AUTHORS NOTE:
I apologise for the delay in getting this chapter out. Unfortunately I was suffering from writers block and I couldn't make the ideas work. I think I have the problem fixed for a couple of chapters at least. The next two chapters are well on the way to being completed so hopefully it won't be too long before I can post them – rather annoyingly chapter 30 is pretty much completed but 29 is refusing to co-operate. Hmm, fingers crossed the problem will resolve itself later today.
As always, please read and review. I hoping that the story is moving onto the final stages (it's already about 20 chapters longer than I ever imagined it being but that's partly due to lots of little updates!).
Hope you enjoy!
Later that evening and the team were enjoying Sam's roly-poly. It had been Jack's evening to cook and the banter around the table was fairly light.
"So, Sam, how come we haven't had anything from your cooking classes before," asked Jack. Sam blushed and ducked her head and Jack found himself captivated. It wasn't often that Sam blushed and when she did he normally found himself feeling slightly lost. "Sam?" he repeated, when she didn't answer.
"It's the first thing that worked," she admitted. "But Daniel helped."
"Daniel?" asked Jack confused. "But Daniel has history."
"I, um, didn't go to history – the teacher's never there anyway," admitted Daniel, avoiding the paternal glare that Teal'c shot at him.
Jack was stunned. "You skipped class?"
"Yes, Jack, I skipped class," said Daniel.
"Daniel Jackson, geek, skipped class?" repeated Jack, finding it slightly unbelievable.
"Yes," sighed Daniel as he roughly stabbed his pudding, not happy with where the conversation was headed.
"Doctor Daniel Jackson skipped class," repeated Jack, the look of shock still plastered all over his face.
"Yes, Jack, he skipped class!" said Sam, bored of the conversation and deciding that she should probably rescue Daniel. "It's not like he missed anything!"
"I do not believe that is the point," said Teal'c, pushing the half finished bowl away from him. "I find it hard to believe that your teacher would have allowed Daniel to attend your lesson."
Sam sighed. "Well she did. In fact she said Daniel would be welcome anytime."
"Only to stop you blowing up her kitchen," joked Daniel in a desperate attempt to divert the attention back onto Sam.
"Blowing up? What the hell can you blow up in cookery class?" asked Jack, his interest piqued. He knew Sam had a penchant for making things explode - and as far as he could tell the rule 'the bigger the better' definitely seemed to apply - but he thought that cookery class would have been a fairly safe class for her to take – in fact he was more concerned when she'd been taking science, half expecting her to blow-up the building in frustration with the teacher.
"The microwave," she admitted, looking up from the table for the first time. "And don't ask me how – I honestly have no idea."
Jack burst out laughing and was quickly followed by the rest of the group. The team (including Teal'c who decided that Daniel skipping class shouldn't interfere with him enjoying roly-poly) finished off their deserts and then retired to the living room to argue over what to watch on the tv.
As it turned out Teal'c made the final decision, choosing to watch the Titanic, and Sam and Daniel both ended up in the corner, books scattered over the floor, writing their latest English assignment. Jack, meanwhile, had fallen asleep, completely uninterested in both activities.
The film eventually came to an end and Teal'c announced that he would retire to his room in order to kel'no'reem. Seeing Jack asleep in the chair, he woke him up and ordered him to bed. Daniel and Sam tried to keep the smiles off their faces at watching their commanding officer be ordered to bed like a child and were even more amused when he didn't object and willingly disappeared out of the room and up the stairs.
With one 'child' dispatched off to bed, Teal'c turned his attention to the two blonde heads currently bent over the one laptop. "Will you two also be retiring?"
"Uh, no, we're going to stay up a while longer," said Daniel, resisting the urge to rub his eyes in Teal'c's presence and wishing that he had somehow managed to sneak in a cup of coffee after dinner.
"We won't be long, Teal'c," added Sam, fixing him with one of her smiles.
"I will hold you to it, Samantha Carter," promised Teal'c, before leaving the room.
Daniel stood up and walked over to the door, listening for the sound of a door closing before nodding at Sam. "All clear. I thought those two would never go to bed."
"I know," agreed Sam, quickly grabbing a different notepad from the pile on the floor.
"Do you think we'll be able to figure it out?" asked Daniel. "I can't cope with being a teenager much longer."
"I hope so, Daniel, I really do," replied Sam earnestly. "At any rate we stand more chance of figuring out what happened than McKay does – I still can't believe they brought him in to help!"
Daniel smiled and patted Sam on the shoulder. "I know he gets under your skin, Sam, but since we have to attend school they needed to get someone in to look after the gate systems and I know that he's not you but, in all honesty, the Air Force didn't really have anyone to choose from."
Sam sighed, knowing that he was right, before returning her attention to the matter at hand. "What do you need to get access to?" she asked, fingers flying over the keyboard at a pace Daniel only wished he could keep up with.
"The footage that I shot of the planet. I thought I'd copied down all the symbols but I think I've missed something – the translations just don't appear to be complete," he said, before adding despondently, "or making any sense what so ever. I need more to go on."
Sam said nothing for a few moments, working on finding a back-way in through the security systems. She knew there would be a way, it was just a case of finding it. Daniel was relieved when she jumped up a few seconds later and started connecting various leads to the laptop. Suddenly the footage he'd recorded sprung to life on the TV screen in front of him.
"Sam, you are a legend!" said Daniel, enthusiastically. "How long do you reckon we have before Teal'c comes to check on us?"
Sam stared at her watch. "I'd say about an hour, maybe a bit longer. Just get down what you can and I'll go through the medical files I managed to copy."
"I'm not even going to ask how you managed that!" muttered Daniel, impressed with how resourceful Sam could be. "Let me know if you find anything."
Sam nodded, already engrossed in reading the files and making notes in her pad. Daniel smiled to himself before turning his attention to the screen in front of him, and was soon following Sam in the desperate attempt to find a solution to there current predicament.
