It had been nearly 20 years since he had retired, well semi retired anyway.
Not that it had been his choice of course. He could see where the General was coming from though; he certainly wasn't the young man he once was. Though he kept himself fit and passed every medical they throw at him they had slowly stopped his gate travel until he was desk bound. He was still needed from time to time of course, he knew more about the Stargate and ancient languages than anyone else. He was still called in to translate text or alien hieroglyphs when the New Guys had trouble. But they weren't really the new guys anymore though; he was just the old guy.
For the most part his retirement had been good. He had got to travel a lot, not Stargate travel just regular hop on a plane to go exploring ancient cities travels.
It was harder travelling on his own. He'd see something Sam would like, or see a tradition that would have gotten the raised eyebrow look from Teal'c, but they weren't there. Sam had tragically died in a bike accident about ten years ago. It hadn't been her fault, some drunk driver in a black van with tinted windows pulled out on her. After that Jack hadn't been the same, he threw himself into work and was eventually killed by the Gaul'd. It was losing the Great Jack O'Neil that had made the SGC change some of their policies. The frequency of travel, the amount of travel each week and to some extent the age of the traveler had all been reviewed; Hence his subtle withdrawal from the travel rota.
He was getting bored again, he could feel another adventure waiting for him, so he started where he always did, the internet. While searching online he found reference to an old haunted mansion in an area known as Old City. There were reports of ghostly images, strange sounds and even stranger markings on the old walls. What few photos there were showed a once great building that had been ravished by fire. Something told him he needed to see it, she he booked his tickets, packed his bags and off he went.