So this was my little submission to the "Where are they now" challenge on the Daniel/Vala LJ community. Set right after the end of "Ark of Truth." Fluffery abounds. ;)

"So sign it already."

"I'm reading it."

"I can see that. You've been reading it for what seems like a very, very long time."

"I don't just sign things until I read them very, very carefully."

"What are you worried about?" There was a hint of worry in her voice now. "I thought you were ok with this."

"I am. I'm just looking for loopholes."

Now she frowned and folded her arms. Her heart was thudding painfully and she was scared. She thought he'd been serious, now she wasn't sure. She asked, "Looking for a way out already?"

He looked up at her and smiled, "No. I'm looking for loopholes so we can get them plugged; I'm not planning on losing you."

Tilting her head, she suddenly grinned at him and scooted closer, peering at the document. "Have you found any yet?"

"No. Nothing other than this part about til death…"

"And maybe not even then." She finished for him.

"Exactly."

"So sign it. We have a city to explore, shopping to do…"

"No. Not tonight. Tonight we have only one thing to do."

She purred and gave him a sultry look. "Visit the casinos?"

He signed his name quickly. "Not even close." He pushed the document to her and watched with a smile as she signed her name as quickly as was humanly possible. She shoved it back at the sleepy clerk who duly nodded and signed his name. They waited for what seemed like another eternity; finally he couldn't wait any longer and asked, "Well?"

The clerk looked up and waved a lazy hand, "Yes, yes, you may kiss the bride. It's official. Congratulations, Dr. and Mrs. Jackson."

::::::::EIGHT HOURS EARLIER::::::::

Vala skipped through the halls of the SGC. Skipped for a bit, just because she was so ecstatic, then she flat out ran the rest of the way because she was just too excited to lollygag along. It was official. In this and any other galaxy (at least as far as she could tell). Official. Done deal. No more worries. No more hesitating, no more of this terribly distressing dance they had been doing for all these years. She was free and she couldn't wait to tell the one person she knew would be every bit as excited about it as she was.

She skidded to a halt at his office door and saw him sitting at the desk, staring into space. No work in front of him. Good. She would have his full attention.

"Daniel!" She called out, hurrying into the room and walking over to his side. He looked up at her slowly and gave her a small smile. She knew he was still tired after their long and stressful mission to the Ori galaxy. The affairs of the Ascended had messed with everyone's heads and lives. This last experience had been extremely difficult and hard on all of them. Vala was hoping against hope that they were finished having to clean up Ancient messes.

"Hey, Vala." Daniel turned to face her, noticing her wide grin and obvious excitement. "What's got you so happy?"

"You."

"Me?"

"Well, you and this one other thing too." Vala stepped closer and threw her arms around his neck.

"Vala." Daniel's tone held warning as he slightly pulled away from her. "What is the 'one other thing'?"

"I got divorced." She gave him a toothy grin and bounced up and down a few times.

"Divorced?"

"Yes, dear. Terminated my short lived little marriage to poor Tomin. The poor dear. I think he really kind of liked me. And he was nice. Not at all unpleasant. But we have so little in common; except for dealing with the Ori and having been married and all." She tilted her head, "But basically we…"

"Divorced?" Daniel repeated.

"I know you've still got a headache from this trip, darling, but you aren't usually so slow. Yes, divorced. Of course that isn't exactly the term Tomin used; he had some long phrase, most likely it was Latin I would imagine. I honestly wasn't paying that much attention at the time. But it means the same thing and it is very, very 100% official. General Landry and all the other important generals and people signed off on it as well; him being in charge here and thus the representative for Earth. I'm no longer married. I'm a free woman."

Daniel stood up abruptly and Vala was surprised when he pulled her right up close to him and without a single word, began to kiss her. And not just a quick peck on the lips, either. Oh, no this was a serious, very long awaited kiss of passion. After a few seconds, or minutes, she wasn't sure which, he straightened and smiled at her. She stared at him breathlessly. He leaned down for another kiss, then stepped back and said, "Go pack a suitcase and meet me at the airport."

Vala couldn't remember ever having so much trouble finding her voice. She finally squeaked out, "What?"

"You heard me. Pack. Go. Now." He grinned and gave her a gentle shove out the door.

Watching as Vala stared at him for one long second, then turned on her heel and ran down the hall, Daniel grinned. He loved it when he could throw her off like that and befuddle her. Heaven knew she had befuddled him enough over the years. It was satisfying to know he could do it too. He turned around and went straight for the phone. He was taking the rest of the day off.

:::::::::ELEVEN HOURS LATER:::::::::

"Hey."

"Hey."

Daniel smiled, "Mitchell is going to kill us."

"Oh pooh. Why are you talking about real life right now?" She gave him a kiss and rolled onto her back. "We have the rest of the weekend before we have to worry about real life."

"This is real life, Vala." Daniel pointed out, watching the flashing lights of the city out the window. He was having a bit of trouble believing it himself at the moment.

She squinted at him. "You're right, aren't you? This is real life, isn't it?"

"I've got the paperwork to prove it." He grinned at her.

"Are you happy?"

"Vala, there aren't enough words in the dictionary, any dictionary, to tell you how happy I am."

"Try."

"Ok. I'm ecstatic. I'm happier than I ever thought I could be."

Vala's smile widened, "Oh, so you kind of like me, huh?"

"Yes."

"Kinda glad I hijacked the Prometheus all those years ago aren't you?"

He rolled his eyes. "I suppose I am."

"It makes such a lovely story, darling."

"If you say so."

"Of course I do." She patted his cheek and glanced around the room.

"What are you looking for? Need something?"

"No, darling. I have absolutely everything I could ever possibly want or need." Vala smiled and stretched languorously. She frowned, "Although I could really do with a hot dog or something. I'm starving."

Daniel laughed. "We probably can do something about that."

"Yes, there are a lot of fancy restaurants…"

"I was thinking room service."

Vala rolled over and rested her chin on his chest. "You do intend to take me out and parade around town with your beautiful new wife at some point, right? I mean, I want to go out and act like newlyweds."

Daniel smiled, "We've got all day tomorrow and most of Sunday yet ahead of us. I promise to parade my beautiful new wife around town. Besides, I thought we were already acting like newlyweds."

"True." Vala nodded. "So, shall we order something and then get back to acting like newlyweds?"

"Grab the menu."

They had been perusing the menu for a few minutes when they were interrupted by the ringing of a cell phone. Frowning at him, Vala shook her head, "It isn't mine. I made sure to turn it off when we got on the plane and I didn't turn it back on."

Groaning, Daniel reached for the end table where his phone was sitting.

"No!" Vala tried to grab it from him, "Don't answer it!"

"I'm just going to see who it is." He glanced at the caller ID. Jack. Of course. Daniel put a finger to his lips. "You shush. If I don't answer, he's going to get suspicious."

Vala rolled over and grabbed the menu again. "Fine. But you can't tell him anything. You told me I couldn't call Sam."

"Shush!" Daniel hissed as he flipped open his phone. "Hello?"

"Daniel."

"Well yes. Did you mean to call someone else, Jack?"

"You know I didn't."

"Well. Ok then." Daniel waited, pointing at what he wanted from the menu. Vala nodded and pointed out the desserts. He pointed at one and she pointed at another. He shook his head and held up two fingers. He was not going to split a dessert with her. She nodded with a smile; she'd still get half of his.

"You busy or something?" Jack finally spoke up again after a bit of silence.

"What?" Daniel asked, a bit distracted.

"You busy?"

"No, why?" Daniel flinched when Vala smacked his arm. "Jack, what's up? You called me, remember?"

"Yeah. I figured you had the weekend off. Sam and I were thinking of going up to the cabin. Mitchell is planning his infirmary break-out as we speak. Teal'c's helping. Make it a team weekend. What do you think?"

Vala was shaking her head vigorously. Obviously she could hear both sides of the conversation.

Daniel rolled his eyes again. Like she thought he was going to pack up and go back tonight? But how to tell Jack no without arousing any suspicion. "Uh, thanks, Jack. But I'm already…settled in for the night. It's actually kind of late."

"Come up tomorrow then."

Vala's eyes widened. She held her breath, wondering how Daniel was going to get them out of this.

"Thanks, Jack. You guys have a nice time. I've got some stuff to do." He glared at Vala when she rolled her eyes, shook her head and mouthed the word lame. He knew it was lame. But he didn't have any brilliant ideas on how to get out of this. Jack was like a dog with a bone at times like these. He wasn't just going to give up.

"Ok. Another time then."

Daniel and Vala met eyes and shared a confused expression. That just wasn't right. Something was wrong. Jack never gave up like that. Daniel shook his head and said carefully, "Oh, ok. Thanks, though. You guys have a nice weekend."

"Yeah." Jack answered. "You guys too. Say hi to Vala for us. Congratulations, by the way."

The phone went dead.

Jack had been immensely pleased that his cell phone had good speakers. He'd put it on speaker phone as soon as he'd heard Daniel pick up. It had been somewhat difficult to keep everyone in the peanut gallery quiet as he'd talked to Daniel. Sam had been having giggling fits, Mitchell had been making under his breath comments. At least Teal'c had been quiet. Jack closed the phone and looked around the infirmary.

"No way!"

Sam laughed out loud at Cameron's exclamation. He was holding his ribs and groaning. Jack had a look of smug satisfaction on his face and Teal'c was just nodding sagely. Cameron finally managed to squeak out, "I don't believe it! He did not go and marry her!"

"Oh, I think he did." Sam grinned. "Finally."

"But, how?" Cameron continued, "How? Why now? What changed?" He looked over at the General accusingly. "And how the heck did you know?"

Jack grinned, "Who do you think was involved with the rather complicated interplanetary divorce proceedings that the former Miss Mal Doran recently went through? Perks of being a general, Mitchell, perks of being a general."

Daniel stared at his phone wordlessly. For several moments, they were silent. Finally he turned the phone off completely and set it aside. He looked at Vala who had the most adorably confused expression on her face. She scooted closer to him and whispered, "Does that mean he knows?"

"That means everyone knows, Vala." Daniel groaned and put a hand to his head. This was not the way he had intended for this to go.

"How does he do that?" She tilted her head, looking around the room suspiciously and pulling the covers up around her a bit more tightly. "Spies?"

"I don't know."

"So what do we do?"

"Whatever we want to do." He smiled at her and grabbed the menu. "What did you decide?"

Vala reached for the hotel phone, dialed and quickly placed their order. Finishing the order, she smiled at him, "If everyone else knows, does that mean you can finally say it out loud?"

"Say what?"

"Say what you haven't said all this time." She put her arms around his neck and pulled him closer. "All these years, all this time, I've been waiting to hear you say…"

"I love you."

Vala grinned, her heart warmed at the sound of those three little words. "You do?"

"I always have."

"I knew it!" She kissed him. "I love you too."

"I knew that."

Thanks for reading! Hope you enjoyed! I love reviews…let me know what you thought! :D