Daniel woke up to the sound of his alarm clock, reminding him of SG1's briefing in ten minutes' time. He put one hand to his head, while slamming down in random places on his desk, trying to find the alarm clock to switch it off. Sitting up in his bed, Daniel turned to his picture of his wife, Sha're. He dreamed, as he had so many times before, of finally finding Sha're on this mission to P3X 182. Daniel's mind drifted off into unconscious thoughts, and he didn't even realise he had a visitor until he heard Jack's voice behind him.
"Hey, Daniel. Mission briefing, c'mon, now!" Jack tried again when he was greeted with very little reaction. "Daniel...?" He walked up behind Daniel and prodded him in the back. "Daniel, you're gonna love this one, I've heard there's an ancient city with lots of confusing writing that isn't writing and doesn't make any sense to normal people like me."
"You're not normal." Daniel turned to his drawers and pulled out a clean uniform. He heard Jack's voice behind him as he pulled himself into his uniform.
"Well finally! A response!" Jack pulled an extremely strange face, containing sarcastic excitement, which was a bit pointless as Daniel still had his back to him ands couldn't see it. "You know, I'm worried about you, even Teal'c would be more talkative than you are this morning! Speak of the Devil!" Jack turned to usher Teal'c into Daniel's room. Teal'c raised an eyebrow, but didn't say anything. "And we all know how hard that is, don't we!" Jack remarked under his breath.
At this point Daniel finished waking up, and stalked out of his room, Jack chattering away to Teal'c behind him. Daniel turned a corner and Sam joined up, walking along side him. Daniel half listened as Sam rushed on and on about how this briefing was longer than normal, so the planet was bound to be a good one, or possibly a very bad one, come to think of it.
The four team members walked into the briefing room. General Hammond was already there, waiting for them.
"Good morning SG1. Please sit down."
Daniel decided he could trust Sam to pay attention to this briefing enough for him to daydream. It wasn't often that he let his mind wonder, but today was one of those bad days, where he couldn't concentrate on anything apart from Sha're. He kept seeing her face at their marriage, shinning like the three moons on Abydos had all joined together as one inside her. Daniel saw different pictures of the time they had spent in Abydos before he had been called back to the SGC, followed by pictures of the year he had spent at the SGC, then he saw, once again, his Sha're speaking Amaunet's words, and doing Amaunet's deeds. Daniel was filled with an aching that he could not escape. A loneliness that ate at him and a frustration at being so powerless. He was filled with such hate for the Goa'uld, that Jack was actually scared when he looked across at his friend.
Jack chose not to say anything, knowing he could easily get Daniel into trouble for day dreaming.
So the briefing passed, and SG1 found themselves, mostly, prepared for another mission, and standing quietly in front of the Stargate. Normally there would be chatter, and excitement as they readied for their mission, but by this time they had all noticed Daniel's strange mood. None of them knew what to say, and the silence was just getting uncomfortable when General Hammond gave the order to dial up the Stargate.
Teal'c was disturbed by Daniel's silence, and so, under the noise of the Stargate, he moved next to Daniel and said in an undertone, "Daniel Jackson. I am sorry for what I did to Sha're and yourself."
Daniel shook his head at Teal'c, and murmured "It wasn't your fault. You would've been killed if you didn't chose someone. I just hope she's not in pain." Daniel sighed.
Nearby Jack heard and flinched. No one blamed Teal'c for what had happened, but sometimes he couldn't forgive himself. Mostly when Daniel was in this kind of mood.
Jack silently noted to 'accidentally' trip Daniel up when they emerged from the Stargate. He immediately felt guilty. It wasn't Daniel's fault. Sometimes everything just got the better of him, and, more often than seemed healthy, he had days where he seemed to blame himself for what had happened to Sha're.
SG1 turned as they heard General Hammond speaking to them. "SG1, you are expected to either make contact or return within 24 hours. Good luck."
The team turned and headed for the Stargate, each buried in their own thoughts.
Daniel stepped through the Stargate and gasped. This must be the place of his dreams! Sam grinned as she saw Daniel's expression, and led the way down to the surrounding buildings.
"I recognise some of these inscriptions! This one here, it means 'sun', or 'source of light'. This one means 'galaxy'!" Daniel had finally been distracted from his state of loneliness as he gazed up at the many tall, stone buildings surrounding him. Each of the buildings had writing literally leaping out of the walls at him. The walls of the buildings were covered from top to bottom with inscriptions.
"Well while you guys gasp and groan at the walls, I'm gonna have a look around!" Jack was glad that his friend had finally managed to distract himself from his long lost wife, but he still couldn't pretend to be interested in a lot of fading pictures and supposed 'words' on cracked walls which were probably nothing of interest to anyone.
"I shall come with you O'Neil." Jack supposed that Teal'c couldn't face staring at a lot of meaningless symbols either.
"Right. Carter, we'll see you and Daniel back here in an hour." Jack called back to Sam as he stalked off.
"Sir." Sam raised her voice, calling to Jack, who looked back over his shoulder to show he was listening. "Don't get hurt!" Jack rolled his eyes and turned just in time to smash his face into a looming wall.
"Are you alright O'Neil?" Daniel and Sam heard Teal'c ask Jack.
"Yeah, Teal'c, I'm fine Teal'c." Replied Jack, to which Teal'c raised an eyebrow.
"And sir!" Sam called again. This time Jack stopped and turned around properly. "Don't get lost!"
Jack turned back to where Teal'c had been standing, ready with another of his cutting remarks. "Hey Teal'c, where are you?!" Teal'c had disappeared! Jack heard laughter from behind him, but decided not to turn. Instead he called out again, and suddenly Teal'c popped out from behind a wall.
"Were you lost O'Neil?" Teal'c asked, with a rare smile.
"You know, you're not funny, Teal'c." Daniel heard Jack say, clearly annoyed.
Daniel shook his head and resumed his task of 'reading' the walls. His eyes opened in amazement as he realised what they had found, and a smile crept across his face.