The Apprenticeship of the Archaeologist
Part 12 of ?
Synopsis: Missing scene/epilogue for "Origin". Vala's found the
perfect place, the perfect bait, and the perfect hook for fishing, but why can't
she catch one reluctant archaeologist? Minor spoilers in varying degrees
for "Origin", "Avalon", "Threads", "Lockdown", "The Devil You Know", "Jolinar's
Memories", "Forever in a Day", Stargate, and maybe a few others.
The Apprenticeship of the Archaeologist
There is no teaching until the pupil is brought into the same state or principle
in which you are; a transfusion takes place; he is you, and you are he... and
by no unfriendly chance or bad company can he ever lose the benefit.
— Ralph Waldo Emerson, "Spiritual Laws"
Crap.
Scrubbing his face with both hands, Major General Jack O'Neill peered cautiously through his fingers at the report sitting on his desk. It was still there. Heaving a sigh, he pinned the offending document with one hand, laying the other atop the telephone handset perched on the corner of his desk.
It was already 1800 in Washington. Even if he could schedule a flight within the next hour, that still wouldn't put him in Colorado Springs until at least 2100 local time, probably later. But if Jack knew Daniel—and he was one of only three people who was even close to knowing the-mystery-that-is-Doctor Jackson—the archaeologist probably wouldn't leave Cheyenne Mountain until almost midnight.
If he left for the night at all.
The line just under his thumb drew his eye again. "Given that the Ori and the Priors seem to believe that our entire galaxy has been raised by evil, I highly doubt the Prior encountered by SG-12 and Colonel Mitchell is the last we will see."
And knowing Daniel like he did, Jack knew that his friend was already shouldering the blame for whatever was to come. The same sense of universal responsibility that had kept the SGC treading the moral high ground for so many years—sometimes reluctantly—was all-too-often directed inwardly. In all the years Jack had known him, Daniel had never learned to cut himself any slack nor offer the same forgiveness to himself that he so freely granted nearly everyone not of the snaky persuasion.
So says an undisputed master of self-flagellation, Jack chided himself, then grinned at the fifty-cent word his own thoughts tossed about so easily. Oh, yes, they'd taught one another well over the last nine years, though Jack was sure he'd gotten the better part of the bargain: he'd tutored Daniel in the arts of combat and sarcasm while the younger man had introduced him to the finer points of compassion and moral responsibility. All the while, they'd helped one another get through some of the absolute worst times in their respective lives, including—but certainly not limited to—the deaths of Charlie and Sha're. It hadn't stopped after Daniel's own death, either, as he'd even taken his highly-evolved self to Jack's prison cell aboard—
Okay, so not going there.
The fact was, despite his outwardly independent and self-reliant nature, Daniel would always be at heart the too-bright little boy who'd lost his mother and father at a tender young age and had consequently never known the strength and support of a parent's unconditional love. Reticence—another big word there, Jack—was something neither man had needed to teach the other, but also wouldn't let one another get away with without a fight. Jack liked to think that he, Carter, and Teal'c and even Janet, Jacob, and Hammond had all helped fill the gap over the years, but Daniel still—whether he'd admit to himself or not—needed someone to talk to.
Unfortunately, Janet and Jacob both were dead, Hammond retired to his quiet new residence in Texas, Carter buried up to her eyebrows in research at Area 51, and Teal'c halfway across the galaxy trying to build a government for his fractured people. Landry was no help, either, as he'd only just met Daniel and was therefore still suffering from the "who the hell is this guy and why can't I say 'no' to him?" syndrome. Mitchell was practically useless, too, for nearly the same reason.
Which meant that it was up to Jack to help his friend sort through all his misdirected feelings of guilt. Groaning, he glanced at the wall clock again, dismayed to realize he'd just wasted fifteen minutes convincing himself of what he'd already known he needed to do. At this rate, his plane wasn't going to touch down at Peterson 'til nearly midnight. It almost made him wish he could—
Jack, dammit, you are the man!
He snatched up the phone, checked his speed-dial list, then punched in two numbers. "Lionel!" he grinned. "I gotta get to the SGC fast. Warn Walter for me, will ya?"
Opening the left-hand drawer of his desk, Jack withdrew a small device and stood up. Picking up his hat and jacket, he muttered, "Beam me up, Scotty." Depressing the button on the face of the device, he vanished in a flash of light.
He re-integrated on the bridge of the Prometheus and was greeted warmly by Colonel Pendergast. "Thanks for getting Mitchell assigned to the SGC," he smiled.
"He deserved it," Jack answered. "I'd love to stay and chat, boys..."
"Right," Pendergast nodded. "The SGC's field dampener will disengage on our signal. Are you ready?" Another brilliant flare later, he was facing a plain gray wall in the control room of the SGC.
"Gee, Jack, I emailed those mission reports three hours ago," came the amused voice of Hank Landry from behind him, causing Jack to quickly whirl about to face him. "What took you so long?"
"Oh, you know me... I've never been a fast reader." He shrugged on the class A jacket and tucked his hat under his arm. "So... weird guy flambéed himself in here? I see no burns."
"Actually, it was the briefing room and, no, you won't. Didn't leave so much as a scorch-mark on the carpet or ceiling."
"Neat trick," Jack commented, unsuccessfully suppressing the need to fidget. "So, how's Mitchell doing? He gonna work out as SG-1 leader and your 2IC?"
Hank gestured toward his office. "He's going to be fine," he answered once the door had closed. "But I haven't yet decided to make him my second. He follows orders a little too well."
"What's wrong with that?"
Landry propped a hip up on his desk, a move Jack approved of since it placed neither man behind The Desk. "I've always worked better with someone who challenges my decisions, makes me think outside the box. I don't know yet if Mitchell can do that, given that he's been such a 'yes'-man his entire career."
"Almost obscene, isn't it?" Jack smirked.
"Oh, yeah," Hank snorted. "George had you, and we both know how you feel about challenging barriers. By contrast, you had Reynolds, who's about as straight-laced as they come. Did he ever contradict you even once?"
"No," Jack admitted, then shrugged. "He had seniority over Carter." Besides, she had enough to do keeping the geek squad from blowing up the planet, he added mentally. Instead, he said, "Aside from that, she already had SG-1 to lead and the science department to run. It wasn't fair to add on another responsibility."
"Jack, you and I both know we need personalities opposite our own to keep us on the right track."
Jack was unable to control his need to fidget once again. "So..." he began.
"Geez, Jack, you didn't commandeer a valuable national resource just to chat about who I have or haven't chosen as my 2IC," Hank scoffed, then sobered. "He's in his office."
"Thanks," Jack answered and tried to look as though he wasn't in a hurry as he made his way to the elevator. Waiting impatiently for it to open and send him to the correct floor, he smiled at the sudden realization that he still felt comfortable here—even though it was no longer his command— and his old routines still felt second-nature.
When at long last the doors opened on the level containing the linguistic library and offices, Jack made a beeline for the room which had become a favored meeting ground for SG-1 for a decade, permeated as it was with the very essence of the man who occupied it.
Daniel sat at his desk, head bowed as he was studiously writing something. Content to just watch his friend work for a few minutes, Jack rested a hand on a nearby stack of books. To his surprise, Daniel started at the slight sound.
"Hey... wow, what the hell are you doing here?"
Jack blinked. That is so not the greeting I was expecting! "Nice to see you, too."
"No, no, sorry!" Daniel stuttered, clearly taken off-guard by his own inadvertent phrasing. "I just wasn't expecting to see you."
Inwardly, Jack winced. Telling Daniel he'd come all the way from Washington just to talk would probably cause his friend to suspect a foothold situation or some other impending disaster. "Yeah, well, I was in the neighborhood." Right, lame one, Jack. You think he's gonna fall for that? "And I've got a little surprise for Mitchell," he hastily amended, making a little note to surprise himself with a surprise for Mitchell.
Daniel seemed to accept the statement. "Oh, yeah, he really loved the last one: the fact you didn't tell him we were all moving on to different positions..."
Whoops. He had forgotten to mention that, hadn't he? "Yeah. Sorry you missed Daedalus."
"No, you're not."
Nailed. "You're right, I'm not. Listen, I just had a briefing with Landry about your stuff, and—"
"Yeah," Daniel grimaced.
"Sounds like it could be a problem?"
"Well, we've been up against some pretty bad guys before—"
Jack couldn't help it. "Yeah, not so pretty... Overdressed, yes."
"—in some tough situations—" Daniel tried again.
"That we always won," Jack finished. They don't call me 'Mr. Positive' for nothin'!
Apparently, the archaeologist still had a point he was trying to make. "Yeah, but didn't you feel that was because we had someone looking out for us?"
Well, obviously you did, Danny, otherwise you wouldn't be here, and therefore none of the rest of us would be, either. Is this 'cause Oma's gone AWOL?
"I don't think I would say this to anyone else, but for the first time, I'm scared."
Stunned by the admission from a man whose inability to talk about himself consistently rivaled even Jack's, the general said the first thing that came to mind. "I'm hungry."
The dark mood was abruptly broken. "Me, too," Daniel grinned.
Score one for Team O'Neill, Jack smiled to himself, leading the way to the elevator and the commissary.
They rounded the corner from the elevator and Daniel froze in his tracks, staring down the hall. "Nuh-uh," he shook his head, closing his eyes. "What are you still doing here?"
Coming from the opposite end of the hall, the dark-haired woman being escorted by a pair of burly SFs grinned impishly. "I was hungry, Daniel. Surely you won't let me starve, will you?"
"It's an option," the archaeologist answered cheerfully, sounding so genuinely amenable to the thought that the general gave him a double-take.
"You must be Vala," Jack decided after a short moment, offering his hand. "I've heard so much about you. I'm General Jack O'Neill."
She shook it firmly. "Vala Mal Doran," she smiled. "I've heard practically nothing about you... leastwise, not from Daniel, all he talks about are old, dead things and scratched-up rocks."
The heated glare from Daniel silenced his first reply before it could even form on his lips. "But you have heard of me," he pointed out, instead. From the expression which now covered the archaeologist's face, there was going to be some "Captain Sparrow" teasing in Jack's near future.
Whoops. He never should have let Daniel rent that film.
"Of course. What Goa'uld with galactic domination goals hasn't heard of the infamous Tau'ri pain in the mikta?"
"You know, Daniel, you never did tell me what that word means."
Daniel cleared his throat, ignoring him. "Ah, when I first told you who we were aboard the Prometheus, you said you'd never heard of the Tau'ri."
Vala rolled her eyes. "I was being dismissive, Daniel, not honest."
"And that 'dishonest' part is different from normal... how?"
"Well, I could have lied to you and told you I wanted to sell your ship to the highest bidder."
"And that's not what you were going to do?"
"I was going to sell it to the highest bidder, then steal it back," she corrected with a smirk. "Big difference."
"Oh, yeah. Huge."
Oh, Dannyboy, I have taught you well, Jack grinned inwardly, imagining the younger man as his Padawan of sarcasm. "Hate to break up the reunion, kids, but I'm hungry."
"Me too!" Vala enthused. "What are you buying me for dinner, Daniel? Something slaved over for hours by your world's finest chefs and served with an expensive intoxicant?"
"No, something ignored for hours by unenthusiastic cooks and served with a cheap stimulant," he corrected.
"Sounds romantic! Will there be candlelight and music?"
"Overhead fluorescents and the sound of clattering dishes."
"Marvelous! What are we waiting for?"
Daniel leaned toward Jack and muttered, "So much for having a quiet conversation over dinner."
The general's eyebrows rose. Who said she had to join us? You're not putting up much of a fight, Daniel. "After you," he offered.
"I like you, Jack," Vala smiled as she sashayed through the cafeteria doors, somehow managing to make blue BDUs look far more enticing than they had any right to be. "You-unlike some-know how to treat a girl like a lady."
"'Lady'?" Daniel closed his eyes and shook his head. "I'm not even gonna touch that," he muttered, following right behind her. Jack exchanged a shrug with the two bemused SFs before trailing after the pair. He didn't miss the twin sighs of relief escaping the guards as they took up positions beside the door, temporarily relinquishing their charge to the care of the not-as-reluctant-as-one-might-think archaeologist.
"Vala! Jackson!" exclaimed the voice of the excitable Cameron Mitchell. The colonel was standing at the end of the food line, having just prepared himself a tray featuring mashed potatoes, baby carrots, green beans, and what the mess hall staff called meatloaf, but could just as easily have been ground-up cardboard for all its taste.
"Feeling brave, Mitchell? The mystery meat's a little too daring for me," Jack grinned.
The younger officer blinked. "What? Oh, General! I didn't see you come in, sir."
"That much is obvious," Vala remarked to Daniel out of the corner of her mouth. "So, what's good?"
"Define 'good'," Jack smirked, grabbing a tray and heading for the cold cuts and bread. Sandwiches, at least, were usually safe.
"Well, so long as you stay away from anything that isn't immediately recognizable as a grain, vegetable, or animal, you should be okay," Daniel answered, grabbing a bowl of salad and putting it on her tray, then getting one for himself. On down the way they went, the archaeologist filling up two trays with the same foods before finishing each off with a serving of dessert.
"Green Jell-O?" Jack asked, when they put their trays down. "They going for a little variety now?"
"They stopped serving the blue stuff when Sam left," Daniel explained.
"This Jell-O comes in other colors?" Vala asked, poking at the quivering gelatin with one finger.
"Oodles," the general answered. "Red, blue, yellow, purple... a whole freakin' rainbow of jiggly stuff."
"Interesting," she remarked, grabbing her spoon and digging into the Jell-O.
Mitchell had already taken a bite from his meatloaf and was now vigorously shaking a bottle of ketchup in preparation to doctor the rest. "What brings you to the SGC, sir?"
"He's got a surprise for you," Daniel answered, swallowing down a mouthful of mashed potatoes. "Hey, Jack, looks like Landry's keeping enough russets in the kitchen."
"Show off," Jack muttered. Catching the curious expressions from the table's other two occupants, he shook his head. "Never mind."
"Was this Jell-O a grain, vegetable, or animal?" Vala asked, scraping the last green bits out of the bottom of the bowl.
Daniel grimaced. "Uh, trust me, it's far safer if you don't know," he answered. Surprisingly, she pulled a face but seemed to agree before diving into her salad.
Jack finally broke the moment of silence by asking, "So, Vala, where to now?"
"Well, since Daniel isn't going to let me have any of the treasure I worked so hard to get, I guess I'll have to go back to begging on the filthy streets of the dirtiest worlds of the Lucian Alliance," she replied, trying for forlorn despair but only coming up with laughable insincerity.
"Yeah, right," Daniel and Cameron chorused.
"You're probably already plotting your next get-rich-quick scheme," Daniel scoffed.
She dropped her fork. "I wouldn't have to if you hadn't ruined the last two," she shot back.
"And whose fault is that?" he retorted. "I didn't tell you to start grabbing stuff at Avalon or take the trip to the Alteran homeworld or try to steal the Prometheus."
"It's not my fault your people made it so ridiculously easy to commandeer."
"You were wearing armor impervious to our weapons."
"Yet you were able to take me out."
"After you'd removed the helmet and gloves!"
Is this what Daniel and I used to sound like? Jack wondered, eyebrows shooting to his hairline as the bickering was traded back and forth. He couldn't withhold a grin at the thought.
"What are you smiling about?" Daniel grumped.
"I'm just trying to find out what you don't like about her," he answered at length. "She looks great, fights dirty, loves Jell-O, and drives you nuts just by being in the same room. I'm thinkin' she's perfect for you, Daniel."
Vala looked immensely pleased. "See? And I'd say what we just went through is about as close as anyone can get to burning in Hell and living, so you've gotten that out of the way." She flashed her teeth at the stunned archaeologist. "Let's make babies!"
"No, no, he's been to Hell already," Jack corrected. "We didn't like the neighbors, so we blew it to smithereens."
"Netu, right," Mitchell nodded, catching on quickly. "Well, Jackson, you did say havin' kids with her was right between 'shooting yourself' and 'burning in Hell'."
"You've never shot yourself that I can think of," the general finished, "but I think we've come to the conclusion that the whole 'burning' thing has been taken care of." He and Mitchell shared a sly grin before returning their attention to the speechless linguist.
Daniel's mouth hung open, his jaw working soundlessly for a minute or two before Jack's gentle reminder of 'flies' kicked his brain into gear again, and his teeth shut with an audible click. "I said 'shooting myself' first," he managed lamely, unable to come up with any better reply.
"Your chambers or mine?" Vala returned, batting her eyes at him.
"Shouldn't you be off-world by now?"
"I was hungry," she repeated, grabbing his neglected bowl of Jell-O and scooping up another spoonful.
"We can see that," Mitchell commented.
Jack saw something else, too. Daniel was the rare type of person who could make himself immediately likeable and approachable to almost anyone, but still managed to maintain a cordial distance. Only with his closest friends did he allow the gap to close, though he never opened himself completely to anyone, not even Jack himself.
With Vala, Daniel allowed almost the same level of casual familiarity he had with Carter. Obviously, the astrophysicist was far too much of a big sister to Daniel to ever taunt him in the way that the thief was doing now, but Jack remembered a time in this same cafeteria when he'd witnessed Carter do exactly what Vala had just done. Like before, Daniel didn't protest the sudden theft of his Jell-O, but raised his overly-expressive eyebrows in Jack's direction as though saying, "Can you believe what she just did?" And the way he argued with her? Well, even the general had already seen the similarity in their interactions and his own with Daniel, and while he couldn't be certain, Jack felt fairly confident the bickering pair shared an admiration for one another's survival instincts, not at all unlike the underlying respect which formed the foundation of Daniel's and Teal'c's otherwise unlikely friendship.
He actually likes her!
The sudden realization wasn't earth-moving, though it was significant, and though the archaeologist probably didn't entertain any romantic intentions toward the vexing woman, something in their shared time trapped in a distant galaxy had certainly brought them closer to one another.
Dollars to donuts, burning to death together has something to do with it, he mused, taking a sip of his turpentine-like coffee. After all, the shared experience of having battled and defeated Ra had started the transition from strangers to closest confidants for two drastically different men.
"Shouldn't the two of you get going?" Daniel suddenly asked, derailing Jack's uncharacteristic train of thought. He had that dodgy look to his face like he was up to something. "The Alpha Site is about two hours ahead of us, but daylight's fading fast."
"What's at the Alpha Site?" Mitchell asked, scraping up the last of his tapioca pudding.
"Lots of things," Jack answered automatically. "Computers, scientists, occasionally a Tok'ra or Jaffa, big honkin' guns and..." He trailed off, realizing what the ever-lovin' sneaky bast—er, best friend had been alluding to in his oh-so-casual mention of the offworld base. "And your surprise," he finished. Danny, I so owe you one. What better way to get Mitchell back in the saddle than to take him for a joy-ride in an F-302?
"Well, hopefully it's not as big a surprise as the last one you gave me," Mitchell answered, then added, "sir."
Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Daniel smirking. "Yeah, well... you'll like this one, I promise."
"Have them back by midnight, Jack," the archaeologist began. "Mind your curfew, don't scratch the paint job..."
I may have taught him too well, the general lamented. It was past time to remind Daniel who the master was. "I can do that," he nodded, gathering his hat and jacket again. "It was nice to meet you, Vala. Now that you've met Danny's folks, when are we gonna meet yours? I hate it when the in-laws never meet 'til the wedding."