enters the infirmary, and I find myself accompanying O'Neill and General Hammond. 

Entering the observation area, I stand quietly beside and slightly behind my chosen leaders, as benefits their rank, and look down over their shoulders to see my ailing friend.  Neither O'Neill nor Hammond moves to active the intercom but I do not need it.  I am able to listen to the conversation going on below without straining my hearing.

Major Carter is standing next to Daniel Jackson's bedside, showing him the healing device she received on Cimmeria.  "Daniel, I didn't suggest this before because the truth is … I'm not really sure what I'm doing with this thing."  Her voice, normally that of a strong warrior, is wavering just the slightest bit as Daniel Jackson looks up at her with total trust in his expressive eyes.  "I could make things worse."

The Major is correct.  The device, if not used by one who knows it well, can cause more torment than healing.  Daniel Jackson, showing once again the strength of spirit within his soul, merely nods at her, giving Major Carter permission to try the device on him.

Slowly, she slips the device onto her hand and lifts it over Daniel Jackson's body.  At first, everything seems to go well.  The device is working.  I can see the ray of energy slipping over Daniel Jackson, and he seems calm…

Monitors in the sickbay screech loudly, forcing me to pull back from the window as Daniel Jackson's body arcs on the bed.

"He's seizing!"  Doctor Frasier calls out the obvious.  "Get the crash cart--" One of the medics pushes a large, wheeled cart closer to the bed.  "Give me five of Valium!"

Major Carter is gently pushed away from our friend, muttering the entire time, "I'm sorry.  I'm sorry" while Doctor Frasier and her team furiously work to stop the seizures racking through their patient.

"Help me get him on his side!"  I watch, helplessly, as the team struggles to roll the convulsing form of Daniel Jackson unto his side.  "Set up an ambubag, draw two grams of magnesium sulfate."  Drugs are administered to the slowly calming body of my friend as Doctor Frasier issues one final order. "Put him back … easy."  Once my friend is gently, almost reverently, placed onto his back and the monitors hooked up to his body start to settle back down into what I have learned are 'normal' readings for a Tau'ri, I leave the observation room.  Preparations must be made and I do not have much time.  Not if I am to honor a request Daniel Jackson once made of me.

~o~0~o~

I'm surprised Sam even thought to try the Goa'uld healing device.  She's never cared for the fact that, due to Joli'nar's possession of her, she's been able to use just about any Goa'uld technology.  She's never been comfortable with the knowledge, but she made it a point to practice with both devices, mostly the hand ribbon, to gain some measure of proficiency with them.  I'm not sure the healing device will work.  I can feel the radiation poisoning slithering through my body, slowly destroying me, but I give her my blessing to try.  If only for her state of mind -- I'm pretty sure I'm toast.

At first, once Sam's activated the device and it's light starts to bathe my battered body … feels wonderful.  Like someone slowly dragging a warm silken cloth over me, calming my fried nerve endings, easing the pain…

Whoa!  What in the hell?  The tremors start somewhere deep in my chest, radiating outward until I'm forming an arching bridge with my spine rising off the bed.  Muscles harden into stone, twisting in unnatural shapes and I can feel my consciousness slipping away, trying to escape the torment my friend has unwittingly unleashed on me.  I can hear Janet ordering her medics around me, but it seems to be coming through a bad com-link.  It's all garbled and, somehow, I have gotten water in both my ears.  It's terrible.  The pain is excruciating and I just want to escape…

Okaaaaay.  This is different.  How in the hell did I end up here in the Gate Room?  In my fucking uniform?  I look around at the room.  Everything is lit in a strange, and glowing blue-filtered light.  As if the Gate was open and the power to the base was off … but it's not.  Everything seems to be in perfect working order. 

Oh!  Who is this?  Why aren't the base's security alarms going off?  I mean, she's standing there, bold as brass, on the ramp to the stargate dressed in flowing white robes.  I know her…

"Your fate is in your hands."

Is that her voice?  So soft and soothing?  Who is she?  Why do I think I know her? 

"Set up an ambubag.  Draw two grams of magnesium sulfate!" 

Damn that quirky com-link.  I feel something pierce my back and the room starts to fade from view. 

Wait a minute!  Not now!  I need to know what the white lady meant! 

"Put him back … easy."  

No!  I need to know… Damn darkness.  Where are the fucking light switches?

~o~0~o~

Samantha's attempt to use a Goa'uld healing device on Danny didn't work.  If anything it may have made his condition worse.  I tried to console her, as did Janet and George, but I doubt any of us got through to Sam.  I tried looking for Teal'c, hoping he'd be able to explain to Sam why she wasn't able to use the healing device on Danny, but he's made himself scarce in the last few hours.  After wandering the lower levels of StarGate Command, I find myself standing outside of the infirmary once more and, taking a deep breath, I steel my nerves so I can face Danny. 

Oh, God…

I hesitate on the threshold, knowing that I'm looking at Danny, but at the same time, fighting the instinct to deny that the mummy I'm looking at is my friend.  I plaster a smile on my face as the bandage wrapped head turns my way, blue eyes startlingly bright against the white field and the dark holes created in the wrappings. 

"Hey, Jack."  Well, he still sounds like himself.  Sorta.

"Hey.  I, uh, just wanted to…" Damn, why is it so hard to face him and just talk?  "I'm really bad at this."

"Yes, you are."  Danny's tone is light, almost teasing, and I appreciate his attempt to make me more comfortable.  "I hear that Sam thinks the naqahdria might be an important discovery." 

How in the hell did he hear about that?  "Yeah, apparently.  If we can get some."  Okay, he knows about Sam's experiments on the damn shit that's killing him, might as well update him on the rest of the story.  "For what it's worth … I tried to get your point across to Jonas."

"He's in a tough position."  Why is he trying to cover for Jonas?

"You are not gonna take the fall for this."  I pause and look Danny in the eyes, opening myself to his inspection.  "I don't care what's at stake."

"Why do you care?"  Ouch.  Danny could always cut to the heart of any manner.  Might as well be honest with him…

"Because, despite the fact that you've been a terrific pain in the ass over the last five years, I may have, might have grown to admire you a little.  I think."  Well, if that wasn't pure honesty, I don't know what it was. 

"That's touching."  I swear, if I could see his face under all those damn bandages, I bet he'd be smiling with that off-kilter grin of his. 

Again there's an uneasy tension filling the room and I wonder if Danny's still awake.  Might as well try to keep talking with him. Let him know how I feel about this whole, rotten, totally unfair situation he's managed to get involved in.  "This will not be your last act on official record."  Gee, how … wretched.  I'm just no good with all this touchy-feely crap. 

He doesn't respond immediately, maybe he's asleep?  I'm about to turn away, to leave Danny so he can rest, when…  "Oma." 

"What?"  What did he say?  Oh man, he's slipping away.  I cannot handle this anymore.  I need to leave, I want to leave, but I can't.  I refuse to leave him alone, even if he's asleep.  You rest, Danny.  I'll be here when you wake up … if you wake up.

~o~0~o~

I hated dropping out on Jack like that, just when he was finally telling me what I'd always hoped to hear from him, but I could barely keep my eyes open anymore.  When I open them again, I am not surprised to find myself back in the Gate Room that really isn't the Gate Room.  She's still there.

"Oma Desala."  She smiles at my greeting and I move closer to where she stands on the ramp.  "I felt like I knew you, that we'd met before but you look different."  And she does.  Not as ethereal, not as all worldly spiritual as she did the last time we met.  In fact, she looks almost normal. 

"Lightning flashes, sparks shower and in the blink of an eye you have misseen." 

Yeah, okay, whatever that means.  "Riiight.  What did you mean when you said my fate is in my hands?"  Hey, I'm here, she's here, might as well try to get some answers.

"When the mind is enlightened, the spirit is freed and body matters not."  Oma sits down on the edge of the ramp.  Her eyes lift to mine, inviting me to sit beside her.

What is it with spirit beings that they feel they have to speak in cryptic?  Wait a minute… I sit down next to her, hard, as the realization hits me.  "You're talking about ascension, right?  Rising to a different plane of existence."  Holy cow!  If I'm really hearing her, she's saying… "Are you saying I could do that?  Become like you?" 

"You must complete the journey you began at Kheb."  Her smile, her voice, it’s so soothing and wise.  "Only then will you be able to find your way to the Great Path."  Great Path?  Great Path, like the Buddhists talk about?  THAT Great Path?  She's talking about Nirvana, Heaven, Valhalla…  Me?

Okay, might as well humor her and satisfy my itching curiosity.  "What do I have to do?"  Oh, that was fantastic, Danny-boy.  Bet you really impressed Oma with that linguistic tongue tripping. 

"Release your burden."

Release my… Could she get any more enigmatic?  "Okay, well … consider it released.  What's step two?"  Oh yeah, I've been hanging around Jack too long. 

"A tall man cannot hide in short grass."

"You know, I really--" I realize I'm getting upset and try to haul back on my runaway mouth.  "I don't have time for one of these kind of conversations."  Oooh, another good one, Danny.  State the obvious to a being that's probably more aware than you are of your condition.

"One cannot reach enlightenment by running from death."

Who's running?  Last time I looked, I was lying flat on my back in the infirmary.  Clearly, I'm going to need some sort of guidance here.  Might as well ask for it.  "Tell me what to do."

"Many roads lead to the Great Path.  Only the willing--" Oma pauses to smile, faintly, at me, "will find the way."

"Okay, well, I'm willing." I stand up from where I sat down near her and turn to face Oma.  "So, let's go.  I mean, you know, do your thing.  Glow me." And the flippant remarks just keep coming and coming.  You've been a great influence on me, Jack.  Thanks.

"The river tells no lies."  She floats to her feet and smiles at me, with that ambiguous grin.  "Though standing on the shore, the dishonest man hears them."

Well, that bursts that bubble.  "Right.  I didn't think it was gonna be that easy."

~o~0~o~

He's been asleep for some time now, only stirring once in a while, probably from pain, and my only real company has come from Lt. Ekcoff, who drifts over this way from time to time to give Danny a dose of meds.  She's a good nurse.  She's helped Dr. Frasier treat myself and other members of the team before, always seems to know -- before the patient does -- when she's needed. 

I'd borrowed a book from Danny's workroom earlier, something about Runes or some other language he's always studying.  I'm not sure.  It's been on my lap since I sat down to keep Danny company.   He really spooked me earlier, saying what sounded like a single word before suddenly drifting off.  I thought he'd died on me, until Janet came over and showed me how to read the monitors hooked up to him.  I think I remembered to thank her for teaching me something new, but I'll have to make sure later. 

I lift the book from my lap, intending to read to Danny, but my eyes drift back to the monitors and check his vitals now against the ones I remember from the last time I looked.  Five minutes ago.  They're the same, no change, he's just sleeping and I need to stretch.  Been in this damn chair too long.  I start to move, my head going back on my shoulders, when I notice the hall door to the observation room open above, light spilling into the darkened space.  It's General Hammond, and he's got someone with him…

Son of a bitch! 

What in the hell is that whore's son doing here? 

I'm up and out of my chair before I realize I'm moving.  There is no way in hell I'm letting that SOB anywhere near Danny.  Not after all the shit he and his damn government has put my friend through.

I lay a gentle hand on Danny's heavily bandaged shoulder, "I'll be right back, Daniel.  Got to take care of some long overdue duties…" and I'm off.  Heading up the stairs as quietly and quickly as possible, ready to rip someone a new asshole.  And I don't mean the General.

When I enter the observation room, General Hammond steps between me and my intended target. 

I nearly trip over myself in an effort not to run over my commanding officer.  Glaring over the USAF blue-clad shoulder, I address the visitor, "What are you doing here?"  Nice growl, Jack.  Might want to tone it back a bit…nah.

At least he's got balls enough to look me in the eye.  "Your commander was nice enough to grant me passage."  Okay, maybe he doesn't have cojones after all.  "I brought this.  Naqahdria."  For the first time I realize he's carrying something in a small box.  "Took as much as I could."

Well, that might make Hammond and Sam happy, but… "Why?"

Jonas squares his shoulders as he once again looks up to meet my gaze.  I'm not sure what he sees.  I know what I'm feeling and it's murderous, but whatever it is, it's apparently enough to cause the Kelownan to spill his guts.

"The data recorded during the accident demonstrated the potential power of the weapon unlike anything collected previously. I really don't know what was worse, seeing my colleagues die in the manner they did," Jonas' eyes turn hard, bitterly hard as he practically spits, "--or seeing the looks of utter glee on our leaders faces when they were told the potential power of this weapon."  He shrugs, looking upset and defeated at the same time.  What the hell has happened to Jonas since I last spoke with him?  "They wanted to know when it could be demonstrated. I told them the truth about what happened."  Oh, great!  NOW you told them the truth? 

My anger is boiling, threatening to overcome my good sense; all I want to do is pummel the arrogance out of Jonas.  If he'd told the truth earlier, there's a chance Danny wouldn't be lying in the infirmary, dying, knowing his sacrifice was for naught.  Hammond puts a hand on my shoulder, causing me to break eye contact with Jonas.  I stare at the General, mentally begging him to look the other way, just for a few minutes, so I can work out my anger in a few swift and lethal moves. 

"I am ashamed that they could not bring themselves to recognize Doctor Jackson's heroism."  Jonas' voice quietly breaks over the wall of fury I'm building… "He saved millions of lives." 

Awwww, hell!  There goes that damn wall.  And just when I was getting set to go around Hammond and beat the shit out of the lying -- okay, that's a bit harsh -- omitting son of a bitch, he had to go all fucking noble. 

"Yes, he did.  At the cost of his own life."  I reach past my commanding officer, grab Jonas by the front of his shirt and drag him toward the window so he can see Danny.  "You see that?  That nearly mummified patient on the bed below?  That's Doctor Jackson.  He's dying because your people were too damn pigheaded to listen to him."  I shove Jonas away from me and head back to the stairs, pausing only to make a request of General Hammond.  "Keep him away from Daniel.  If I hear he's been anywhere near here, I'll personally return to his world and hunt him down."  I slam the door shut behind me, but not quick enough to avoid seeing George nod in understanding and the hurt expression on the face of our Kelownan visitor. 

Screw him. After all that's happened, Jonas fucking deserves to get hurt.  By me, personally, should he come closer to Danny than he is right now.  I won't even use a damn gun.  I'll break his neck with my own bare hands and I'll be sure no one finds the body until it's too late for *anything* to save his fucking worthless life.

~o~0~o~

Oma had shown me how to look into my past, to help me relive the incident that landed me where I am now, and it wasn't pretty.  I practically badgered Jonas into bucking "the system" on his world, encouraging him to step forward and tell the scientists there that what they were doing -- building a huge bomb -- was wrong.  Not to mention potentially lethal for the whole planet. 

But that wasn't the hardest part of revisiting my memory of the event.  No, the hardest part was watching myself throwing caution and common sense out the proverbial window.  Instead of listening to Tomis and Jonas, I quite literally blew my way into the research chamber, wading into the super-irradiated area, stepping over fallen dead, scientists who had been living only moments before as if they were nothing more than obstacles blocking my way to the bomb.  Even as I watched myself reach into the device to pull the core of naqahdria out, I could see the lesions popping out all over my exposed skin. 

Suddenly, I'm seeing the event from my own perspective, reliving those last moments as I had lived them and I'm looking up at Jonas through the shattered glass.  He's backed against the wall, flattening himself as much as possible, fear all over his face.  But is his fear born of his knowledge of radiation sickness, my sacrifice, or me?  I mean, hell, I pulled my gun out without thinking, fired it into the safety glass, then dove into the room like a madman. 

The memory fades as a voice creeps into my ear…

"He saved millions of lives."  Jonas, but who is he talking to and why can I hear him?

Shaking off the disorientation of the little trip down memory lane, I unconsciously answer Jonas' statement.  "Millions could still die."

Oma Desala's voice drifts through the fog in my mind, clearing it and allowing me to see her again.  "The future is never certain." She looks at me, a rather odd expression on her face.  "You saved many without regard for your own life."

Yeah, right.  I only delayed the inevitable.  "Should've destroyed the device."

"You believe your journey is not over?"

Ah-ha!  Now she hits on the crux of the matter before me.  "Actually I'm not entirely sure what the point of my journey so far has been."  I shake my head, and then look up at the ghostly gate room where I sit next to Oma.  "I mean, if this is about being honest with yourself, I believe my entire life has been a failure."

She doesn't say a word, just gives me one of those damn enigmatic grins of hers and the next thing I know, Samantha Carter is standing in the room with us.  Only, it's not really Sam.  She looks more like a holographic ghost of herself, but her words come through loud and clear.

"Just so you know, Jonas had a change of heart."

~o~0~o~

I haven't been back to the infirmary since I tried to use the healing device on Danny and nearly caused him to lose his life sooner than expected.  I should've known better, I've never been fully comfortable using Goa'uld technology, even with the memories of doing so with confidence.  But those aren't *my* memories, they belong to Joli'nar.  She was the one who could use the technology without fear; she was the one who used such things in the past with such confidence, not me.  But her memories became part of me when Joli'nar sacrificed her life to save mine and countless others, I just have a hard time accessing our shared memories at times and fully believing I can do what my memories tell me I can. 

Stifling back tears that threaten to fall from my eyes, I open the door to the infirmary and walk in.  Spotting Janet sitting at her desk, looking completely wiped out, I manage to toss a weak smile her way as I walk over to Danny's bedside.  If he wasn't the only patient in the infirmary, I'd have a hard time telling that the bandage swathed body on the bed before me is Danny.  There's not a part of him that isn't covered in white, or nearly white, bandages and with his eyes closed, I'm not even sure he's awake or will hear what I've come to tell him.

General Hammond briefed me on Jonas' visit and Jack's reaction to the Kelownan Special Advisor.  But Jonas had managed to bring through the gate a fairly good-sized amount of naqahdria and, according to the General, he finally told the government officials back on Kelownan the truth about what happened in the research center.  I just don't know if it'll be enough to change the course of events that have been put into motion on Jonas' planet. 

Biting on lips gone suddenly dry, I sit down next to Danny and reach out to lift a heavily swaddled hand.  I'm not sure what to say, what to start off with… "Just so you know, Jonas had a change of heart."  Did I just feel Danny's hand twitch in mine?  Maybe he's able to hear me.  "He stole some naqahdria for us.  He took a big risk, he said it was because of what you did." 

No response, maybe I just imagined his hand moving in mine.  I can feel a pressure building up behind my eyes and a tightness welling in my throat, so I hurry to explain further to Danny before I lose control.  "I think it could be important and I wanted you to know that."  I blink and a tear starts to blur my vision.  "You have an effect on people, Daniel.  The way you look at things, it changed me too.  I see what really matters."  The tear falls, trickling slowly down my cheek and the pressure I feel in my throat slowly moves down to my chest to rest over my heart.  "I don't know why we wait to tell people how we feel.  I guess … I hoped--" The tightness chokes off my words, but I struggle past it as a flood builds up in my eyes.  "--that you always knew."

The battle is over, the flood gates open, and I collapse against Danny's sick bed and let loose the anger, the fear, and the anguish I'd been fighting off most of the day.  I love Danny.  I realize that now, but I never told him how I felt.  Oh, it wasn't the type of love between a man and woman, though that's a small part of my love for him, but rather the love and respect of two colleagues who've worked side-by-side for nearly five years.  Daniel is the brother I always wished I had.  Now, he's dying and will never know just how I feel about him. 

I feel a hand come to rest on my shoulder and lift my head up from the now soggy sheets to see Janet standing next to me.  "You have to believe that Danny knew, Sam.  And that he can hear you, even now."  I nod, understanding her words and reach out to pull her into an embrace while never letting go of Danny's hand. 

~o~0~o~

Watching Sam, crying over my body while holding onto Janet like a drowning person holds on to a life preserver isn't easy.  I want to scream, to wake my sleeping self up and tell Sam everything is going to be okay, that I feel about her the way she obviously feels about me.  I feel like an intruder, a ghostly trespasser who has no right to witness such an emotional outpouring. 

"You can never reach enlightenment if you do not believe you are worthy."

Chewing on the inside of my cheek, using what little pain I can feel in this other-worldly realm to help me collect myself, I turn to face Oma and hope there are no tell-tale tears forming in my eyes.  "Then I guess we may have a problem."

~o~0~o~

I have broken one of the many taboos of the people of this world.  I believe O'Neill would call it breakage and entrancing.  It does not matter.  I did what only had to be done and the damage to Daniel Jackson's work area was minimal, for I knew precisely where the item I needed was placed. 

Moving with stern purpose through the gray halls of the SGC, I cradle the purloined item close to my body and rapidly pass many Tau'ri on my way to my destination.  None of the persons I pass pause to look at the article I have tucked next to my chest.  This is good, for detection of my crime would cost me valuable minutes and I am obligated to visit my ailing associate.

Gaining entrance to my objective, I halt my movements until Doctor Frasier can finish her duties.  She is changing the many bandages covering Daniel Jackson's arm, which have appear to have, somehow, become wet.  Perhaps someone carelessly spilled a clear liquid on my friend.  If that is the case, I shall let them know of my displeasure.  Until I can do so, I stand patiently, awaiting Doctor Frasier to complete her task. 

Many moments pass before she is finished and Doctor Frasier glances over to where I stand, watching and waiting, and motions for me to move closer to the bedside even as she relocates to her work area in the corner of the sickbay.  Possibly she has discerned the reason for my visit and decided to give me time alone with Daniel Jackson.  I shall show her my appreciation for her thoughtfulness once I have completed my honor duties here. 

Pulling the vase I acquired during my criminal-like activity from its place of safety, I hold it out to where Daniel Jackson could see it.  If he were awake to look at it.  "You once gave me this.  You said its spirit would one day serve it's owner in the afterlife."

I carefully set the item, once identified to me as a funerary urn, on the table next to Daniel Jackson's bed.  This urn had a twin, back on the world where I first met the man lying before me and that is where the other jar rests, in the final resting place of Sha're.  This urn was made for her husband, the man who tried to save her from Apophis and will shortly be joining her in the next world. 

"If you are to die, Daniel Jackson, I wish you to know that I believe that the fight against the Goa'uld will have lost one of its greatest warriors."  I lean over the body of Daniel Jackson and place my hand on his chest, gently so as not to cause him further pain while he rests.  "And I will have lost one of my greatest friends."  Rising from the position I had assumed, I honor my friend with a salute in the Jaffa manner of respect for a fellow soldier in arms.  I will not grieve for him until his body has breathed it's last, but I will pay tribute to his courage, his inner warrior spirit, and make sure to tell future generations of scholarly fighters of the man who paved their path. 

~o~0~o~

"…its spirit would one day serve it's owner in the afterlife."

Teal'c's words wash over me and I pause in my fruitless wallowing of self-doubt to respond to him, even if I know there is no way he could hear me.  "Thanks.  I'm not dead yet but… I guess it doesn't look so good right now."

My halfway facetious remarks cause me to lose track of what Teal'c is trying to tell me and it takes a while for me to hear him again.  "…I believe that fight against the Goa'uld will have lost one of its greatest warriors." 

Yeah, right, me -- a great warrior.  An allergy stricken, constantly getting into trouble, forever screwing up, accident waiting for a place to happen bookworm -- that, I can see.  But Danny Jackson a warrior?  Bullshit.

"And I will have lost one of my greatest friends."

Aaah, hell.  I'm going to miss you too, Teal'c. 

"Because it is so clear it takes a long time to realize it."  I find myself standing next to Oma once more, but we're no longer in the ghostly gate room.  We're in my lab and work area and damn if it doesn't have that same otherworldly look about it.  "If you immediately know the candlelight is fire, the meal was cooked a long time ago."

I wave an impatient hand at her.  "Yeah, yeah.  A monk at Kheb said that to me.  I didn't know what it meant then and I still don't know now."  Besides, talking in Zen-like conundrums might have held my interest at first, but frankly, I'm getting a little bored with this whole thing. 

"Why do you feel you have failed on your journey?  You opened the stargate for your world."

Yeah, like I, and I alone, did all the work.  Nice try, Oma.  "I cracked the code, a lot of other people made it work."  I'd started to wander around my work area, pausing when I spotted one of the few pictures of Sha're I have.

"The very next thing you did was help free the people of Abydos from evil." 

Even as Oma speaks of Abydos, I reach out to pick up the photo of Sha're, and unexpectedly I'm reliving that awful day when I first lost my wife to Apophis.  The Gou’ald’s Jaffa warriors had come through the newly unburied stargate, led by their Prime, Teal’c, and stolen several of my friends, my wife and my life.  I drop the photo as if it had burned me, but what burns is the memories of what I did-- my incessant meddling.  

"I had the chance to live out my life with her. I couldn't leave it alone. I was the one that unburied the Gate. What happened to her was my fault."  The self-hatred, the loathing I've hidden from others and myself comes welling up to the surface as I try to explain to Oma what I did over five years ago.  "I couldn't save Sha're, I couldn't save Sarah. Every Goa'uld I helped eliminate, another one took its place."  Anger builds up inside my heart, only to crash against my resolve to do what ever I could to put the screws to the Goa'uld.  "Maybe I did something good every now and again but nothing I've ever done seems to have changed anything."

"These tasks of which you speak were great challenges.  Perhaps they were even impossible to achieve."

"Does that absolve me?"

"You feel you must continue your journey until you have found redemption for these failures?"

I shake my head, "No.  No more of…" It dawns on me, finally hitting home.  "I'm dead."

"Exactly true."

Oooooh, great bunch of wise words strung together there, sister.  "You said I was the only qualified to judge myself?"  Oma nods in that sagely way of hers, a slight grin crossing her face.  It's like being back in school and trying to feel my way around an answer that I know the professor is hoping I'll find.  "So… however much I want to achievement enlightenment, or whatever you want to call it, what happens if I look at my life and I don't honestly believe I deserve it?"  I never could find the answers right off the bat, no matter how hard I thought about them. 

"The success or failure of your deeds does not add up to the sum of your life. Your spirit cannot be weighed. Judge yourself by the intention of your actions and by the strength of which you faced the challenges that have stood in your way."

That really doesn't help me, oh-mighty-glowing-one.  "What if I can't?"

"The people closest to you have been trying to tell you; you have made a difference. That you did change things, for the better."  Well, that was interesting.  I think that's the first time I heard Oma Desala pointedly emphasize any of her words. 

"Not enough."  It's like being a day late and several hundred dollars short.  Too little and too late. 

She's looking at me, like she's thinking she's finally getting through to me, but I'm not so sure.  "The universe is vast and we are so small."  Oma's expression changes, shifting subtlety from one of expectation to that of a long-suffering teacher.  "There is only one thing we can truly control."

Finally!  Maybe she's about to drop that final pearl of wisdom into my lap!  "What's that?"

"Whether we are good or evil." 

I'm starting to feel like I'm about to fall into a major pile of manure and there's nothing I can do to stop my descent.  Just when I get the idea that I'm finally catching on to what Oma is trying to tell me, she drops the smallest kernel of knowledge on me and I'm lost again.  Only, I'm not.  I think I'm really starting to understand this whole cosmic connection thing.  At least, I hope I'm getting it right.  Won't know for certain until I actually try… 

~o~0~o~

In order to keep my unspoken word to O'Neill, I've brought Jonas into the briefing room and have started what might appear to others as a simple debriefing.  In fact, I've opened what can only be negotiations with the Kelownan Special Advisor.  I don't want to be here, I want to visit Dr. Jackson, but I'm the commanding officer and the President's direct representative here at the base and, therefore, the duty to open 'talks' with Kelownan representative falls to me.  The only reason Jack is in the room is I want him where I can keep an eye on him and make sure he doesn't do something foolish to Jonas.

At first the conversation was, to say the least, difficult, but we've slowly started to get around to the point I most need to know.  And Jonas' answer isn't heartening. 

"Obviously they do not know I am here."  Oh, isn't that just great… I'm negotiating with a non-entity as far as his home world is concerned.  "I was lucky enough to be able to access our Stargate. If I am caught returning to my planet I will be considered a traitor."  Yes, that is a distinct possibility, son.  Even Jack looks like he's suddenly realized what Jonas may have sacrificed to be in this room at this time. 

"What do you want?"  Might as well lay my hand on the table in this little card game we're playing and see what his response is.

"I do not believe my people will ever truly support a war that leads to any kind of mass destruction."  That is good to hear.  Just hope the boy is right.  "Our leaders just don't see any viable alternative right now."  Neither could ours back during the cold war years.  "Promise me, if you're able to develop defense technologies such as these shields that you spoke of, you'll share them with my Government."

Easier said than done, but Jonas has acted in good faith, bringing the naqahdria for Major Carter to study… "Of course."  See how easy?  I look at Jack, who looks ready to bite my head off, and mentally order him to stand down. 

Klaxons start to howl, interrupting my thoughts, and I jerk around to stare at the speaker on the wall just as Davis' voice starts to echo through the base.

*Unauthorized Incoming Wormhole*

Oh, shit!  I hurriedly rise from my chair, sending it rolling across the floor and into a wall, and once again turn my attention to Jonas.  "Wait here."  I pause only long enough to see him accept my order and then I'm out the door, not quite running through the halls to the Gate Control Room, fast on O'Neill's heels.   

I burst through the door into the control room, barely beating Jack to the portal -- surprising him, I'm sure -- and before I can ask, Davis is giving me information I need. 

"Receiving Tok'ra GDO, sir." 

Looking over the control panels, I see my teams already moving, but give the required order anyway. For the record and to cover our collective asses.  "All defense teams on high alert." 

Davis leans over to speak into the microphone at his station, "High alert.  Repeat, high alert." 

And I turn my attention to the gate, watching as the last chevron locks into place and I wonder, not for the first time, if this is the time a swarm of Goa'uld come through after somehow acquiring the 'safe' GDO we supplied to our Tok'ra allies.  My security teams are in place, weapons locked and loaded before I give the next, possibly fatal, order.  "Open the iris."

I listen as Davis' fingers clatter over his keyboard, keying in the proper security sequence that will open the iris, my eyes glued to the gate.  Slowly the iris cycles open, revealing the calm pool-like surface of the gate's event horizon, and within seconds a figure steps through that wall of water.  And I recognize him. 

Reaching past Davis, I grab the microphone and give another order.  "Stand down."  I stand up to face Jack, only to see the Colonel has already left the room and, once again, I'm following in his wake.  Maybe, just maybe, Jacob Carter, or even Selmac, his symbiote Tok'ra, will have the answers to the questions I and all of SG-1 have burning inside our hearts…

~o~0~o~

I had arrived home, with the last of our undercover agents safely snatched from harm's way, only to hear a call for help had originated from Earth.  After listening quietly to the recorded message, hearing the not-so-well-hidden stress and pain in George's voice, and quickly conferring with Selmac, we're speeding through the halls of the Tok'ra hidden base to the gate.  Meia'ka, one of the newest members, is keying in the radio sequence that will tell the SGC that it's a friendly about to come through the gate but, being the prudent person I was before joining with Selmac, I wait until I'm sure my daughter's team members have received the code.   And then wait a few more seconds, giving them time to open that damn iris -- no desire here to go splat -- before I step up to the horizon, then calmly step into the wormhole.

No matter how many times I've traveled through a gate, seemingly zipping and whizzing through the cosmos at a speed guaranteed to make one dizzy if you stop to think about it, is always a rush for me.  Selmac, on the other hand, is far older than I am and just doesn't feel the same about gate travel.  Or so he tells me.  I think he's learning to enjoy the rush again, through me. 

Stepping onto the arrival platform deep in the heart of Cheyenne Mountain, I find myself facing more than a wing of firearms, trained on my person and deadly in their warning.  Looking up over the heads of the lethal security forces, I see General Hammond in the Control Room leaning over towards Davis just as his voice booms over the intercom system.

*Stand down*

The men and women of the SGC's reactionary teams safe their weapons and start to clear the gate room.  I'm happy to see that George has taken to using the security teams in such a fashion, since there is a chance that, one day, my fellow Tok'ra might lose to the Goa'uld and then my home world could face possible annihilation.  Especially if the Goa'uld were able to get their slimy hands on our safe GDO codes. 

Taking a few steps down the ramp, I can't help but notice when O'Neill and George come into the arrival area and I approach them.  Jack, to put it simply, looks like hell and George doesn't look much better.  The General is the first to reach me, stepping past O'Neill to do it, and he reaches out a hand, which I take and pump in a fast handshake. 

"Sorry about that, Jacob.  Giving what's happened with the Tok'ra lately, we had to make sure it was you."

George looks almost embarrassed, but I really can't fault his reaction to my arrival or his security measures.  My fellow Tok'ra and I have suffered a few, shall we say setbacks, and any good General worth his stars would take extreme measures to ensure the security of Earth. 

"Understood.  What's going on?"  I ask as I allow George to start leading me off the ramp and deeper into the SGC.  George's voice had been the one on the message that was played for me back on the Tok'ra base, but nothing he said really enlightened me.  Just a request for Selmac and me to pay a courtesy call, as soon as possible, with anyone else we thought might be able to assist in a "dire medical emergency." 

"It's Daniel."  I look at Jack, who answered my question, and see the pain in the Colonel's eyes.  Daniel Jackson, the brilliant young man who forms the heart and soul of the Colonel's team, my daughter's team, is the dire medical emergency? 

"Jack, George, tell me… what happened and what's wrong with Daniel?"  Neither of them answer me, at first, but wait until they've lead me into a room just off the main hallway leading to the Gate Room.  Then they drop the bomb on me.  Literally.  

Once they're done briefing me, I confer with Selmac and we both decide that we have to try.  With a healing device, there is a chance Selmac might be able to help Daniel.  I follow George through another series of corridors after a short ride in the central elevator until we're just outside the infirmary.   Stepping though the doorway, I see my Sammie, standing beside a person on a sickbay berth totally unrecognizable as an individual, but I know who it has to be.  And if I had any doubts, the heart wrenching pain I see in my daughter's eyes tell me who it is she's standing guard over.

"Hey, Sam." I reach out to her and bring her into a firm embrace, "I'm so sorry…" 

She's pushing out of my arms and holds up a healing stone, all business, my Sammie.  "I tried this … it didn't work."  I gently take the crystal from her, feeling it's power pulsating through my hand even as Selmac tells me it's fully charged and ready to be used. 

"We'll do our best."  I slip the device, the healing stone, onto my hand and let Selmac taste the power emanating up my arm as he activates the ancient device.  Knowing this is not my area of expertise, I let Selmac take control of my body and listen as he quietly tells me what he's doing. 

He's activated the crystal's diagnostic capabilities and even I can see the results, playing like a hologram in my mind's eye, are not good.  Selmac, ever concerned about Tau'ri emotional reactions, asks me if he should tell the others what he has discovered about Daniel's condition and I prompt him to be honest with my daughter and her friends.  Then, with a little mental shifting, I step aside and Selmac steps forward, his voice issuing forth from my mouth, albeit with a slightly different timbre and tone.

"His condition is grave. I do not know if I can save him. Even if I can, I do not believe I can restore his full healthy state."  The words are harsh, hard to listen to, but I know I was correct in telling Selmac to be honest with Daniel's teammates.  With Selmac, I look toward Sammie, then Jack, Teal'c and Dr. Frasier and see the same determination in all of them.  But it's Sam who speaks up first.

"Do what you can."

Nodding, I signal our compliance, and Selmac uses the opportunity to once again show me exactly how to activate a healing stone and how to use it.  It no longer seems like a form magic to me, I know it's actually a technology so advanced that there is no way any scientist of earth could ever learn to fully understand it.  I'm actually able to see into Daniel Jackson's body, down to the molecular level.  I can see how the radiation has ravaged his cells, breaking them down, destroying them one by one in a manner that makes Selmac and I feel like were racing against death. 

If only we'd arrived sooner!  If only we'd gotten George's frantic plea for help a few hours earlier! 

I struggle to support Selmac as he starts to pour more and more of his efforts into helping the healing stone work it's magic.  But there is only so much I can do to support my symbiotic friend.  The rest, the real healing, is up to the patient and even as Selmac and I race to heal the damage to his body, I wonder if we're doing Daniel any favors…

~o~0~o~

How long Oma Desala and I sat in this otherworldly gate room, not talking but still managing to silently converse with each other, I have no idea. 

Some of the images she's helped me access, the memories of triumphs and failures, have left me totally thunderstruck and I have no words to express my emotions.  As a member of SG-1, I've been a part of so many missions that ended either in total disaster or stunning victory and many that ended in a way that just seemed so ambivalent. 

Hell, most of our missions ended without any sort of resolve. I've started to talk to my inner Self, using my skills as a linguist and debater to try to feel my way through what Oma has told me I must do.  Judging my worthiness to see if I'm capable of continuing my life.  We thought we were protecting the Nox, but in the end, we were nothing more to them than very young children trying to hold back the monsters of our imagination with a brave front and a flimsy blankie.   And then there were the people of Cimmeria, they didn't need our help, we needed theirs.  If it hadn't been for Kendra over coming her fears of returning to the cave system that had helped free her of her Gou'ald parasite, we never would have found Jack and Teal'c in time.  Of course, if it hadn't been for Thor's Hammer, Teal'c and Jack never would have run into a 'First One' and had to destroy him in order to save themselves… But then again, it was that world that led me to believe that "Thor" was actually an alien race, not Goa'uld, but pretending to be a race of gods in order to protect their chosen worlds.  I stand up and start pacing the room, lost in my thoughts and inner debates. 

Man, who would've thought?  Thor's race of people was actually the 'greys' the UFO maniacs had talked about for decades!  But no one in their right mind, especially the main-line scientists, ever thought there might be some grain of truth in all the babbling of folks who'd claimed to have been abducted by aliens.  Just like those same main-liner scientists scoffed at my theory that the ancient Egyptians had actually had contact with a highly advanced race of beings.  Turning their collective backs, and noses, on me and flushed my academic career right down the shitter.  Well, lookie at who was right and who was wrong, Danny-boy.  Only who's going to tell the stuffed shirts after I'm gone, huh? 

My attention is suddenly yanked from my mental yammering when I realize just how bright the gate room has become.  Spinning around I see Oma standing on the verge of stepping through an activated -- when did that happen -- gate.  "You're leaving?"  I ask stupidly.  "You can't leave."  You haven't told me if I'm absolved of my transgressions!

She stops and looks at me with one of those enigmatic smiles plastered on her face.  "The rest is up to you."

Up to me?  I have to…?  "Why, why me?"  Gee, that sounded petulant.  "Why--" I shake my head slightly, trying to gather my thoughts into something resembling coherency.  "Why give me this chance?"

"Anyone can reach enlightenment."  She's still standing next to the event horizon, but somehow I get the impression she really doesn't need the gate to leave -- it's just a prop.  "Anyone prepared to open their mind as you did when you first came to Kheb."

I open my mouth to ask her to elucidate further on her rather irritating and cryptic remarks, when something twinges on the outer edges of my physical perceptions.  Before I can think not to say anything to Oma, words spill forth from my usually overactive mouth.  "They're trying to save me.  They're healing me, I can feel it."

Her expression becomes opaque, no longer smiling, no longer unapproving, just plain neutral.  "Then your journey will continue as before."

"What if I don't want it to?"  Whoa, when did I make that decision? "Not that way."  Yes, I can feel the healing taking place on my physical body, pain flaring through ravaged nerve endings, fire racing along my bones trying to repair damage, but my heart just isn't in it.  I don't want to return to a physical, limited body, I don't, I can't…

"Walking the Great Path brings great responsibility."  Her soft words reach inside me, calming my near-panicky resolve and strengthening my faltering faith.  "You cannot fear it nor hesitate in your resolve."

A peace falls over me as I finally grasp the lesson Oma Desala's been trying to teach me.  "I understand.  I'm ready to go with you." 

"Then stop them."

"How?"  Even as I ask, the answer presents itself to me.   The gate room fades away and I'm standing in the infirmary with my friends.

~o~0~o~

There is something surreal about watching Jacob, or is it Selmac, using the alien device in a last ditch effort to save Danny.  The emotions flying around the infirmary, centered on the bed and the patient lying there, are intense and I find I’m trying to physically distance myself from them.  It's too much.  The pain Danny's going through is almost palpable, and it's tearing me apart.  I want Danny back, fully healed, healthy and mildly irritating, but I'm not sure that he'll be fully healed even if Selmac and Jacob can 'heal' him with that device.  I can't help but ask myself what would Danny want? 

Most of the members of the SGC have filled out and filed Living Wills, legal papers stating exactly what measures should and could be taken to preserve their lives should some catastrophic illness, injury or other calamity befall them.  I updated mine only two months ago, Carter updated hers shortly after that, and even Teal'c filled one out with the help of our command's legal services.  I never thought to check my team's files to see if Danny had filled one out or even thought to ask him.  I mean, for crying out loud, how does one bring up that subject in a normal conversation, huh? 

A shiver snakes its chilly way up my spine and I get the sudden impression that I'm no longer standing by myself in the corner of the infirmary.  I try to shake off the notion that, somehow, Danny's standing behind me when something warm touches my shoulder and… Hello?  How in the hell did I get from the Infirmary to the Gate Room?

I was never one to fully believe my grandmother's stories, but now I know she was telling the truth.  That a person who is dying can reach out to the living, have a conversation with them and maybe ask for one final favor…  "Daniel?"

He's standing before me, on the ramp of this odd-looking gate room, with the oddest expression I've ever seen on his face.  "Yeah."

"Did you want something?"  I can't believe I'm asking this, I mean, he's not really standing there and I'm not really here.  Right? 

"Yeah, tell Jacob to stop." 

Stop Jacob?  Stop him from healing you?  "Why?"  Please, don't make me ask this of Jacob…

"Because I'm ready to move on."

Anger flares inside me, but it's weak, like I knew this was going to happen that it was inevitable.  "You're just giving up?"

"No.  No, I'm not giving up," Danny, or this thing that I think is Danny, looks at me and smiles, "Believe me."  He looks over his shoulder, back toward the gate and I follow his gaze.

I see her and I realize what Danny's about to do.  Oma, the name he called out earlier, has come to take my friend away from us.  I watch as she changes, morphs, from a woman to the spirit form I saw on Kheb and the gate activates without being dialed up.  Danny's voice intrudes on my thoughts, "You remember Oma?"

"Sure."  Why lie?  I do remember her, just wish I wasn't seeing her now or realize why she's here.

"I think I can do more this way.  It's what I want."  Danny steps away from me, closer to Oma and the event horizon.  "I have to go now.  Everything's going to be fine."  He's moving even closer to the calm waters, further away from me, putting more and more distance between us.  "Please, Jack, tell Jacob to stop." 

I can feel the tears welling up, grief starting to crash in on my heart and tension building in my throat as I nod.  Just as I'm about to tell him I'll do as he asks, I find myself caught between two worlds.  In one, I'm back in the Infirmary watching as Jacob continues to use the healing device on Danny; in the other, I'm still in the gate room, talking with Danny. 

Swallowing against the lump in my throat, willing the tears to hold off a little longer, I let the mantel of command settle over me like a old, worn favorite shirt and use that to bolster my decision.  It's what Danny wants.  "Jacob… stop."

"Are you serious?"   He looks startled.  So does everyone else.

I nod, using the gesture to indicate Danny.  "It's what he wants."

Jacob hasn't turned of the healing device.  He does outrank me, but now his attention is split between healing and seeking advice from the others.  His gaze is right on target as he asks Janet, "Someone else want to tell me what to do?"

"Just let him go."  I speak up before Doctor Frasier can.  Jacob shuts down the alien device and within seconds, the monitors are screaming as Daniel's body fails. 

"COLONEL!"  Janet's screaming at me, but she can't see what I can and there's no time to tell her that this is what is right, that this is what Daniel wants.  I hear people gasping, startled intakes of breath, but my eyes are on Danny as he steps closer and closer to the gate in the world where only I can see him. 

"I'm gonna miss you guys."  He's saying goodbye.  Too bad Carter and Teal'c can't hear him.

"Yeah, you too." 

"Thank you, for everything." 

I can't answer that, so I just give him a short, choppy nod of acknowledgement.  "So…what?  See you around?" 

"I don't know."

He's on the verge of stepping through the gate, but I have to know… "Hey, where are you going?"

Danny stops, turns to face me and quirks that off-kilter grin of his.  "I don't know."  He steps through the gate and I'm suddenly back in the infirmary, just in time to see his body, Daniel's physical body, turn into something mystical and glowing.  The glow hovers for a few minutes above the bed, then flies up into the ceiling and he's gone.  The tears I've been holding back break over the floodwalls I erected and I feel the first of them trace over my face.  "Bye, Danny-boy."  And good luck on your journey….

~o~0~o~

I still can't believe he's gone.  It's been nearly a week, okay, six days, but it still doesn't seem real to me.  I remember staring in shock at the ceiling of the Infirmary, not willing to trust the evidence of my own eyes, that he'd … changed and left us behind.  But he had.  Danny's gone.  Leaving behind three shattered members of his team and hundreds more who knew him, although maybe not as well as others, and mourn his loss. 

Oh, how I hated Jack O'Neill in those first few hours after he all but ordered Jacob to stop his efforts to heal my ailing friend.  Even now, Jack still sports a slowly fading contusion around his left eye and cheek, a bruise that I, a medical doctor, put there when I slapped him.  Full force, no hold barred and he *let* me land that blow.  No way in hell Jack O'Neill would let a blow land on him that he didn't want to land.  Too many years of training, fine tuning physical reflexes and automatic response.  He held back and let me hit him.  He stood there in the infirmary, after Daniel's body had … evaporated … letting me, Sam and even Jacob yell and scream at him until I, not the hot-tempered-Samantha, couldn't hold back anymore and I let loose. 

And he let me.  The first blow was the only one to leave a mark, but it wasn't the only hit I got in that night.  There were several, and they all found a convenient target somewhere on his body.  I wailed and bawled and smacked him around, finally letting loose the frustration and guilt I'd felt while trying to treat Daniel.  And he just stood there, jaw clenched into granite and let me abuse him.  Damn, there are times I really love Jack.

When I finally collapsed, from sheer exhaustion and emotional upheaval, if it hadn't been for him, I would have hit the floor.  But I didn't.  He caught me and held me close while the wracking sobs coursed through my weary body, slowly collapsing with me to the floor, and there we stayed until I cried myself to sleep in his arms.   I barely recall Jacob comforting Sam, or General Hammond and Teal'c talking quietly in the corner.  All I can recall is the two arms that held me close and let me start my grieving while he stood, steadfast and strong, determined to prevail against the emotions running rampant in the infirmary. 

Twenty-four hours after Daniel left us, I found him, still not allowing himself to grieve and I made some remark about being there for him like he'd been for me, and he blew me off.  Oh, Jack didn't mean it in a mean-spirited way.  He just wasn't ready to let go and I had to respect that.  He was thoroughly immersed in the strong leader role as he roamed the halls of the SGC, consoling others who were grieving and helping them to open up and remember the good times they'd spent with Daniel Jackson.  But he never opened up, never shared his memories with us.  He roamed, he helped others and I started to watch him like a hawk.  Waiting for the moment that I knew had to come, the one split second when his guard would lower and the vulnerable heart of Jonathon Patrick "Jack" O'Neill would break.

It's been six days and no sign of the impending breakdown.  I've gone from merely watching to hovering, and have recruited the assistance of those that know him best.  They'd come to me, worried about their commander and friend and, well, I played dirty and recruited them into my personal hell -- watching a man slowly tread the path of self-destruction.  

There are times when I wish I didn't know his medical background, didn't know why he'd left the Air Force, only to come back and volunteer for what appeared, for all intents and purposes, to be a suicide mission.  He's displaying the same symptoms, the same emotional distancing now that he's lost Daniel.  If I'm not careful, if I can't catch him when he finally falls, I'll lose another friend and that is not acceptable.

Which is why I'm here.  In the heart of Stargate Command, the Gate Room, listening to General Hammond deliver the eulogy for Daniel's memorial while standing close to Jack.  Teal'c is on one side of the Colonel, Samantha on the other, but I'm right behind him.  Watching his body language, waiting for a sign that he's finally allowing himself to grieve and starting to worry that I won't see that sign.

Keeping one ear and one eye on the memorial service for Danny, and keeping the other eye and ear on the man standing in front of me, I realize that it's nearly over.  Like it had happened once before, there is no body to bury or cremate, just an empty Egyptian funerary urn with his name inscribed on it in ancient hieroglyphics.  During the ceremony, that urn had rested on a small elegant yet spartanly decorated table in front of the Stargate, that Daniel's hard work had helped open, but not within the radius of the 'wave effect' that rushes out when the gate activates.  The gate isn't active, not yet, but as the last notes of the gathered pipes and bugle fade away, the outer ring of glyphs starts to move about the ring and the first of the seven chevrons lock.

We're sending him home to Abydos, at least we're sending his spirit there to rest next to his wife.  His father-in-law, Kasuf, is here, waiting to take the urn and our memories of Daniel home.  To Shar'e.  The second chevron locks.

The honor guard snaps to attention as two members of their team step forward to remove the American flag that is draped over the urn and slowly, keeping a steady cadence, they start to fold the stars and stripes in the proscribed manner.  The third chevron locks.

Except for the sound of the gate cycling through the glyphs, the room is eerily silent and all eyes are glued on the flag as the team makes the final folds.  Fourth chevron, keyed and locked into place.  I'm watching, waiting, and still there's no sign that Jack's reacting to this ceremony for our departed friend.

The captain of the honor guard takes the crisply folded material, the dark field of blue and white stars the only thing showing, from the folders and, lacking a family member to turn it over to, presents the honor flag to General Hammond.  Fifth chevron is now locked.

The General receives the offered item with a solemn grace, and the captain returns to her place with the rest of the honor guard, quietly commanding them to return to parade rest.  Heels snap against the deck as hands are solidly, crisply clasped behind backs in precision so sharp I can hear their hands slap together just as the sixth glyph is locked into place on the gate's ring. 

I watch the General like a cat watching it's prey, knowing what he'd planned for this moment and praying it helps knock Jack out of the killing depression he's slowly drowning in.  I'm not the only one watching the tableau playing out before us.  Kasuf is watching.  So are Teal'c and Sam and the rest of the SGC.  Half are tracking George as he moves across the cold, gray concrete floor, the rest are professionally trained on the man standing before me.  Hammond stops before Jack, just as the seventh and final chevron locks into place and the wormhole activates in its normal, spectacular manner.  And a chink appears in the armor encasing the body before me as a small, almost imperceptible shiver shakes wide shoulders. 

"Colonel O'Neill, since Doctor Jackson left no family behind here on Earth, and in accordance with his wishes, relayed to me in a private conversation, please accept this flag in his name and as a representative of his family here at the SGC."  George hands Jack the flag after the Colonel gave a choppy nod of acceptance.  "On behalf of a grateful nation and a grateful Earth, please accept our condolences…"

There it is.  He's falling, crumpling to the ground, clutching the flag like a lost child, and I'm there, catching him with the help of Sam and Teal'c.  The four of us slowly sit on the ground, not caring who sees this, not even noticing that Hammond has quietly started passing orders for the memorial attendees to disperse.  All we care about, all we're focusing on is Jack. 

The tears fall silently.  Even in grief he can't allow himself to voice his pain, but I feel the sobs as they wrack through his frame.  We sit there, God only knows how long, supporting Jack as he finally starts his grieving process, Teal'c providing physical strength, Sam giving soothing comforts and me doing what I can to help him get over this first, wrenching bout of sadness.  I'm also there as a doctor, ready to give Jack a mild sedative if he can't control his reaction and needs it.  Yes, I actually brought a pre-prepped syringe, loaded with Valium, to the memorial.

Jack finally starts to settle.  I realize he's muttering and move in a little closer to hear what he's saying; Teal'c's reaction to the words isn't encouraging.  Leaning closer to Jack, I hear the words and… damn.

"He's not dead.  He's not really dead.  Death is just a way to start a new journey. He's not dead.  He's not really dead.  This is just the beginning…"

Author’s Notes – Late one evening in August of 2002, while I was visiting Beth at her Pennsylvania home, I made mention that I might be tempted to write a Stargate SG-1 story.  Up to this point, I’d only written in The Sentinel universe but I was willing to take a chance and, apparently, so was Beth.   I had just watched Meridian for the first time and I couldn’t help but to focus totally on the raw emotions, which were only hinted at in the episode.  After talking to Beth about this, I decided to see what my brain could come up with.  I knew I didn’t want to “fix” the episode, there were many writers out there in the fandom doing just that, what I decided to do was rewrite the episode and bring attention to the emotions of everyone involved in Daniel’s passage.  Hopefully, what you just read has brought home those emotions for you.  I know that when I wrote the story I vacillated between joy, sorrow, happiness and the darkest of depressions.  Death, no matter when or how you face it, will run you through the gamut and leave you feeling used, abused and worn out.  The only thing, I think, we can truly hope for as a human is to face death well and with a grace we may not have shown previously in our life.   Yes, Stargate SG-1 isn’t “real” but I hope, when it comes time for me to slip the bounds of this mortal coil and fly up into the heavens, that I can face my death with as much dignity and grace as I tried to show Daniel doing within this story of mine.     

Suisan