Eight Years Experience

(Set During Atlantis Rising, after the expedition goes through to Pegasus)

The phone rang and Jack glared at it, snapping his pencil in half. He was way too tense. If his eyes had the power to burn holes in solid objects that phone would have been smoking. He really didn't want to talk to anyone at the moment. However, he was the General so he had a duty. Didn't mean he had to be nice about it. Yanking the phone off the hook, he growled into it, "O'Neill."

There was a demure laugh on the other end of the line. "I take it your day is going well, sir."

Jack's mood instantly improved. "Carter."

"Hello."

"Hello yourself." He smiled slightly, sitting back in his chair. "Whatcha doin'?"

"Sitting on the beach."

"Oh? Having fun, are we?"

"It's been great, sir." There was a pause and Jack could almost see Carter smirking all the way from California. "So, sir."

"Yes, Carter?"

"How'd it go?"

"Oh, it went."

"Drove you half crazy, did he?"

"Half?"

"Pestered you endlessly?"

Jack gave that some thought, "You know, he's been more restrained than I thought possible."

"Did he smuggle himself in a crate?"

"No, no, although I think he seriously thought about it."

"I bet he did. I can't believe you managed to keep him from going."

Jack took a deep breath. He couldn't quite believe it himself. "He probably won't ever speak to me again."

"Oh, I don't know, sir. He's still speaking to you after all these years and all the crap you've put him through." He could hear her smile.

"What about all the crap he's put me through?" Jack countered, "There's been plenty of that!"

"Of course, sir."

He hated it when she agreed with him in that tone of voice.

"So tell me all about it! I wanted so badly to fly back and see the team off. It has been killing me to be so far away!"

"It was a logistical nightmare, Carter. People everywhere with all their..." he floundered, "Stuff. Couldn't go anywhere without tripping over something or someone."

For the next fifteen minutes, he brought her up to speed on the departure of the team to Atlantis. It had been unfortunate timing that Jacob had been back and wanted to take a family vacation to San Diego. She had wanted to stay in order to be a part of the preparation for the Atlantis expedition, but Jacob's time had been limited. So she and Jacob had flown out to California to spend a couple weeks at the beach with her brother and his family.

"They really got to Atlantis." Carter's voice was awed. "That's just incredible, sir!"

For the next few minutes, Jack listened with an indulgent smile as she excitedly rambled on about just how incredible it was. He was glad the SGC was quiet at present and his door was closed. No one was likely to interrupt him for the near future. He put his feet up on the edge of the desk and closed his eyes, enjoying her voice. When she reached a lull, he interjected, "Good to hear your voice, Carter."

She paused, then her voice took a more quiet tone, "It's good to hear your voice too, sir."

He smiled. "It just seems like such a long time since we've talked."

"It's been about twelve hours, sir."

"Such a long time."

"Yes, sir."

He grinned. She was indulging him. Just like always. He loved this. He also loved their chats. They'd spoken at least once every single day since she'd been gone. It was almost like old times. Fiddling with his yo-yo, Jack had that nagging feeling that his life was close to incomplete without her. He'd known this for years, of course, but now that he wasn't going out on missions with SG-1 anymore, it was becoming more and more obvious to him. He missed her.

"I miss you too, sir." She said softly, clearly reading his mind.

"Aw, Carter, you're getting so sentimental in your..."

"My what, sir?" She had a challenging edge to her voice now.

"Your, your vacationing state."

"Mmhm." She clearly didn't believe him. "Well, in my vacationing state I'm about to go for another swim with the kids."

He could hear laughing and young voices in the background. "Ok, have fun. Say hi to Jacob for me."

"I will. Get out of the office, sir. I know you've had enough paperwork. It'll keep till tomorrow. Go take Daniel a pizza and tell him how much you would have missed him if he'd gone to Atlantis."

Jack stared at the phone. "Are you drunk, Carter?"

She giggled, "Maybe a little, sir. Just go be nice."

"I'm always nice."

"Mmhm. Talk to you tomorrow."

"Bye, Carter."

"Bye, sir."

He hung the phone up and looked at the clock. Almost 2100. Too late for pizza. Nah. Daniel would still be up. Jack grimaced and got to his feet. He wasn't sure he really wanted to do this tonight. Daniel had taken the whole thing better than he'd expected, but he figured the man had been moping ever since he'd last seen him. He hadn't seemed upset when he'd walked out of the control room and disappeared, but that didn't mean he wasn't cursing Jack O'Neill's name in some dark corner.

Oh well.

He flicked off the lights and headed out.

Daniel wasn't entirely surprised when there was a knock at his door. He closed his book and stood up, smelling the pizza through the door. He was starving. He'd left shortly after the Atlantis Expedition had made it through the Gate and had been working on translations at his table ever since. Translating Ancient writing would have been a good distraction if it wasn't a continual reminder that he wasn't part of that Atlantis Expedition. Taking a deep breath, he unlocked the door.

"Daniel."

"Jack."

"Pizza."

"So I see."

"Want some?"

Daniel nodded. "Yes, actually I really do."

Jack nodded triumphantly and marched into the living room. "Thought so."

Closing the door, Daniel headed for the kitchen and grabbed two beers. He had a feeling Jack thought he needed to apologize for something. He smiled. Sure, he was disappointed not to have gone to Atlantis. Extremely disappointed. But he wasn't as upset as he thought Jack thought he was. By the time he joined Jack in the living room, a slice of pizza was already missing.

"Missed dinner?"

Jack groaned and put his feet up on the coffee table, accepting the beer. "Paperwork. Mountain of paperwork. Sending a group of people on a top secret mission to an uncharted other galaxy should not involve so much paperwork."

"Who's going to read it?"

"Exactly." Jack nodded sagely, "It's so classified that the laptop on which I wrote the report doesn't have high enough security clearance to even process it."

Daniel snickered and helped himself to a slice. He had missed dinner too. Distractions were great except when they distracted you so much you forgot to eat and wound up starving at almost 2200. For a few minutes, they ate in silence. Daniel was curious about how Jack was going to bring up the Atlantis expedition. That was surely the reason for his arrival.

"So."

"So."

"Whatcha been up to?"

"Research."

"Ah."

Sensing a dead zone ahead, Daniel elaborated, "I've been working on translating some of the script we found at the Antarctic outpost."

"Ah." Jack's expression turned wary.

Daniel gave him a five minute lecture on what he'd found and, although he kept his face from showing it, he was amused to no end at how interesting Jack seemed to find it all. Oh yeah, Jack thinks I'm furious with him for not letting me go to Atlantis. He finally stopped talking and smiled. It was time to put Jack out of his misery.

Jack raised his eyebrows. "What?"

"Jack, I'm not angry with you."

"No?"

"No."

Jack frowned, trying to ascertain if this was the truth or not. "Really?"

"Jack, I'm disappointed of course. I want desperately to go and see the lost city of the Ancients! How could I not?" Daniel shook his head. "You want to go almost as badly as I do."

"What? Me?" Jack shook his head.

"Yes you. I could see it in your eyes."

"You saw nothing of the kind." Jack grabbed another slice.

"You want to go. You want to see it too." Daniel argued. "You're just as curious as me."

Jack laughed, "Nobody is as curious as you are, Daniel. Nobody."

"Ok, but you're still curious."

"Alright, so I'm curious." Jack admitted. It was true. "But I'm not ready to run through a one-way wormhole to who knows what. I happen to like Earth. Being stranded off world with no hope of getting home once was enough for me."

Daniel nodded slowly, his mind wandering back to the year he himself had spent off world. He hadn't really missed Earth that much. He smiled slowly, "It just depends on the company."

Knowing exactly what Daniel was thinking, Jack smiled, "True. If we were still SG-1 and we got the mission, I'd have gone."

"We are still SG-1, Jack." Daniel countered, knowing Jack was missing being on the team as much as they all missed him.

Jack nodded slowly.

Daniel looked down at the empty pizza box. The evening could be ending. He didn't really feel like sleeping, though. And he had a feeling someone else needed the distraction as much as he did. He stood up and grabbed the chessboard. It was Friday night and there was no reason not to play a game. Or two. It had been obvious that Jack was still acclimating to his new job position; and not necessarily finding the transition very easy. Jack often accused him of being oblivious, but Daniel knew what was going on and that was why he had forced himself to be as self-controlled as he could possibly be about the Atlantis trip. Of course, he hadn't been able to help himself from being a bit pushy at times.

"You've been showing great restraint."

Daniel looked up in surprise. There he goes again, reading my mind.

Jack just studied him sagely, "I know you've been unusually restrained. With as nuts as this place has been lately...I appreciate it. And I appreciate it even more knowing how much this meant to you."

Setting up the pieces, Daniel nodded slowly. "Like I said, it just depends on the company."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning, well, I guess I'd rather stick with the devil I know."

"Excuse me?"

Daniel grinned. "It's taken us over eight years to..." he moved his hand back and forth between them, "to develop this..."

"This..."

"Yes, this."

"Yes." Jack smiled.

"And it would probably take that long, or even longer to develop it with what was his name?"

"Sheppard?"

"Yeah, him. Too much work." Daniel shook his head, and sat back in his chair. "Besides I don't think I would get along very well with Dr. McKay."

"Oh, I'd pay money to see you work closely with McKay for an extended period of time." Jack grinned at the thought.

"More than you'd pay to see Sam working with him?"

Jack gave that some thought. "You're right. I think I'd rather see them work, or not work, together."

Daniel made his first move.

"So your decision to not aggravate me about this expedition was just because you thought it was easier to stick around here?"

"Devil I know." Daniel repeated, grinning and taking Jack's pawn.

Jack grunted and moved his rook up to threaten Daniel's bishop. He was secretly pleased to know Daniel wasn't furious with him. He was also happy to know that Daniel seemingly had finally, finally decided his place was with them.

"Besides." Daniel said, "You'd have missed me."

"What?" Jack's head snapped up. Daniel was smiling at him, knowingly. "Miss you? Nah. It would make my life a lot easier if you were in another galaxy."

"True." Daniel had to admit it.

"But I'm not sure that Dr. Weir is up to the job."

"She's extremely experienced, Jack."

"She has no experience whatsoever in dealing with you." Jack countered. "That takes over eight years to develop..."

"So you're an expert?"

"The only one in existence." Jack nodded proudly.

"I'm curious. If I had been angry with you, what exactly were you prepared to do to get back on my good side?"

Jack snorted. "What are you talking about? After eight years, you think I don't know what I'm doing? You liked the pizza, didn't you?"

Daniel laughed. It was nice to know that even when things changed, they really did stay the same.