Chapter Seven

"Danny . . . Danny honey, come on sweet heart, it's time to get up." Claire Jackson spoke softly to her son as she rubbed his head. "Come on now, Danny, wake up . . ."

Turning his head this way and that, he groaned. "No, Ma. Wanna sleep."

The sound of distant talking kept bugging him. "Maaaaa, wanna sleep. Go way." Daniel mumbled as he turned over away from the noise.

Dr. Fraiser and Dr. Addie walked over to him after they heard his muttering. Placing a hand on his forehead, Janet whispered to him, "Hey you. Coming back to life now?"

Slowly opening his eyes, Daniel tried to focus. "Wha . . . wha . . ." He looked around with fear quickly growing on his face. "Mom?"

Janet looked over to Dr. Addie with concern. "Daniel? What's wrong?"

Curling up on his side and hiding under his blanket, he began to whimper. "Want my mom, where is she?"

Dr. Addie sat down next to him and with a pointed look at Janet; the CMO turned and left the room.

"Hey, Daniel, do you remember me?"

Peeking out from under his blanket, he eyed the man suspiciously. "No." He pouted. "Where is my mom?"

"Daniel, how old are you?" Mike asked him.

"Eight. Who are you?" He asked in a small voice.

"My name is Dr. Addie. You can call me Mike though." The new doctor answered him.

Daniel frowned in concentration, "My dad told me not to call adults by their first names, its dis . . . dis-re-spect . . . ful."

Nodding his head, he accepted that, "Okay then, Dr. Addie is fine." Mike smiled at Daniel and asked, "Is it okay if I ask you some questions?"

"Sure." Daniel quietly said.

"Were you dreaming just now?" Mike queried.

"Yes. About my Mom and about Egypt. I used to live there." Daniel sat up suddenly, all excited. "Do you know about Egypt? I was born there. My mom and dad are archeologist. We lived in Cairo."

Daniel seemed very happy talking about Egypt, so Mike let him ramble on.

"My mom and dad would have been considered 'scribes', those people were very well thought of. I want to be just like my parents."

"That's cool. What can you tell me about the pharaohs?" Mike asked him.

Daniel thought for a moment, "First of all, they didn't call themselves 'pharaohs'. They were kings. The word pharaoh really comes from the Greek and was used in the bible. It started out in the Egyptian 'Per-aa', which means 'Great House'."

"Wow . . . you really know your stuff!"

"Yeah . . ." Daniel giggled.

Mike smiled at how excited the 'young boy' in the body of the man before him, was getting. "What else can you tell me? Do you know any of the pharaohs . . . excuse me, kings names?"

"Sure! Which dynasty?"

Laughing, Mike told him, "Well . . . um, how about the one King Tut was in. He's really the only one I know."

Daniel smirked at him. "Okay. That was considered the 'New Kingdom'. Kind'a the renaissance period for Egypt. King Tut was in the 18th Dynasty.

"First king was Ahmose from 1539-1514. Then Amenhotep I 1514-1493, Thutmose I 1493-1481, Thutmose II 1491-1479, Hatshepsut 1473-1458, Thutmose III 1504-1450, Amenhotep II 1427-1392, Thutmose IV 1419-1386, Amenhotep III 1382-1344, Amenhotep IV 1350-1334, Smenkhkare 1330-1334, Tutankhamun 1334-1325, Ay 1325-1321, and Horemheb 1323-1295." Taking a deep breath, Daniel grinned at Mike, who just sat there with his mouth hanging open.

"Wow!" He finally said, "That's a lot of information. I'm impressed."

"Thanks. My mom said that I absorb knowledge . . . like a sponge. That's what she called me sometimes."

Daniel's face turned sad at that thought. He realized that he phrased that in the past tense. He grew very quiet and withdrawn. Mike watched as before his eyes the excited little boy become a scared and confused little boy.

"She's dead." Daniel whispered as tears streamed from his eyes. Mike got up and sat next to him, putting his arm around his shoulders.

"Do you want to talk about it, Daniel?"

With a sob, he leaned into Mike's embrace, shaking his head no.

"It might help if you do." The young doctor encouraged.

Outside the room, the klaxon sounded at the same time as someone in the hallway tipped over a cart. The resulting crash sent Daniel into hysterics. Jumping up he tried to run away, pulling the IV out of his arm. He screamed out as the shunt ripped from the back of his hand. Scampering into a corner, Daniel curled up into a small ball and covered his head, weeping unconsolingly . He wouldn't let Mike get near him. Every time the doctor tried to touch him, Daniel would shove him or hit at him, howling, "GO 'WAY . . ."

Dr. Fraiser rushed in to try and help, only to have Mike tell her to get out and close the door. Looking affronted, she left.

"Daniel, let me help you."

"No . . . no . . ." he cried. "Mommy . . ."

"Daniel, your mom is dead. You just told me that. Do you remember what happened? How she died?"

Shaking like the preverbal leaf, the despondent man whimpered. "She . . . she . . ." Sniffling and wiping his hands over his face, he tried again; "She and my dad were crushed under a cover stone. They didn't move out of the way in time . . . I, I . . . I saw the whole thing happen."

"How do you feel about that?" Mike asked him gently.

Daniel looked up at him with such sadness and misery, Mike felt so sorry for him. He didn't want to see the young man suffer like this.

With a moan, Daniel buried his head in his arms again. From under his barrier, he mumbled, "Mad. It makes me mad." He began to cry again, "I don't want to be mad at them. I loved them . . . but they left me alone. All alone. And . . . and Grandpa Nick, he, he . . . he didn't want me. He didn't want to take care of me. Why?" He howled out and grabbed Dr. Addie, crying into the man's shoulder.

Rubbing Daniel's back and speaking soothingly, Mike began to get his charge to calm down. When the shaking stopped, the Doctor pulled Daniel up and got him back to the bed.

"It's okay now, Daniel. It happened a long time ago. You're safe now. With friends who love you and are worried about you."

Waiting for a few minutes, he asked, "Feel like talking anymore, Daniel?"

Turning sorrowful blue eyes towards the doctor, he shook his head.

"All right," Mike accepted, "how about we let Dr. Fraiser patch up your hand there, then we can take a walk. Would you like that?"

"Outside?" Daniel asked hopefully.

"I'll see what I can do, Daniel." He smiled at him.

****

In the early evening, Sam sat with O'Neill as he ate his blue Jell-O. It was painfully quiet. She wasn't sure how much he knew what was going on with his friend.

With a strained voice she queried, "How long are you in here for?"

"Ah . . . Little Napoleon said tomorrow afternoon, but I plan to be home tonight." He gave her a mischievous grin. Placing the empty bowl on his tray, Jack became serious. "Carter, is Daniel . . . I mean, has Daniel . . . well, has he said anything to you about . . . what . . . what happened?"

Shaking her head no, she replied quietly, "Sorry, Sir. He hasn't talked to me about it at all. He's been with Dr. Addie all day today. Even got to go outside for a little while. Most of the time he has been bouncing between six and eight years old, Dr. Addie said."

Looking at her with a suspicious eye, O'Neill asked, "Do you like this . . . head shrinker? Trust him?"

"I really haven't gotten to talk with him much, Sir."

"Your gut instinct, Carter," he fussed at her, "what does your gut say?"

Scrunching up her forehead, she absent mindedly nibbled on her lip while thinking, "Yeah. Yeah I do. I believe he may be able to help Daniel not only with what happened . . . you know, now. But also with what happened when he was a kid.

"You remember what he was like when we finally got out of the 'game keepers' clutches. No one could get through to him. He was a mess. Then to top it all off we go to Shyla's planet and he gets addicted to the sarc. I think it was only after you helped him come down off that, that things started looking up for him a little.

"We all have our childhood horror stories, Sir. It just seems to me, Daniel's got more then most."

Jack nodded and closed his eyes in a silent grief. He now was responsible for dredging up all those horror stories and adding quite a few more. Both personally and by having him on the frontline team of planet hoping soldiers.

"I think I'm going to ask Hammond to remove him from the team. Have him assigned to a science team or just head-up his departments only, not go off world any more." He said quietly.

Shocked, Sam almost shouted at her C.O., "NO!"

Jack looked at her with raised eyebrows, "Captain?"

"I mean, Sir," she calmed down to explain herself, "if you do that, you might as well tell him you think he's a . . . a useless, weakling. And you know he's not!"

"I do know that, Carter! I just can't see justifying my participation in adding to the horrors in his life."

"Oh, Sir. With all due respect," Carter snorted, "That's bullshit."

Peering at her incredulously, he realized she was right. "Yeah, yeah . . . it is. I just don't want to see him get hurt anymore."

"Daniel's strong, Sir. You know he is or you wouldn't have had him on your team in the first place. He's just forgotten it right now. But I really think with Dr. Addie's help, he'll be back. And knowing Daniel, better then ever."

Jack smiled at his 2IC. "Can't keep a good 'space monkey' down, can we?"

She giggled at him and nodded, "Nope. Can't even seem to kill this one either." Turning serious, she patted O'Neill's shoulder, "You should get some sleep. That might impress Janet enough to let you go home early."

Settling down on his pillow and watching Carter leave, he called out to her, "Carter."

She turned and looked at him.

"Um, thanks. You know, for . . . well, just . . ." he waves a hand in little circles as if that tells her what he wanted to say.

And since she knows him so well, she does understand what he wanted to say, "Sure. Good night, Sir."

****

He was so tired. He wasn't sure how far he had run, but he knew he couldn't go much further. The angry shouts behind him were pushing him to his limit. He had to escape. Had to get out. But to where? He wasn't even sure where he was. Everything looked the same. Trees. And more trees.

Chancing a glimpse behind him, Daniel tripped on a branch and went crashing down. Stunned, he laid there for a moment and tried to catch his breath. Then the hands descended onto him, roughly pulling him to his feet. He tried to kick and punch at his captors, but they just laughed at his feeble attempts and beat him. He got a look at one of them just before he was hit in the face and knocked out. It was Hayes. Only he had on a uniform. An Air Force uniform.

When the blackness receded, Daniel could tell he was bound to a tree. Looking up, he saw a group of Jaffa milling around something, but he couldn't make out what it was. Then Hayes came over to him with a wicked grin on his face.

"Hey there, Danny. Glad you finally decided to join us." He growled in that horrible voice that Daniel hated that he remembered so clearly. "I got somethin' for you, Danny. Wanna see?"

The Jaffa parted and Daniel could see very clearly now, five freshly dug graves. Two were filled with his parents. The other three were empty. Just then, a couple more Jaffa marched three children out of a near by tent and had them parade by Daniel and then kneel one in front of each grave.

Daniel shook his head and muttered, "No . . . no . . ."

Hayes walked over to the first child and savagely twisted his head around so that the archeologist could see the boy. He may have been young, but Daniel would know Teal'c at any age. Hayes put a gun to the boys head.

"NOOOOO!" Daniel screamed. The other two children turned to look at him and he could see the images of Sam and Jack as clear as day on their young faces.

Hayes put the gun down and walked back over to Daniel, giving the youthful Teal'c a kick. "Tell you what, Danny. You don't ever mention what happened with us again, and your friends will be spared." Pulling Daniel's face around to look him in the eyes, the linguist gasped when he saw Jack's face and not Hayes' "We got an understanding now, Danny boy?"

Daniel nodded. A tear sliding down his grubby cheek.

"Good. But just to make sure you really comprehend . . ."

Jack turned quickly and fired at one of the children. The Jaffa cheered and ran over to the fallen victim and easily cut the head off. Daniel closed his eyes in utter revulsion, and wept. He wasn't sure which of the children were killed and he didn't want to know. But when everything suddenly went quiet, he chanced a look.

There, staring at him with sightless blue eyes was his childhood head on a pike.

The scream had everyone on level 21 racing to ISO room 2. When Doctors Fraiser and Addie got there, they found Daniel covered in sweat, crying hysterically, and Jack O'Neill holding him, rocking him, trying to sooth the nightmare.

"Shhhh, Daniel. It's all right. Everything will be okay." Jack whispered to his friend. "I won't let anything happen to you, I promise."

Still crying frantically, Daniel clung to O'Neill with all the force of a drowning man. His lifeline, his friend. And even though he knew somewhere in his twisted, mixed up mind that Jack was the start of this latest trip through hell, he was also his best friend and the first one to get to him when he awoke from the nightmare.