Apologies to the nth degree. I meant to publish this months ago but wasn't sure it was finished. If it isn't now, it never will be. Small, explanatory chapter epilogue plus omakes yet to come. I hope you haven't all given up on me as I really have appreciated every review and hit this story has garnered.
I disclaim. Neither the characters of Stargate nor the lines "she used her body just like a bandage / she used my body just like a wound" belong to me.
She Used Her Body Just like a Bandage
"There is no time like the present" is a misquotation of the famous Ter'fin'aki proverb, "There is no time but the present".
Suddenly realising the truth of the statement, Daniel loses himself in the moment of knowing that she stands before him. Against all the odds and all common sense, he has played Orpheus to her Eurydice and rescued her from the Underworld.
When later asked, Persephone will point out that this is a much better fate for Daniel than being ripped to pieces by wild women made mad by his rejection of them and his body parts thrown in the river as Orpheus was. Jack will shudder in response and then consider picking the hot Goddess up before remembering that she is one of the race that made Daniel 1) multicoloured and 2) comatose.
There are moments that can change a person's life forever, that are crossroads of the soul where the Devil offers the sweet damnation of success, and where worlds are won and lost in the flick of a forked tongue.
This moment is not one of those but it marks a landmark in human history which will be debated by Daniel's academic successors for the millennia to come. The Ter'fin'aki will offer humans an escalator on the mountain path to becoming the Sixth Race and immortal words are to be spoken by Earth's representatives. The speech will be listened to in as much awe as those who heard Neil Armstrong step onto the moon.
Step forward Colonel Jack O'Neill.
"You god damned, delusional, snake ridden, arrogant, evil, self-righteous sons of bitches!" The Colonel's right hook has lost none of its impact and he curses aloud as instead of Persephone his fist hits the Stargate. "You come here with-"
Before he can get any further, there is a small tug on his uniform.
"Daaad!" It is Charlie's 'you're just so embarrassing' tone that convinces Jack that the apparitions are really their loved ones and their solidity is affirmed when his so-real 8 year old boy's arms fling around his neck in a bear-cub hug.
Shau'ri is staring at Daniel like a miser at Ali Baba's treasure trove.
"No, no, no," Daniel, so weak from his ordeal, scoots back. "I failed you, I chose not to save you, I left you!" The final three words seem to be torn from his very soul.
Shau'ri kneels next to him and her warm, slightly work roughened hands grip his. "Dan'yel, my Dan'yel."
As he breaks down in his wife's arms, Persephone snaps her fingers to make the picture more congruent and Daniel's skin tone loses its Technicolor shading, fading to pale brown.
Walter and more than one of the Marines quietly sniff back tears. They have seen Daniel suffer for years from the grief and guilt over the loss of his wife, seen the fire in his eyes extinguished when she died, seen him grieve all over again when he had to first give birth to a child hers and not his, then give up that child to protect it from the creature that had kidnapped and raped his wife and tortured him.
Jack hadn't believed that a woman more beautiful than Demeter existed until he saw Persephone in her full glory. His standards were then refined once more when he saw Shau'ri Jackson wrapping herself around Daniel like the world's prettiest teddy bear. All Persephone had was gorgeous bone structure, flawless skin and godhood. Shau'ri had Daniel's happiness in the palm of her hand. The only thing more beautiful than that was the small boy who had yet to let go of his father for an instant.
Colonel Jack O'Neill wasn't crying, nothing so girlish and soppy as that, he was full blown sobbing till he choked.
Teal'c raised an elegant eyebrow of, well not surprise, but perhaps the word would be curiosity. Then his handsome dignified face was split by the biggest grin the Marines had ever seen and internally, he did Chulak's Dance of Happiness and Triumph Over Enemies Whose Names Are Cursed and Whose Graves are Spat Upon.
It was, perhaps, a good thing that Teal'c did this only internally as the only thing standing between Hammond and a full on nervous breakdown was the big Jaffa's calm and grace under pressure.
The importance of this calm becomes especially clear when it is realised that Daniel would have recognised it as a variation of Bullet-Led-Tap-Dance Rhythm he himself had once performed.
The world was simply not ready for Teal'c to dance the Funky Chicken in public.
"Are they real?" One marine is quietly fingering his M16 as the mountain's favourite team acts most uncharacteristically.
Even scarier than Jack's tears are Teal'c's grins, scarier than that is the look on Carter's face as she questions Persephone, scariest of all is the love so palpable between Shau'ri and the Doc. Terrifying because it promises so much happiness and has instead brought so much pain.
Then she is kissing him and the love that was a bonfire becomes a nuclear explosion.
"Oh yeah," the second marine answers, "they're real."
"And this, this is the food of the gods, blue jello." Jack is showing Shau'ri and Charlie around the base while Daniel is forcibly restrained as he is checked by Janet's nurses. He begged for Shau'ri to remain but Janet had showed her the needles and Abydos's toughest lady had flinched and hidden behind Jack. Daniel had wondered if he should be insulted by that but then he would have done the same in her place.
"Jello?" Shau'ri's English is perfect, made more attractive rather than less by the Abydos accent, but she doesn't know what Jello is despite Daniel's attempts to explain.
"Yeah, jello, it's great," Charlie nods happily as he digs into the dish. Jack's eyes are on him and the love between them is as transparent as the boy's food.
"Do you have any," Shau'ri searches for the unfamiliar word, "Ice-cream? Dan'yel described it to me and once tried to make some with the milk of the female Mastadge but it," again words fail her and she pouts as she thinks, "tasted of feet."
"Feet?" Charlie is fascinated.
"No, I mean boots – 'army boots boiled in sand and then frozen for three days' is how Dan'yel described it."
The burst of laughter from Jack is enough to turn any gaze that has not already been pointed their way.
Hammond is standing in the doorway, thinking how much happier Jack looks now. He is shocked by the thought that he has barely noticed his premier team disintegrate. Reese was the final blow to their morale. The fragments of the friendship that had once been as strong as naquadah lay buried now between the new layers of hope and love.
The report on what Daniel had done to regain Charlie O'Neill and Shau'ri Jackson would have to wait. The General had no intention of disrupting the happiest day SG-1 had had in years.
Janet comes to tell him that Daniel is strangely fine, and not in his usual "No, really this is just a terrible haemorrhaging head wound that isn't really worse than a papercut, I'm fine" way but actually perfectly healthy. Persephone had fixed his skin, removed any weakness following the coma and even improved his eyesight. Now he was only as blind as a bat, not as blind as a naked mole-rat.
Hammond shook his head at that thought – too many hours of watching Animal Planet with his beloved granddaughters were clearly damaging his General Calm.
"It is really them, isn't it?" Janet is still standing at his elbow. Her eyes are fixed on the scene before them as Daniel rejoins his beloved wife and Shau'ri's eyes widen as she eats ice-cream for the first time. In seconds the bowl is empty and she holds it out for more. A marine rushes to fetch it for her. It has taken 22 minutes and 46 seconds, but Shau'ri Jackson has captured the heart of the entire base.
"Yes, General. It's definitely them. I don't know how it could have happened but it did and I think we just need to be grateful. SG-1 were beginning to crack." Janet sighed as she watched them. "I've yet to write my medical report, sir."
She left a meaningful pause then went on. "Sir, what are we going to do when Area-51 find out about this? They're going to want to pump Shau'ri for information and I don't even want to imagine what they'll do to her and Charlie when they realise that they're back from the dead."
Hammond never took his eyes off the quartet but a smile played around his lips as they were joined by Sam and Teal'c. "What we always do, Major."
The Doctor raised an eyebrow elegantly. "Lie our asses off?"
The General's smile is as bright as the Texas sun at noon on a hot June day. "Precisely."
Unbeknownst to anyone at the SGC, several thousand light years away, a planet called Kelowna blew itself up with a naquadah enhanced bomb.
A still disembodied Lachesis – he wasn't due for incarnation into his new female avatar for another 3 millennia – grinned as his plans came to fruition. Daniel had only assumed he was saving the world from Snake-Thing and Minthe. Actually he was saving it several times over and the loss of Kelowna would, incidentally, cause several other planets to flourish as SG-1 arrived intact and sans-Jonas. Lachesis had big plans for his pet archaeologist. Those Ori were really getting on his currently incorporeal 32DD tits.
Jack digs deep into his Jello and realises that life has never been so good. "So the Kid did good work today. You two should be very proud."
"The Kid?" Shau'ri's brow crinkles as she stares at Jack in wonderment.
Jack waves a Jello-free spoon in the air carelessly. "You know, the Kid, your son, the Harcesis child Shi-fu."
"You called him WHAT?" Jack winces at the sudden rise in volume.
Daniel stares down at his bowl as Charlie hides a smirk. He knows all about when parents fight and he finds it particularly funny when it's Shau'ri using her Angry Voice which she usually reserves for Hades himself. "Shi-fu. It means light."
"I know what it means." The Marines are sneaking looks at each other as a tornado hits paradise in the shape of Shau'ri's soon to be infamous temper. "I want to know why you did not do as I instructed and name him in the Abydonian-Earth tradition?"
"I didn't get to keep him. The Ancient Oma Desala is helping him cope with his power. She called him that." Daniel's head is down but his eyes are bright. Jack wonders if Shau'ri's sudden reappearance will cause problems for the couple. They had had a tumultuous time since they'd been together last – and that wasn't counting the whole pregnant with the Harcesis child of your greatest enemy thing. This couldn't be smooth sailing, could it? No, nothing was ever easy for Daniel Jackson.
"Oh my Dan'yel," Shau'ri's eyes are full of tears as she wraps her arms around him. She knows how he feels about leaving people behind, refusing to abandon anyone as he had been abandoned so many times before. Giving Oma Desala the Harcesis child cannot have been an easy decision. "My Dan'yel."
For the second time that day, Jack and the Marines felt tears welling up. They weren't going to cry in the Mess Hall though so everyone made sniffing noises, coughed and muttered something about allergies to the food.
Persephone watched from near General Hammond, invisible, and smiled. Her time on Earth was almost done – she had left her mother and husband to sort out their differences in the Underworld and if she didn't get back soon she suspected Zeus would end up descending to stop the fight and when Zeus appeared, Hera could not be far behind. Thinking of the matriarch of the Ter'fin'aki, Persephone shuddered and snapped her fingers.
For a brief moment Shau'ri and Daniel's skin pulsed gold and then it was gone, but in that moment he forgot all the torments of Tartarus and knew only he had suffered but it was over now. Shau'ri forgot less and more, and never clearly remembered her years as the host of Ammonet or her days in the Underworld, but would be able to tell him all about the days she had spent with the others at the Haven.
Just before Persephone vanished back into her own world, she heard Jack ask, "So what did you want to call him?"
And Shau'ri responded in the finest tradition of Abydos, "Jack-Daniel's."
His laughter would resound through the Kingdom of the Dead and eventually reach Melbourne and Claire Jackson who would smile, hold each other's hands and laugh their heads off too.
Later that night, Jack and Charlie watch the hockey together, waiting for Sarah to come. How he's going to explain that their eight-year-old son who died seven years before is alive and well but still only eight he doesn't know and nor does he care. Nor will she.
Happiness, at last, is his.
He wonders how far Shau'ri and her Dan'yel got before they gave into the passion that was so clearly burning between them. Shau'ri was damaged, but then so was Daniel. He wouldn't be surprised if they didn't get out of the base before they caved.
Teal'c was above betting on such things but he won any moral bet when he had said simply "Daniel Jackson and Shau'ri Jackson will reach the carpark and no further" before disappearing to Kel'no'reem.
Shau'ri is alive.
He has lost and gained and saved the world again.
The sun is brilliant as it shines on her face.
The breeze is sweet as it stirs her hair.
The music is wild as she dances with whirling feet.
The fire burnishes their bodies bronze as it warms her bones.
The ice-cream pools as he feeds her body.
The only life is that shared with her.
There is nothing without her.
He breathes deeply and lets the darkness of her eyes take him.
She uses her body just like a bandage.
She uses his body just like a wound.
The scars will linger but not forever. In the hot night Daniel finds solace in her arms.
He breathes deeply and lets the darkness of her eyes take him.
"My Dan'yel," she whispers softly.
At last, he finds peace.
Watching, Lachesis hisses "It's about damn time" and for once, Jack would agree.
