Hi, guys! Sorry it took so long... Life has interfered. Happily, I've decided what college I want to go to, so that won't intrude anymore... :)
This story has now been beta'd! Hope you like it!
-Emilie :)

Daniel

My head hurts.

And somebody's mad at me.

That's really all I can figure out right now. I mean, the head thing is obvious, right? My head hurts, that's all there is to it. I'm betting that's why I can't figure anything else out.

And the other thing, that someone's mad: I can hear yelling. It may be Janet, because I'm pretty sure it's a woman, and Sam usually doesn't yell at me, although it's possible. And the only women I really know are Sam and Janet.

I wonder idly if that makes me pathetic.

-----------------------------------------------------

My confusion has backed off—a little bit, at least. Anyway, I can think more clearly. I open my eyes, and realize that we're in a closed van or something: anyway, it's a moving vehicle, with a fair amount of room in the back. There are no windows. I'm lying down on a bench-thing, with a seatbelt to hold me in place, and there's a guy sitting on the bench across from me, grimly staring into space. He's got a gun in his lap, I realize, and I'm suddenly frightened.

I squash the emotion down, and say, "What's going on?"

The guy frowns at me. "That's none of your business," he says shortly, and turns away.

The woman speaks, the one I heard earlier. "We were kidnapped," she says.

Not Janet, I think. I look over: hey, it's Cassie! She's sitting by my head on the bench.

Dammit.

I start to sit up, but Cassie puts her hand on my shoulder. "They hit your head, Daniel. I don't think you should get up."

"I'm okay," I groan. And I am. Mostly.

The world spins and then rights itself, and I'm sitting up.

Cassie frowns. "Are you sure you're all right? You were out of it for a really long time, Daniel." She sounds a little scared.

I sigh. "I'm fine, honest. I've definitely been worse. What happened?"

"I told you, we were kidnapped. Don't you remember?"

I frown. "I remember…Jack's barbecue."

"Right," Cassie says. "For his birthday."

"We were taking the dog for a walk." The guy's frowning at me, but doesn't tell me to be quiet.

"Yeah…"

"And…we were at the park."

"Right, that's where they found us." Cassie shoots an evil look at the guy guarding us. He doesn't respond.

I sigh. "Why?"

"Will you two just shut up?"

Cass frowns. "What're you gonna do, shoot us?"

The guy frowns. "I might," he says deliberately.

Cassie snorts. "I'm sure that would please whoever you're working for, right? Shoot the kids you kidnapped? It must have been for a reason."

The guy rolls his eyes. "Fine, I won't shoot you. But shut up, you're giving me a headache."

"Don't talk to me about headaches," I mutter.

Cass looks down at me. "Daniel?"

I sigh. "Relax, I'm fine. It's just a headache, that's normal when someone brains you."

Cassie looks ready to protest again, but the guy on the other bench speaks up. "Look, girlie, the kid's okay. Trust me. When kids aren't okay, they make sure you know about it." He turns to me, and says, "And I didn't brain you."

Cass glares at him. "You don't know this kid," she tells him.

The guy rolls his eyes. "Fine," he says, "suit yourself. But like I said, stop talking, it's giving me a headache."

My head throbs in agreement.

----------------------------------------------------------------

"Hey, kids, wake up. We're here." A rough hand grabs my shoulder and takes it.

"Where?" I groan, rubbing my eyes. The headache's still there, though not as noticeable.

"Here," the voice repeats. It's the guy on the other bench—only now he's not on-the-other-bench, he's shaking us awake. "C'mon," he says, "you guys have to get up."

Cassie sighs softly: she's fallen asleep as well. "What's going on?" she says, her voice sleepy.

"Get up!" the guy says, grabbing my left arm and Cassie's right, and literally pulls us to our feet.

"All right, all right," Cassie grumbles. "You don't have to get huffy."

"Well, you weren't getting up," the guy says, a little angry.

A different voice comes from the front of the van. It says, "You aren't fighting with the kids, Mike, are you?" The voice is mocking and makes me angry, even though it's not directed at me. This guy, Mike, can't be much older than Cassie—maybe twenty—but to him, we're 'kids'—a young woman who, if she were on her own planet, would be having babies, and a 38-year-old man in a six-year-old body.

But he doesn't know, I think. Then, Wait, no being nice to these people. They kidnapped us!

"C'mon," says the guy—Mike—and opens the door. Then he gently pushes us out of the van.

We're in a garage, like you'd see in a suburb. It smells like gasoline and cigarette smoke, and I wrinkle my nose at the combination.

Mike climbs out of the van behind us. "Ready to see your friends?" he asks, smiling. He's acting nicer now.

Cassie and I look at each other. "Friends?"

"Yeah. C'mon, I'll show you." He leads us into the house, and through some rooms—kitchen, dining room, living room. We're led up some carpeted stairs, and ushered into a bedroom. It's big, but a lot of space is taken up by the two sets of bunkbeds. There are several more kids in the room, too, standing in a corner. "There ya go," the guy says. "Friends. Have fun, okay?" He closes the door, and we can hear it lock behind us.

------------------------------------------------------------

"Hi, Daniel," one of the kids says, subdued. She's in a shadow, but she steps forward when she talks: it's Lindsay. "We're in trouble, aren't we?"

I shrug. "Pretty much," I say. "Wanna introduce me to these people?" I gesture to the other kids.

"I don't know them," Lindsay says in a small voice.

Cassie looks at the others. "You guys haven't introduced yourselves?"

Headshakes. These guys are obviously all scared stiff.

"Well, why don't we all do that?" Cassie asks encouragingly. "It'll help if we all know who everybody is."

"Okay," says one boy, who looks like he's in his early teens. He's holding a little girl on his hip. "They did this at camp. Let's sit in a circle and say our names and ages and favorite food."

"Uh—" I interject, and the kids stare at me. "Instead of favorite food, why don't we say what our parents' jobs are?"

The kid rolls his eyes. "That's stupid," he says. "Why? You wanna be just like Daddy?"

I blink. "Not really," I say. "But I think it may be relevant."

I get uncomprehending blinks from some of the kids, but one boy, who's a little younger than the kid with the little girl, says, "He's right. After all, they kidnapped us. We should start gathering clues." Ah, a detective in the making.

And that Lindsay's here, along with Cass and me, is a big enough one to look to Cheyenne Mountain for the source of these kids, I think. Also, these kids are freaked out, and calming them down can only help.

"Let's get started," Cassie says, taking charge again. "C'mon, let's sit in a circle." When they do, it's easier to see what the kids are like. Cassie's the oldest. The youngest kid looks about three: she's the girl Mr. Outspoken Teen had on his hip, and she's sucking her thumb. "Okay, I'll start," Cassie says. "My name is Cassandra Frasier, and I'm seventeen. My mom works at Cheyenne Mountain."

"What about your dad?" Lindsay asks curiously.

"I don't have a father," Cassie says calmly, and turns to me. "Your turn, Daniel?"

"Sure," I say, and turn to the group. "I'm Daniel Jackson, and I'm…six. I work—uh, my father works at Cheyenne Mountain."

"A clue!" says the detective-boy, who's sitting next to me. "Me next. I'm Ben Felson. I'm twelve, and…My dad works at Cheyenne Mountain!" he crows, and then adds, "He's a marine. I think working in a dark, yucky mountain would be awful, but he says it's exiting. You next." He turns to Lindsay.

"I'm Lindsay and I'm six," says Lindsay in a small voice. "My dad is linguinist at SGC, only I don't know where that is."

"Stargazer Complex," Cassie says quickly. "They work with telescopes. That's at Cheyenne too."

Quick thinking, Cass. I sigh quietly in relief, and Cassie gives me a quick grin.

We turn to the next kid, who's the guy with the little girl. "I'm Scott," he says. "Scott Siler. I'm fourteen. This is Amy, who's three. She's my sister. And my dad's a technician—also at Cheyenne Mountain." So these are Siler's kids, I think.

We turn to the last guy, who hasn't said a word yet. "I'm ten," he says quietly, looking at his hands. "I'm Jake. My mom works at NORAD."

"In Cheyenne Mountain," Cassie concludes. "So there's our clue right there."

"Now what do we do?" asks Ben, child detective. "Do we need to look for more clues? I can interview people!"

Cassie looks at me, and I shrug.

"Hey, what're you consulting him for?" asks Scott. "He's just a baby!"

Cassie frowns at him. "This is the smartest 'baby' you're ever going to meet, Scott."

Scott shrugs and looks away. "Whatever, dude."

Jake speaks up—well, he talks. He's not very loud. "I—I don't want to be interviewed."

"I do!" says Lindsay. "It sounds really neat. Can we, Daniel?"

I look at Cassie, who says, "Whoever wants to be interviewed can be. Ben, I assume you want to be the interviewer?"

"Yeah!" he says excitedly.

"Okay," says Cassie, "but only people who want to be interviewed, and if they don't want to answer a question they don't have to."

In the end, everyone gets 'interviewed' except Jake, Cassie and me. Scott looks reluctant, but his sister Amy is so excited that he agrees to help her.

"You're pretty good with kids," I say to Cassie, while the others are playing Interview.

She shrugs. "I babysit some," she says. "How's your head?"

I smile. "It's fine, Cass, I told you. Maybe a mild concussion, but nothing worse than that, I promise."

She sighs. "Okay. Good."

We sit in silence for a minute, watching the kids play, and then Cass says, "Daniel, what are we going to do?"

I shrug. "We wait until someone rescues us, and in the meantime, if the opportunity presents itself, and there are low risks—very low risks, with the crowd we've got here—we try to escape. Most likely, though, Jack'll get here first."

Cass pouts. "Why do they want us, anyway?"

"Could be for information, could be blackmail. Ransom, possibly, but it's unlikely, considering."

"Well…if they ask, what do we tell them?"

"Just tell them your mom's a doctor at Cheyenne and you don't know what she does there. I don't think they'll torture us, so you don't have to worry about that."

Cassie goes a little pale. "Torture?" she asks quietly.

"Uh…yeah. Like I said, though, I don't think they'll go for that."

"You don't think."

I shrug. "It wouldn't make sense. We're—"

The door opens, and I shut up.

The guy who opens the door—not Mike—smiles at us. "Hey, guys," he says, and everyone stops what they're doing and looks at him. He's older than Mike, but other than that he looks a lot alike. Brothers, maybe. "I see you've all made friends. Good! Now, can one of you come with me, so me and my friends can meet you?"

I wince. Bad grammar.

"Well? Will one of you come, or do I have to choose you?" I suppress a smile: it sounds like he's threatening to call someone in a recalcitrant classroom to the blackboard.

"I'll go," I say, fully aware of how cliché this is becoming.

"Good. C'mon," says the guy, and gestures out the door. I follow.

It's just a house, I think, as we walk down the corridor. It's not something you'd think of as an ideal place to store kidnapped children. There are mirrors and bad paintings on the walls, and I can see a baseball cap sitting on a table in the corner, beside a phone.

The team, my mind screams at me. Find out what the team is, figure out what team that cap has on it!

Although I don't really follow sports, understand them, or even tolerate them, I am vaguely aware of a certain geographical loyalty on the part of the fans. I run quickly to the baseball cap, and start to act. "Cool, baseball! I love baseball. I wanna be a baseball player when I grow up. Is this your favorite team?" I look down at the cap. The Rockies is emblazoned on it. Okay. Remember that. The Rockies.

The guy smiles slightly. "Yeah, that's my favorite team. How about you? What's yours?"

"Uh… the Yankees," I say, the Yankees being the only baseball team I know.

He nods. "Okay. I'll give you that. Although the Yankees are a long way from here."

Ah, another clue: we're nowhere near New York. But I was pretty sure we weren't anyway.

"Here," I say, handing him the cap. He reaches down to take it.

"Thanks. Let's get going, okay?"

I comply, and keep acting. "What are we gonna do?"

"Just ask you some questions. Me and my friends want to get to know you, is all."

I suppress the urge to say, "Actually, it should be 'My friends and I.'" Instead, I say, "Okay. Sure."

Most likely they know about the Stargate program, and want to know more. But why take a kid who's only connected to NORAD? Those guys don't know about us—well, they don't know anything except that we're there.

So, maybe they don't know very much at all. They knew about something going on at Cheyenne, and randomly chose the children of people they followed home, or something.

Down the stairs we'd ascended before, and into the living room we'd gone through. There are two other guys in there, including Mike. The corners are dark, but I can see a little red light flashing in one of them. Video camera.

"Hey," says the guy I haven't seen yet. "Why don't you take a seat, and we can have a little conversation, okay?"

Okay. Act. You're a six-year-old. Act like Lindsay.

"Okay," I say cheerfully, and climb into the chair provided for me. The Mike-brother person sits with the other men.

"What's your name?" he asks.

"Daniel," I say readily. No reason to lie about that: either they know who Daniel Jackson is, or they don't, but nobody outside the SGC knows that I'm the same guy as the one who figured out the stargate, is a member of SG-1, etc. So me being Daniel is just a coincidence. "What's your names?"

The Mike's-brother-guy smiles indulgently. "I'm James," he says. "This is Mike, and that guy is Freddie. What's your last name?"

"Well, O'Neill, of course." Technically true, since Jack's 'adopting' me. "That's my daddy's last name, so I have it too."

"Okay. Speaking of your daddy, what does he do?"

"He's a Colonel in the Air Force. He flys planes and kills bad guys and stuff."

Also technically true. Being six is underrated: this is the best disguise ever.

"What kind of bad guys?"

"Oh, you know, bad guys that want to hurt us."

"Who's 'us'?"

What is this, an interrogation?

Oh, right.

"Nice people, like me." Generously, I add, "You, too, I guess," while thinking, We're gonna kick your butts.

Mike's shifting uncomfortably in his seat, but James shoots him a look and he stops. "Have you ever been to the place where your dad works?"

"Cheyenne? Sure. My favorite part is the commissary, which is like a lunchroom only for grown-ups. They have food there all day, and really cool blue jell-o, even though my favorite flavor is the red, which I think is cherry."

"Have you ever seen anything…odd at Cheyenne?"

I frown. "What do you mean?"

"Have you ever seen aliens?"

Yes. "No," I scoff. "Who believes in aliens?"

"Daniel," says Freddie, leaning forward, "we believe that the government is involved in a very scary plot to take over the country, and that Cheyenne is at the heart of it. We believe that people from outer space—aliens—are in control of key people in the government, and want to hurt ordinary people like you, me and my friends here."

Ohhh, conspiracy theorists. I should've known.

"Aliens aren't real," I say disbelievingly. "I know. Dad told me that aliens aren't real when he told me about Santa and the tooth fairy."

James sighs. "Okay, Daniel. We're going to take you back to your room now, okay?"

I pout. "When can I go home?"

He pauses. "We need to talk to your friends," is all he says.

Great.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

"What did they ask about?" Cassie says.

I shrug. "They're conspiracy theorists. They wanted to know about the aliens that are taking over the world from Cheyenne Mountain." I look briefly over at the other kids, who are still playing interrogation. They're not the only ones, I think.

"Did they…torture you?"

I frown. "Usually when someone's been tortured, they don't look so good. At the very least they'll be upset. Do I look hurt or upset to you?"

Cassie rolls her eyes. "Daniel…"

"Relax. The only torture device they have at their disposal is the ability to maul the English language."

Cass sighs and looks down at me. "What are we going to do?"

"All we can really do is wait. Hey, do you know the baseball team 'The Rockies?'"

Cass blinks. "Daniel, they're based in Colorado." An unuttered duh hangs over our heads.

"Oh. Good. Then maybe we aren't so far from home."

"I don't even want to know how you know that. What do we do for food?"

I look at my watch. "Oh, dinnertime."

"Yeah. And despite being terrified, I'm still hungry. Go figure." She smiles tightly.

I roll my eyes. "Look, nothing's going to happen to us. I get the feeling they're incompetent, as a matter of fact. Jack'll find us, and we'll go home."

"You've got an awful lot of faith in Jack," Cassie says dubiously.

I frown. "He's earned it, more times than I can count. Besides, if we can we're going to give him a little help."

"How?"

I shrug. "We'll think of something." We're quiet, thinking. My head starts hurting again, but I keep quiet.

James comes in. "We need to talk to someone else. Who'll volunteer?"

"Um, actually," Cassie points out, "we're kind of hungry. Can we get any food?"

James rolls his eyes. "We'll get you some food. Meanwhile, who wants to volunteer to be next? It's really fun, right, Daniel?"

I shrug. "Sure, I guess." I nudge Cassie, who looks at me.

"Uh, I'll go," she says after a minute. "But only if we get food afterwards. You can't starve little kids, you know."

"Yeah, yeah. Follow me."

He closes the door and locks it, and I sigh in relief. I can trust Cassie not to give anything away, but I need to talk to the other kids to make sure they don't.

Without giving anything away to them myself, I realize. Oy.

"Lindsay," I call, and she looks over.

"Hi, Daniel," she calls back, smiling.

"Can I talk to you for a minute?"

"Sure." She trots over. "It's a really fun game. And Ben's good at interviewing. Only if someone doesn't want to talk, he stops, like Cassie said."

"What's he asking about?" I ask curiously.

Lindsay shrugs. "You know. He's trying to ancipate what the mean guys who took us are gonna say. So he asked me about my daddy, and I said about when I was sick and I went to SGC and Jack took care of me."

I frown. "Ancipate? You mean anticipate?"

"Yeah, ansissipate." She smiles at me.

I sigh. "Lindsay, when you really do talk to the mean guys who took us, I don't think you should mention the SGC, okay? Just say 'Cheyenne' instead. And since your dad's job is secret, you shouldn't tell them very much about it. If they ask, just say you don't really know what he does."

Lindsay frowns. "Okay. Should I tell everyone else to do that, too?"

I smile. "That'd be great, Lindsay. That would help a lot."

"Good," she says, grinning, and skips to the other side of the room.

I sigh, sit against a wall, and close my eyes. My head's hurting, and I'm sleepy. I think I'll just…

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Daniel!" A hand shakes my shoulder, and I mutter and push the hand away. I'm trying to sleep, dammit!

"Daniel, wake up. Food!"

I blink. "Sleepy," I murmur, but the hand keeps shaking. A small one joins in, and the tiny fingers tickle me. "Stop!"

"Well, wake up, stupid!" The voice is slightly panicked, so I open my eyes.

Cassie and Lindsay.

"Food?" I ask, and Cassie sighs in relief.

"I thought it was your head injury," she says. "You know, you hear all those stories about people with concussions falling asleep and never waking up…"

I roll my eyes. "You should listen to your mom more."

Cass frowns at me. "Where do you think I heard the stories?"

I sigh. "Fine. Where's the food?"

"Over here," she says, leading me to the place the other kids were playing Interrogation. "And after we eat I'm going to take a look at your head."

"Even if I start hemorrhaging—which I don't think is likely, by the way—what are you going to do about it?"

"Something," Cassie says grimly. "I'll bang on the door until someone opens up, and then I'll beat whoever answers senseless and steal his cell phone and call 911."

I smile. "Nice plan. We could even put that one into action without me going into a coma."

Cassie snorts. "Yeah, right."

I look at the food. "Mac and cheese?"

"Apparently not very good cooks," says Scott, who's dishing out the macaroni. "I think it's the instant stuff."

I shrug. "Better than some stuff I've eaten." MREs, for instance. Along with a big bowl to carry the stuff, our captors have provided smaller, colorful, melt-in-the-microwave plastic bowls from which to eat.

Joey, the quiet kid, says, "Your parents don't cook well?"

I smile ruefully. "Jack really goes in for barbecue," I say.

"And not much else," adds Cassie.

Macaroni is slopped into my stunning neon-orange bowl—I suddenly remember Hadante—and I sit down next to Lindsay.

"Hi," she says.

I smile. "Hi. How's the macaroni?"

She takes a bite. "My dad makes it like this," she says.

I wrinkle my nose: somehow, Breton doesn't strike me as the best candidate for a cook.

"His sushi's a lot better," Lindsay says defensively, after seeing my look.

I smile: yeah, that's Breton.

"Did you hit your head again?" Lindsay asks curiously.

"Again?"

"Yeah. Remember the dodgeball game? You fell and you were bleeding, and they wouldn't let me see you. And I called you later and you were really nice."

I smile. "Yeah. I hit my head earlier today, but it's not bleeding this time."

"Then it's not as bad," Lindsay says dismissively.

I smile slightly. "Exactly."

---------------------------------------------------------

Once I finish the crap mac'n'cheese, Cassie comes over to me. "Your head," she says, and I roll my eyes.

"Fine. But there's nothing to do about it."

"Let me be the judge of that," says Cassie. I wince at how similar she sounds to her mother.

She sits squarely in front of me, and runs her hands through my hair. It feels nice, actually, although I'm not going to tell her that. Then she hits the sore spot, a little above my left ear, and I pull away. "Ouch!"

"Sorry," says Cassie. "You have a bump there."

"Good. Now that you're aware of my bump, what are you going to do differently?"

Cassie rolls her eyes and pulls away. "Snarky," she mutters.

I snort. "Whatever that means."

"Snarky! You know… sarcastic and bitchy and so on."

"Bitchy? Me?" I thought that was a strictly feminine trait.

"Yeah! Bitchy, like…oh, come on! You're a linguist, you should know this stuff!"

"Apparently I'm not caught up on my teen slang," I murmur.

Ben's frowning at us. "How can Daniel be a linguist? He's only six, right?"

"My father was," I explain. "I know a lot of languages, that's all."

"Oh." He looks like he's going to say something else, but we hear the door unlocking, and Mike comes in. "Next kid. Who's it gonna be?" When nobody volunteers, he says, "Okay. You," and points at Ben. The boy gets up, looks uncertainly at us, and then leaves with Mike.

Cassie sighs. "Do you think they're getting anything from us?"

I shrug. "No way of telling. They could be 'getting something' from the color of our clothing. After all, they're conspiracy theorists."

"Right," says Cassie.

I look at my watch: 8 PM. I'm usually awake for a few more hours than that, but I figure on a day like today, I can give myself a break. I let my eyes slide closed, and try to think of nothing.

--------------------------------------------------------------------

"Daniel, wake up!"

Cassie again. I groan.

"Daniel…!"

"Stop it," I murmur. " 'm not hemorrhaging, I promise."

"It's not that. Wake up!" She shakes me, hard, which jars my head.

I wince and open my eyes. "What?"

"Listen, they just took Scott and Amy. You know, she's little, so she was making a big fuss when they grabbed her…"

"And?" Yeah, so I'm not a cheerful person when I've just woken up. Deal with it.

"So, I think the guy was so focused on her that he didn't lock the door."

I sit up quickly. "Really?"

"Yes!"

"Okay." I stand and walk to the door, carefully testing the doorknob.

It turns. I smile, and turn to Cassie. "You were right!"

"What are we going to do? Run away?"

"No, we probably wouldn't get very far. Besides, the Siler kids would still be trapped." I look around: the rest of the kids are sleeping, either on the floor or on the beds.

"So…"

"So, I get out and try to alert the SGC somehow."

Cassie frowns. "Will you be safe?"

I shrug. "If I'm caught, I do the dumb six-year-old routine." She looks doubtful, but lets me go. I carefully open the door, peer out and, seeing nobody, creep down the hall. I'm around the corner from where I saw the baseball hat when I realize there was a telephone next to the hat. I quickly walk to the telephone, and pick it up.

Dial tone. Yes! I carefully dial Jack's cell phone number, praying it's on. It rings once…twice…three times…four…

I'm about to hang up when a gruff voice says, "Who is this?"

"Jack?" I talk quietly, hoping they don't hear me downstairs.

"Daniel? Where the hell are you? We've been looking for you and Cassie for hours!"

"We were kidnapped. There're five other kids here, all children of Cheyenne Mountain employees. I found a Rockies baseball cap, so I think we're still in Colorado."

Jack's silent for a second, then says, "What kind of a building are you in?"

"A house. It's got two levels and a garage that connects to the house. You can use caller ID on your phone to find out where we are, right?"

"Yeah, I can. Listen, do the people holding you know you're making this call?"

"No, I don't think so. They left the door unlocked by accident."

"Good. Get back to the room and pretend nothing's happened."

"Okay, bye—"

"Wait!"

"What?" I ask.

"Are you guys ok? Nobody's hurt?"

"No," I say, conveniently neglecting to mention my headache.

"Okay, then, go."

I hang up and walk quickly but silently back to the room.

Cassie's waiting for me. As soon as I get back, she asks, "What happened? Did you get in touch with anyone?"

"Jack," I respond. "He's got the number of the phone I was using, so hopefully he'll be able to figure out where the house is. We'll probably be out of here by morning."

"We should pretend to be asleep," Cassie suggests, "so when they get here and find the door unlocked they won't suspect anything."

"Good idea," I say, and lie down where I was sleeping before. I quickly fall asleep, and don't even hear Scott and Amy return.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I'm awoken to shouting downstairs. I rub my eyes and sit up, and see a dark shape—a man, but I can't see who. He looks at me when I move, and then starts towards me.

Being half awake, I do the first thing that comes to me: cower. I can hear him come closer, and then a hand is placed on my shoulder. "Daniel?"

I know that voice! "Jack?"

"Yeah. What have they been doing to you? You're…jumpy."

"They've been letting me sleep," I mutter.

"Well," says Jack cheerfully, helping me up, "if you want to stay here and have a little nap, go ahead. I'm not stopping you."

"Evidence points to the contrary," I say, rubbing my eyes and looking around for the other kids.

Yep, they're all here—asleep, but here. I walk over to Cassie and shake her.

"What?" she mutters sleepily. I smile, realizing how often in the past day this scene has been played out the other way around.

"Wake up, they're here!"

"Pizza?" she asks, her voice rising as she yawns.

I roll my eyes: must be a dream. "No, Jack and some other people who're gonna get us out of here!"

She wakes up some more. "Oh," she says, and sits up. "When are we getting out of here?"

"I don't know," I say, turning back to Jack, who's talking quietly to Lindsay. We walk up to stand behind him, and he smiles briefly and then turns to Lindsay.

"Wanna help us wake these other guys up?" he asks, and she nods. "Good," says Jack. "Let's get outta here."

Soon, everyone's awake and stumbling around the room. Jack radios someone, and then says, "It's safe to go down, guys. Let's go."

We stumble down in the darkness, blinking and rubbing our eyes. Jack leads us through a door in the kitchen that leads outside, and into three rather comfy cars. Cassie, Lindsay and I all sit in the same car.

From the window, I sleepily watch Freddie, Mike, and James being led into another car in front of us. They're wearing handcuffs.

"They thought there were aliens trying to take over the world," Lindsay says sleepily. "But that's just silly, right, Daniel?"

I smile. "Right."

Jack, in the passenger seat, says, "Did they get anything?"

"I don't think so," I murmur. "Not from me, anyway. There's a tape."

Jack frowns. "I'm gonna find that," he says, and leaves us with the driver, who glances at us sympathetically and then turns away to let us sleep.

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I'm asleep the rest of the night, and through the morning, so I miss the drive from Denver to Colorado Springs. All the kids are taken home—I think the idea is 'they've been through enough'—and I only wake up when Jack comes in around lunchtime the next day.

"Wakey, wakey," he says, poking me.

"You know," I say, "if there was any justice, people who've been kidnapped should be allowed to sleep once it's over." But I open my eyes. I feel rested for the first time in the past day.

"I watched this," says Jack, holding up a videotape.

"The tape of the guys questioning us?"

"Yup. Nice acting, by the way."

"Shut up," I say calmly. "Did they get anything?"

"Well, it doesn't matter too much, since they're going to jail. But the only security breaches I saw were Lindsay saying 'SGC'—which she explained meant 'Stargazing Complex' or something—" He looks quizzically at me.

"Cassie came up with that," I say. "I thought it was quite clever."

"Indeed it was," Jack agrees. "The other security breach, if you could call it that, was a rather detailed description of the commissary." He grins at me.

"I have nothing to say about that," I say grumpily, and get up to find some clothes. I realize I'm in my pajamas, and wonder idly how I got in them.

"The Doc wants to examine you," says Jack.

I stop rummaging through the pants drawer and look at him. "Why?" I ask

"Something about a bump on the head," Jack says innocently. "I'm sure you understand."

"I'm perfectly fine," I grumble, pulling on the pants and grabbing a shirt at random from the next drawer down.

"Cassie thought otherwise. Frasier's waiting."

I frown. "You mean she's here now?"

"Yup," comes a voice from behind the closed door to my bedroom.

"Dammit," I mutter.

"Janet. I love you…" sings Jack, getting up and opening the door for the doctor.

She comes in, shooting a look at Jack, and says, "Oh, Brad…"

I must look pretty confused, because after looking at me, they both say in tandem, "Rocky Horror Picture Show."

"Oh," I murmur.

"Now," says Janet, "I hear you hit your head yesterday." She raises her eyebrows, and I know I'm in trouble.

"I'm fine," I protest, but Janet doesn't buy it. She sits me down on the bed, and starts examining my head exactly as Cassie did yesterday.

"Let me be the judge of that," she says.

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I got 54 reviews for this story after writing the last chapter. So far, my hypothesis is correct. This is another long chapter... (Emmy crosses her fingers)
I love reviews! If you review, not only will you be partaking in an important statistical experiment, but I also promise to think of you when I'm eating my Cherry Garcia ice cream.