Teal'c was awakened by a light tapping at the door, which startled him, since he was unsure of who could be on the other side at this hour and on this world. His warrior reflexes kicked in instantly and swiftly, and he dashed from the bed, securing his zat gun from under his jacket and made his way to the entrance, cautiously to meet their threat. Moving silently as to not wake Daniel or Cameron; although nothing seemed to wake Daniel lately with his late night work on the database, Teal'c tiptoed, moving his bare feet carefully on the stone floor. Listening again, his weapon drawn and ready to fire at whoever was on the other side, he turned the knob and peered through the small gap into the tiny passageway, whispering sternly, hoping his tone would be warning enough.

"Who is there?"

"It's me Teal'c, open da dah!"

The voice wasn't threatening, but was in haste, a quiet feminine whisper, accented slightly.

"I feel like ah cooyon already, just open da –"

She didn't need to finish her request; Teal'c opened the door a small crack to see Adrienne standing shivering in the drab gray hallway. She wasn't in uniform; in fact she stood wearing a t-shirt and her pajama pants, casual even by her normal standards. By her face he could tell that she was visibly upset, and by the look of her disheveled hair that she had just woken up, possibly not in a pleasant manner.

"Is something the matter AdrienneRowan?" Teal'c asked, concerned by her state.

"No, shug, I'm fine. Just let me in befo I freeze ta death," she answered as she stood there, arms crossed across her chest, holding what little heat the drafty passageway had to offer close to her body.

The old Jaffa warrior had to admit that it was much colder here on PX4-592; much colder than the original Stargate command base, which was hard enough to believe since Stargate command had been built right into the side of the mountain. This world, however, seemed to be an entire planet of mountains, and an entire planet of cold.

It reminded him of those movies where the little fellow with the big feet had to tote that ring around but he was too tired to remember the name of the movie right then, just that the poor fellows trudged around in the snow for what seemed to be ages completely barefoot, as he was now.

He bowed his head slightly, stepping back from the doorframe and allowed her to pass.

"AdrienneRowan, where are SamanthaO'Neill and ValaMalDoran?" Teal'c asked, concerned as to why only one of the women was standing at their doorway and she laughed at the question, rolling her eyes as she stood there in tie-dyed slippers, gray faded pajama pants and a Thundercats t-shirt, looking a big kid because in many ways she really was. Inside, Teal'c smiled, thinking that Thundercats was a great cartoon and an excellent choice for a shirt.

"Dey fine Teal'c," she said, brushing her brown hair out of her face, "but 'ave ya eva slept in da same room as Vala? She snores anyway and wit how cold dis place, it's so loud that I was honestly shocked that I cud nah 'ear 'er coming down the 'all. Ya know it's got to be bad to wake me up."

"ValaMalDoran is snoring?" Teal'c was skeptical. "Then, where is SamanthaO'Neill?"

"Amazingly enough, asleep. I swear, I wish I drank whatever she had at dinner because she hasn't moved for hours," Adrienne responded, clearing her throat in a somewhat successful attempt to quell her accent, Teal'c thankful since he could barely understand her speech when it was like this.

The dark handsome man let out a loud laugh, and then quickly silenced himself before waking the others. Adrienne began to laugh at herself but he shushed her as he heard stirring coming from the bottom bunk.

"Teal'c?" Daniel said groggily. Apparently the suppression of the laughter hadn't been effective, "What is going on? Is someone here?"

"Daniel, cher, it's me. I can't sleep with Vala. She sounds like a freight train. And if you have a hope and a prayer of my being able to translate anything tomorrow, I suggest you scoot over and let me in," Adrienne ordered and made her way over to his bed.

Teal'c was both surprised and relieved at her blunt request.

Upon arriving at the planet they were informed that they would be housed at the main government building's former barracks as opposed to one of nicer hotels in the center of the city. The two rooms, one for the men and one for the women, were across the hall from one another, but while the room given to the women had three twin beds, the room for the men had only a set of musty bunks. Their hosts, unaware that Teal'c no longer carried a symbiote and required at least a few hours of daily sleep, had searched for hours to find the small cot on which he had been resting. Despite both Daniel and Cam's insistence, Teal'c had taken the smaller bed since he required about half as much sleep and for a brief moment, he thought he had lost that bed too.

"What?" Daniel again questioned, still floating in the world between sleep and wake.

"Scoot ova. I'm sleepin' wit ya. Unless there's some snoring going on in here y'all'd like to tell me about in which case I'll take my pillow into the hall," Adrienne answered, but was already at his bedside, shoving him over.

"That's not subtle Addy," Cam warned from the top bunk, though laughing at his own words, "I don't wanna have to write a report."

"Screw ya reports," the cajun spat, backing away from Daniel's bunk, all but a foot which she now used to step in the side of said bunk, bringing herself to Cam's level, "Then ya fool tchew can scoot over if ya want me to get any work done because I gotta sleep."

"Hell no, that's what Jackson's for," Cam rolled over, shoving his backside to the very edge of the bed, spreading out as much as he could, "Just keep it down down there, ok?"

"Damn tchew," Adrienne muttered, looking back down where Daniel had already moved, lifting the blanket.

"Ad, get in so any of us can get any sleep," he grumbled, Adrienne dipping back down. She kicked off her slippers and climbed in beside him and the Jaffa was certain he saw Daniel's arm slip around her waist pulling her closer before the blanket fell.

Teal'c laughed inside at the convenient absurdity of the situation.

While there had always been one alien woman or another who had expressed their interest in DanielJackson, never before had Teal'c seen him actually act as if a woman existed until AdrienneRowan. She was strong, but not pushy. Intelligent, yet not arrogant. And she liked languages as much as he did. After serving on SG-1 for well over a decade DanielJackson actually had someone who understood what he was saying.

Literally.

It was clear why he had fallen in love with her.

Hiding his grin, Teal'c had climbed back into his cot when Adrienne spoke once more.

"And, whoever introduced her to Bath and Body Works, you and I will need to have a SERIOUS conversation tomorrow morning! I've avoided taking her there at all costs! She's stinking up the entire room!"

From the top bunk Cam was laughing again.

"I think you can thank Sam for that one. They came in the other day with armloads of shopping bags from the mall, pink ones from stores you refuse to go to," he joked.

Daniel snickered from his bunk as did Teal'c. Adrienne didn't have any particular dislike for Vala, but she also had a short fuse for her more immature behaviors. Adrienne would often comment that she had seen frat boys with more self-control than Vala. They were good friends, like sisters, but careful friends, also like siblings, and Adrienne wasn't afraid to set her straight.

Having a very eventful few minutes in the middle of the night, Teal'c decided to try to sleep. After all, tomorrow was going to be a long day and it was best that he rested.

As the sun began to creep its way into the very small, very crowded room, Daniel reactively shivered. Reaching down to pull up the blanket he realized that there was no blanket there. He glanced out of the corner of his eye and remembered the 2 a.m. disturbance and saw Adrienne beside him, wrapped in the entire blanket.

"I froze for you Ad, that's love," he whispered in her ear and she didn't move, as he had expected.

He shook his head, she never woke up, and carefully inched over her and out of the bunk, turning to make sure that he didn't disturb her as he left. Peeking over his shoulder to make sure his comrades were still asleep he leaned over, kissing her forehead lightly, making sure that she would be warm in his absence.

Not that they would care, but Cam would make another joke about fraternization reports and the collective group would start in with magnifier jokes.

They were such good friends...

He stood and grabbed his glasses from his pack on the floor hoping that this planet had something equivalent to coffee.

When they sent the MALP through weeks ago, he was pleasantly surprised to see a once undiscovered human settlement with similar technological advances to that of the Langarans. With both the Goa'uld and the Ori out of the picture, at least as long as Anubis was quiet, which he had been, eerily so since Rodney's encounter, it was back to old addresses and database information, and, fortunately another lucky break.

First contact with PX4-592, which was known by its inhabitants as Sklarana, had revealed they not only treated the Stargate as an undetermined armament, but that the Sklaranans had discovered an Ancient lab complete with volumes of information. These paper volumes were a very intriguing find, since most of the ancient writings that they encountered prior were either in a computer database or carved on a wall.

Actual paper text in Ancient that covered a variety of disciplines was a grand find indeed.

The Sklaranan military had put their best minds on deciphering the text, hoping it would teach them how to use the Stargate. However, the sheer number of volumes, information, and possible resources meant that the whole team needed to be there. First and obviously Daniel would be needed to translate and if they wanted to finish within a reasonable amount of time Adrienne would have to come as well, so he was very thankful that the IOA had come to their senses.

Once the text was deciphered, Sam would be needed in case the information yielded was of a scientific nature, as Rodney claimed to be too busy with his cloning, especially since he did not have Adrienne to work with. Daniel knew that his old friend was hoping to discover more information on dialing the ninth chevron without blowing up a planet to do so, but Daniel was skeptical that a solution to bringing home the Destiny would come to them so easily. Regardless, she was using it as an excuse to leave her post for a while and let Jack fill in for her.

Truth be told, she missed going off world.

Cam and Teal'c were there as a general precautionary measure; they didn't know these people or what ulterior motives they might have. The planet's leader, Moreed, had also provided some interesting photographs of what looked like some bodies of Jaffa warriors on a planet that supposedly had not seen Goa'uld activity in many years. Teal'c had asked permission to tackle this side mission once the threat level, if any, was assessed.

As for Vala, she was coming along to do now what she did best: spy, which had proven to be a something she was quite good at doing.

And drive the team crazy when she wasn't snooping around.

Daniel laughed to himself, imagining her, wearing that silly pink eye mask with black feathers she would stagger into the mess wearing from time to time, just snoring it up while Adrienne tossed and turned and covered her ears. He was actually surprised Adrienne hadn't just slugged her with a pillow.

Better for him.

He'd kind of gotten used to sleeping with her in his arms and was slightly disappointed this mission wouldn't allow that.

Maybe he should thank Vala.

He turned the corner and entered a drab olive green hallway, a color equally as ugly as the drab gray hallway where they were being housed, and asked a passerby the direction of the cafeteria. Without comment, the tall thin Skalaraan pointed toward the direction in which he was already headed. He was dressed in a manner that reminded Daniel of the ghost of Christmas past, somewhat chilling given their facial structure but Daniel tried not to think about it. He simply thanked him and continued on his way.

What they called a cafeteria was just a small unadorned room with a table set in the middle upon which a variety of native fruits and vegetables had been laid out for their consumption. The area was not much larger than a closet, but Daniel was thankful that they were being fed at all. He had been on enough missions where a Powerbar was as close as he got to food, much to Adrienne's chagrin. He filled the small dish with what looked like an approximate equivalent to strawberries and toast and poured himself some of the hot beverage that looked somewhat like tea.

"Dr. Jackson," a voice behind him spoke.

It was Moreed.

The Skalaran was a tall, pale man with hair so light in color it almost appeared silver. Daniel had noticed that all of the Skalaraans were rather pale and speculated that their paleness was due to the low level of UV light they were exposed to. He was wearing long purple robes that clasped down the center with small gold fasteners and his feet were clad in silk black slippers which Daniel could never imagine wearing around this bitter cold planet. Moreed had shown them a variety of maps of the planet when they arrived and it seemed that the only truly habitable part of the world got very little continual sunlight and that most of that was in a constant state of fall/winter. The food seemed to match this theory; even the strawberryish plants were more like the late summer/fall fruits back on earth.

"Moreed. It's a pleasure to see you. Would you care to join me for breakfast?" Daniel offered politely as their host slowly shook his head.

"Unfortunately, I have only a limited amount of time this morning. I just wanted to make sure that you were well rested and the accommodations were acceptable. I heard there was a disturbance last night," the tall man responded, Daniel trying not to make a face.

"No disturbance. Just a problem sleeping. We will take care of it tonight," Daniel thought it best not to get into detail.

"Excellent. Please let me know if I can be of assistance at all. I just wanted to check on your group and then I will be heading out for the day. My assistant Kyro will be taking you and Drs. Rowan and O'Neill down to the laboratory and the archives. Our head of security, Jahwna will be leading the remainder of your team down to the site where we have discovered the bodies," Moreed offered.

Daniel nodded his head respectfully. Moreed seemed to be a cross between a president and a high priest so he made sure to carefully remember his etiquette when dealing with both.

"Thank you for everything. We're hoping that on this visit we may learn much more about our common ancestors and what we can do to mutually benefit our worlds," Daniel replied.

"I look forward to much the same," the slight man answered, turning to leave.

"Ah! Before I forget, I understand that your people are accustomed to much warmer weather. This drink we have created, we call it Oklug, we have found that it raises the body temperature just enough to make one more comfortable here on our world."

That explains it, Daniel thought. Adrienne had four cups of the potion last night. Someone must have told her, or she just felt the difference without putting the two together.

It would be Adrienne that would suffer the most here.

Last month she tried to convince Jack to open a Stargate research office in Miami. She had come up with a good argument too, proximity to the equator generating more solar energy and a bunch of other things that Sam, who apparently bought into this Miami scheme, had come up with. Needless to say, Jack hadn't been convinced.

Another excuse for Adrienne to join him in the bunk tonight.

Oh darn...

"Thank you Moreed. For your kindness and assistance again," Daniel replied. Moreed smiled and nodded.

"You are quite welcome, Dr. Jackson. I look forward to your findings," Moreed said and left the cafeteria just as Cam was heading in.

"Sir," Cam said as Moreed walked by, "Hey Jackson, anything good to eat?"

"Some bread and fruit over there, Adrienne will be thrilled but I haven't tried it yet. Oh, and the drink is supposed to help regulate body temperature. Make up for how cold it is," Daniel pointed in the direction of the tea pot.

"No thanks, that's what running is for. I just need to toss some grub down my throat, get Teal'c and Vala going and meet this commander," Cameron responded.

"Jahwna is his name. He's supposed to come and meet you guys in your quarters. Are Teal'c and Adrienne up yet?" Daniel continued, second guessing his word choice, his tone conveying that this was all perfectly normal for your girlfriend to bust into the boy's room and crawl into bed with you.

Or have your girlfriend on your team...

"Yeah. Teal'c is getting himself armed right now and I think Addy left shortly after you did," Cameron replied but before Daniel could answer, the girls strode into the cafeteria and despite last night's episode, the three of them seemed to be getting along just fine. Sam and Vala appeared well rested and Adrienne seemed alright as well, albeit with dark circles under her eyes.

"Daniel, you're up," Vala joked, cocking her eyes at Adrienne, "Was wondering since Addy ditched us for a booty call last night."

Grunting and rolling her eyes, Adrienne shoved past her as Daniel shook his head.

"Good morning to you too Vala, breakfast is over there," he replied and pointed at the table, darting his eyes over at Adrienne, who was red in the face.

"And Moreed said that the tea-like drink will help maintain body temperature," he added.

"Figured that out last night Indy," Adrienne smiled as she took her seat beside him, "Didn't you see me chugging them down?"

Smiling, because of course she had, he didn't stop himself before reaching over and squeezing her hand lightly, before continuing eating his breakfast.

The toast was dry and the fruit was tart, but Cam would just have to make do. He had gotten up first this morning, slipped out and gauged his five mile daily run the best he could through the dreary alternating green and gray halls. He was going to ask Adrienne to join him, but when he crawled down from the bunk she and Jackson were laying there asleep, their arms wrapped around one another.

He still wasn't used to them not only being a couple, but one in the open as well.

So Cam set out alone hoping to head back to the room and hit the showers before Jahwna was to meet them.

No one else was in the room when he arrived, so he assumed that they were all still at breakfast.

It paid to be an early riser.

More hot water for him, if this planet even had hot water.

Every time they visited a planet Cam was surprised at the conditions under which human beings would live. This was one of the coldest planets that he had visited thus far, but the run had helped warm him up a bit. He crossed the room over to their packs, grabbing some fatigues and a black t-shirt and hit the showers.

As he showered, which was warm thankfully, his mind wandered. He had not been looking forward to this mission at all; it just seemed entirely too boring. The expected allotment for the mission was one week and then a return to Stargate Command for regrouping and briefing. Cam loved his position on SG-1, but lately he seemed to be running security details for the nerdier members of the team and he felt like the captain of the football team in charge of guarding the math club. However, these Jaffa bodies were intriguing and it would allow him and Teal'c to escape the excitement of the three PhD's. He didn't even mind that Vala would be joining them since she was good for at least a laugh or two. In fact, the image of Vala snoring suddenly popped into his head and he stored that into his memory for proper harassment later.

Cam stepped out of the shower, toweled himself off and dressed quickly while the steam was still warming the room, Teal'c entering the room as he was pulling on his shirt.

"Colonel Mitchell, our guide is here to take us to the site," his friend informed him.

"Great. Let me strap my boots on and I'll be ready to go. Can you come grab that equipment Jackson wanted us to take down?" Cameron requested, running his fingers frantically around the laces.

As Teal'c slipped by him to the corner of the room, Cam got a look at their guide standing in the doorway. Jahwna was almost as tall as Moreed and equally as pale. His hair was long but copper in color and he had very dark violet eyes that clashed with his maroon robe. Other than the variations in color, he looked almost identical to Moreed. Cam thought to ask if they were related, but decided not to, taking the bag from Teal'c and approaching their guide.

Jahwna led them through the corridors until they could finally see light ahead. Through the frosted windows the outside appeared chilly and Cam was glad that he had run that morning; the better his blood was flowing the more adept he was at dealing with the cold.

He zipped up his parka, put up the hood, preparing to enter the chill.

"Wait! Where are you guys going? You can't leave me with the nerd squad! As if Daniel isn't boring enough, Addy's become female Daniel now and that's just as bad!" Vala was yelling this at full volume as she ran down the hall.

Ah Vala…. Never a dull moment.

He almost couldn't wait for her running commentary as they set out to the site. As Vala approached them she slowed her advance, playing with the ties to her coats and making a cute face at Teal'c.

"Muscles, promise to carry me if I get tired?" she asked coyly.

"ValaMalDoran, our guide has secured transport so that we do not need to walk," Teal'c replied, looking down at her in annoyance.

"Oh, excellent. Then how 'bout a lift to that transport?"

She leapt up into his arms,Teal'c dropping the bag Daniel had asked him to bring and of course there was a loud cracking sound.

"Damn it Vala!" Cam shouted, "Do you have any idea how much that equipment costs?"

"You sound like Addy and her damn LED lights. Look, if it's broken I'm sure Sam can fix it. What does Daniel want with it? Since when do dead bodies matter to him?" she asked, hopping down from Teal'c's arms.

Rather than try to explain basic archaeology to Vala, most of which Cam had learned from Indiana Jones movies, he just shook his head, bending down to pick up the bag himself. The three of them and their guide headed out the double doors.

Some might say that Sklara was a beautiful planet. Cam might have been inclined to agree since it reminded him so much of Kansas winters, however, the mere fact that it stayed this way year round made him reconsider.

Off in the distance he could see acres and acres of fields between the mountain peaks that looked like a midwestern October. According to what Mordeen had told Jackson upon their arrival it was harvest time and that was why they had fresh fruit this morning.

If that was the bounty of harvest, Cam decided he would stick to Power Bars.

Sklara was about the developmental equivalent to late 1940's Earth, just without the clean-up of a world war. Apparently, the people on this planet practiced a strict religion of non-violence, which had resulted in a history of no war. When Cam had asked what happened to those who exhibited violent behavior, he was informed that they were exiled to an island where they would no longer be welcomed into the general population and this system had worked for them for over two hundred and fifty years.

Cam was not quite sure how he felt about an island penal colony; it seemed too much like something from a bad movie.

A large jeep-like vehicle drove them about two hours from the government building. The colonel noted that the building in which they were housed was located on the outskirts of the city; but again, they didn't get to visit the center of the metropolis, which was just plain weird in his opinion.

"So how far away is this place?" Cam asked Jahwna as the truck bumped them along their way.

"Just another few moments sir," the man, if you could call him that, answered weakly.

Fair enough, Cam thought, he had suspected that a ravine with bodies would not be something that was near the general population. The photos they had been given were aerial shots too, so he has suspected this would be a bit of a hike.

"Is that acceptable sir?" the commander added, concerned by Cameron's lack of response.

"Yeah, and it's Cam," he replied, trying to ease the obviously nervous and uptight young man.

"Excuse me sir?" the alien asked.

"Call me Cam. Sir is what you call my father," Cameron corrected, with a smile.

"As you wish si… Cam," Jahwna stuttered, seemingly not noticing the gesture.

Teal'c raised his eye-brow and Vala barely moved from her position on the Jaffa's shoulder.

She had fallen asleep over an hour ago after complaining about every bump or sharp turn made as they navigated the Skalaraan "wilderness." At least she appeared asleep; she very well might have been faking. At first, it was funny but after her last round of whining Cam had, in a not so nice voice, ordered her to be quiet and she had, choosing to use their friend as a pillow.

Cam was about to nudge her, see if she would get up and stop laying all over Teal'c when, as promised, they arrived at what appeared to be a large ravine.

"Sir Cam," whatever, Cam thought, "We have arrived," Jahwna announced. Teal'c lifted Vala's head and she snapped awake immediately.

Cam knew she was faking, starting to be annoyed again, but stood, grabbing his pack.

Together they unloaded the small vehicle and made their way down to the crevasse.

The ravine itself was not deep, and they could see the reflection of the sun off of the Jaffa armor not too far in the distance. It was not a particularly bloody scene, the colonel noted, and there were no signs of shrapnel or other bombs and explosives, but it was the smell that was the worst. Not expecting anything that foul, Cam quickly covered his face to block the odor.

"What the hell is that stench?" Vala exclaimed.

"That ValaMalDoran is the stench of death," Tealc answered, unaffected by the smell.

"I know that Teal'c," Vala answered, "It was a rhetorical question."

"Enough guys, it's too cold to stand here and argue," Cameron intervened, the bitter cold wind not only beating on their exposed faces but wafting in the strong smell of rotting flesh and other signs of decay. Cautiously, Cam edged himself closer to the bodies.

It was obvious even from a quick glance that these men were not killed in battle. There were no blasts from staff weapons or other projectiles, they just lay there lifeless and still. For a Jaffa a death not in battle was the worst insult to their lives and with only a cursory examination it was obvious that these four young men had died without their honor.

Cam glanced back at Teal'c to judge his reaction seeing that he was clearly upset by the scene in front of them. He frowned and wrinkled his brow, slowing his approach as he unloaded Daniel's equipment gently onto the ground.

"These Jaffa must have been murdered," Teal'c stated plainly with confidence, a confidence Cam wished he could share. The Jaffa approached the first body carefully, seemingly oblivious to the penetrating odor. With Teal'c's recent involvement in the movement to free and organize the Jaffa, sights such as this troubled him as they should any good leader of a fledgling government.

"If you touch those and get that smell on you, you're not riding back with us," Vala spat, clearly disgusted and trying to play off the gagging Cam could see her doing in the corner.

Silently Teal'c knelt beside the fallen Jaffa. With his staff weapon, he gently pushed the nearest body aside and the corpse rolled over quickly, as if pushed by a great force, and there it was face up, mouth gaping, his throat slit from ear to ear.

Cam breathed in in shock, quickly regretting it.

The stench was overpowering and he ran back behind the transport, retching up his bland breakfast as his mind raced.

Jaffa were not so easily killed.

He had killed quite a few Goa'uld warriors in his time, as had the others, but usually with a blaster, staff weapon, or a Zat gun. Since many Jaffa were also very large men and women, it would take not only a foe talented enough to get that close to them but strong enough to wrestle him to the ground and then to slit his throat. Composing himself, Cam quickly wiped his mouth, turning, heading back to the deep ditch. Teal'c was examining the other body and Vala was reading Daniel's handwritten directions for taking samples for carbon dating.

She might complain about the nerds, but she chipped right in to fulfill their requests.

"Sir Cam?" the Sklarna captain asked, "Is there a problem?"

"No problem Jahwna. We just usually see Jaffa bodies after a fight. Their throat wounds indicate something different," Cameron explained.

"Interesting... " his voice trailed off.

Cam hesitated, sensing something wrong in his voice but he choked it up to nerves, since the Skalaraans were such peaceful people and this was truly a gruesome scene.

Not knowing what else to do, he patted the commander on his back and headed down to help his teammates.

Sam was used to working alone in a variety of conditions and to be honest, she was the kind of person that thrived on the silence of being alone when she worked.

However, this place was a little too eerie for her liking.

Mordeen's assistant Kyro had led her first to this lab before he had escorted Adrienne and Daniel down to the ancient site. It was a simple room, in the style that reminded her of a high school chemistry classroom minus the rambunctious teenagers. It lacked many of the Asgard and other advanced technologies of her own lab but she had learned with beakers and Bunsen burners and she wasn't afraid to use them again. However, regardless of the cold, she was happy to be off world once more.

Still, it was not the temperature nor the quaintness of the room that bothered her, the Tok'ra tunnels where she had worked side by side with her father had been both cold and small, but not like this.

It had never made her nervous before, like she was feeling now.

Silently she wished she could go down and join her comrades, but afraid to make herself look silly and unprofessional, she rubbed her arms, took a deep breath and kept working.

Yesterday when they had arrived, Daniel had stumbled upon a series of formulas in the archives adjacent to the laboratory. Many of these formulas so far seemed to be basic chemical compositions found also on Earth, household and commercial chemicals like ethyl alcohol, nitric acid, and sodium chloride. The names were different, but the Sklaraans had about the same level of knowledge as had been on Earth in the middle twentieth century so it wasn't that hard to figure out. Whether or not they realized it, this ancient research had been a precursor to their civilization's scientific advances and Sam was intrigued by the information enough to begin converting their names into a format to best match it to the Earth periodic table. With such a conversion chart elements could be easily identified and scientific theories and whatnot could better be shared.

Much to her disappointment, Sam hit a point of confusion right around fourth period metals when she noticed a foul taste in her mouth and she looked down to see that she had literally chewed her pencil down to the lead. Disgusted, she spit the wood chips onto the floor, looking back at the mess that had been her pencil and saw the hand holding it was trembling violently. Shocked, she stopped it with her other hand and leapt from the seat, looking at her watch.

It was already 2 p.m. Earth time.

She wasn't quite sure where the day had gone but she needed a stretch and she needed some hot tea. Mind made up she headed down the long drab hallway to the archives.

"Hey Sam!" she heard Adrienne calling from the archives before she hit the door.

Sam rounded the corner, peering into the doorway and there sat Adrienne cheery as ever with a large pile of scrolls stacked in front of her and Daniel with a similar pile at the next table. They looked to be akin to the ones Sam had back at the lab and she was hoping they were the next in the series of metals. It would be great to have most of the periodic table converted by bedtime. The records were terrific so far, written in clear Ancient, so this process was much easier than she had expected.

"Wow, how did you do that? How did you know it was me?" Sam asked her, puzzled.

"I dunno, I heard your stride, you have a particular stride, and other than Kyro this morning we haven't seen a single soul. Strange huh?" Adrienne laughed, "Discovering anything groundbreaking?"

"Nothing new, just some elemental connections, I'm working on a periodic table. I think that the IOA will be pleased to know how they note their basic elements. The next step would be to see what resources they have in abundance and maybe we can discuss trade. How 'bout you guys?" Sam asked.

"Just pages and pages of lineage today," Daniel responded, "It is like reading the "Begats.""

"The "Begats?"," Sam was totally lost. Her world was equations and formulas, not historical terminology.

"Pages and pages of crazy boring lineage in the Old Testament, so the Jews could justify their connection to King David and Abraham. A nice stick it to the Babylonians," Adrienne answered with a smile.

"How amazingly P.C. Dr. Rowan," Daniel joked, peering up at her.

"I try," she added and then stopped quickly, making a face at her friend.

"Sam you look weird, is everything alright?"

"Yeah, I think I was just in a zone. Got a little cold, a little anxious and figured it was time for a stretch break," the general replied.

"Amen!" Sam saw Adrienne look at Daniel to see if he picked up on her continuation of religious mockery and he smiled without looking up, "Let's go get some tea."

"Oklug," Daniel corrected, again without looking up, "It is called Oklug."

"Whatever," Adrienne responded, "There is no coffee on this planet and I drank through my supply of Diet Coke yesterday. "

"Your supply, in one day?" Sam inquired.

"Yeah, but considering that we were only allowed one personal backpack each, my supply was two twenty ounce bottles," Adrienne answered, heading for the door.

"Bring me one," Daniel yelled to them.

"What do I look like?" Adrienne asked, putting her hands on her hips but smiling the entire time.

"Like a woman who loves me so much she would bring me back hot tea," he replied as Sam chuckled to herself. They were just so perfect for one another, and she was glad they could finally stop hiding it. It reminded her of Jack, which made her nerves flutter, even though he was just on the other side of the gate probably whining about having to cook his own dinner.

"Cher, ya lucky I do," Adrienne teased, shaking her head. Taking a breath, Sam grabbed her now shaking arm and the women headed out into the corridor.

Despite the drab settings, the Sklaraans had gone out of their way to make sure the team had everything they needed. On the small central table were more fresh fruit, bread and a large pot of Oklug. Sam made a note that she needed to take some back to have it analyzed by the doctors at Stargate Command, the stuff worked so well, and it would be great to figure out how to use it on future missions where weather was questionable. Carolyn might even be able to convert it to a pill form for emergency rations.

The women sat in relative silence as they sipped their tea. Neither felt the need to talk; they had both been drowning in their work for hours, but just to sit in silence and relax was fantastic. After a few minutes enjoying the fruit, this offering was slightly better than breakfast, and some tea it was Adrienne that broke the silence.

"Sam, I didn't notice it before but you smell great! What are you wearing?" she inquired.

Sam was baffled.

She tried to remember back to this morning after she showered if she had put on any perfume.

Did she even bring perfume?

"Uh, deodorant?" she finally answered.

"Well, you got your money's worth," Adrienne answered unfazed, "Remind me to get the name of that when we get back home."

Ok, that was weird, Sam thought.

Maybe Adrienne had been trapped in the room so long with those musty old books that anything smelled better than moldy paper. Sam smiled politely, thinking her friend needed a break about as much as she did, and continued to eat.

"Sam, are ya alright? Do you need to take a walk or something? You've got some crazy nervous energy going on," Adrienne spoke again, looking at her with concern.

Sam looked up again from her plate and then down at her own leg which was shaking violently, so much so it was rattling the table and the small metal cups and plates. She could feel her heart racing in her chest and it was a little hard to breathe, like the air was thick.

"Uh, yeah. You're right. I've been sitting way too long. I think I'll get a shower and or maybe go for a run first. Cam might have had the right idea this morning," the general replied.

Sam stood to leave so Adrienne went over to pour Daniel a cup of tea and bring him back a small plate of fruits and the general turned, heading down to their quarters, trying to remember if she had packed her running shoes.

A run and a hot shower was just what she needed.

She had been working way too hard and besides, there was no curfew, she could rest for a bit and head to the lab after dinner. Maybe then someone could come down with her just so she could bounce ideas off of them.

Pleased with her decision, she entered the room, feeling better already, heading over to her pack.

It wasn't that Vala necessarily minded the grunt work, or the smell for that matter, she had simply become accustomed to life on Earth and forgotten the cruelty that is death. With the threat of the Ori behind them, Vala had been moved from a more active role in SG-1 to SGC intelligence due to her wealth of information on the Lucian Alliance and other less reputable groups of humans wandering the galaxy. So, at first, she had been excited about a long term mission such as this.

Now, elbow deep in dead body and dirt, she wasn't so sure.

Squinting, she read Daniel's instructions carefully:

Take digital photos of the entire area.

Map out area int grid using included red thread. It should look like a checkerboard.

"I know wha grid is, Daniel," Vala hissed, rolling her eyes as she dug through the bag. It was filled to the top, the items stuffed in unnaturally, and she was sure she would be unable to shut it again. Inside, were some Asgard dating device, a level, she had no clue what that was for, multiple containers of test tubes, a tape measure, a variety of colored Sharpies, medical tape because Daniel preferred labeling his samples with medical tape claiming it was easier to write on, a small digital camera, a bag containing quite an assortment of small wooden stakes, and at the very bottom, red string.

Of course, she thought to herself, as she unloaded the entire bag to get the thread.

Securing the string, she started marking off her one foot squares. It was mind-numbingly boring, but fairly simple, and much easier than looking at star charts and gate addresses trying to find spies.

She supposed that made it a sort of vacation.

As she knelt to make her fourth square, she shivered and felt someone standing behind her.

"Ma'am, might I ask what you are doing?" the voice said and Vala jerked upright out of instinct, taking a defensive stance, but it was Jawa, Jakna, whatever, the commander who had led them there. He stood looking at her quizzically, those dark maroon robes waving around him, trying to figure out what she was doing and whether or not she was going to hit him.

"Oh, sorry. It's nothing. It's for our scientists. Since they're too busy to do this themselves," she continued, in her usual Vala tone, "I get to make them a pretty picture so they can look all smart when they identify what I'VE found."

"I see…" he didn't get her sarcasm, "and what are you looking for?"

"Nothing really. Danie – er – Dr. Jackson just suggested that we find out how long these Jaffa have been here and take some core samples of the soil while we're here. I've got nothing else to do," Vala explained.

"And why would one want to know how long they have been there?" the man continued asking questions.

Vala thought that was a strange question, given that the Skalaraans had suggested they take a look at these bodies. Isn't that what they wanted SG-1 to do, to investigate these unexplained deaths on their peaceful planet?

"They'll give us an idea of when they died and maybe we can trace where they came from and even lead us to who might be responsible," she answered him.

"I see..."

The thin copper-haired man walked away without another word.

Freak, Vala thought, continuing with her task. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Teal'c, leaning over the bodies with one of the worst expressions she had seen the Jaffa make as Cam was coming back over the ridge, wiping his mouth. He must have run back to the transport to throw up; she would have to make fun of him later.

With only a "huh" to herself, she continued gridding and preparing samples.

As the day progressed on, she could feel it getting colder instead of warmer. Makes NO good sense, she thought; who in the hell could live in a place like this?

Just as she was starting to shiver, she felt that creepy presence behind her once again.

"Jahwna, listen, where I come from, people don't just come slinking up behind someone and watch. It's creepy and it can get you shot," Vala spat, peering over her shoulder at her visitor.

"Pardon me ma'am. We Skalaraans rarely speak first unless it is needed. I noticed your shiver and I have brought you some Oklug," the man leaned toward her, offering her a small cup.

Vala stood, slowly, noting the kindness in the gesture.

Well, he might be creepy, but that was nice.

"Thank you. I was just thinking how cold I was," she said politely, taking a long drink, the tea warming her body. This planet was just too cold for normal people but she was grateful that they at least had this to get them through. With a grateful nod, she handed the Thermos-like container back to the commander and continued her work.

A short time later, she felt the approach of yet another person. Infuriated, she looked up and shouted.

"Now, when I don't get this finished, who do you think Daniel is going to blame?!" When she finished shouting she saw Cam looking right at her, his mouth open in surprise.

"Jeez, Vala, chill out. We've been over here for five hours. Apparently the days here are much shorter, the sun's going down and Teal'c's looking pretty messed up," Cam defended.

Frowning, Vala put her hand to her forehead, shaking her head.

Five hours!?

Had it been that long?

Why didn't someone tell her?

She had only gotten a few samples completed; why had she worked so slowly?

Growing more and more frustrated, Vala internally chastised herself for acting just as unreliable as everyone expected.

"Well, that's just great," she said, annoyed and exasperated, "Now, I get to go back, get yelled at, called stupid, whatever else he wants to say to me. You couldn't have budged from your vomiting sessions to tell me I was zoning off?! Too busy for that?!"

"Look Vala, I don't know who pissed in your Cheerios this morning, but I'm gonna start packing up. We can come back out here tomorrow, just leave the grid and give Jackson what you've taken already. I'm sure he's too bogged down himself to worry about it and Sam'll probably be the one to run the tests anyway."

He put his hand on her arm, "Calm down."

Vala took a deep breath, still annoyed but Cam was right, so she bent down to pick up the gear and packed up everything but the mostly complete red-thread grid.

At least she had one good box of samples to be tested.

She fought a nervous stomach as she hoisted the pack to her shoulder, managing to get everything back into the bag and headed up the steep incline to the transport.

When Adrienne got back from the lab, she gave Daniel his tea and fruit and went back to her work. He seemed a bit upset, like he was stuck on something and she knew better than to disturb him so she placed the cup and plate beside him, laying her hand gently on his back and leaned over to lightly kiss his temple.

"Tea, Cher," she whispered in his ear.

"Thanks ja-wer," he answered, but didn't look up.

Sighing, Adrienne just went back to her work station.

On her table, right where she had left them, were pages and pages of lineage. She shuffled through them again, some of them in scroll form and others pages of text crammed into twine, wrapped bundles of yellowing paper, looking for a change in wording that might give some indication as to the end to the list.

There was none.

Sighing, she bent over her work, continuing where she left off. After their successes yesterday with the chemistry notes she had hoped today to find more exciting information. Oh well, she thought, such is the life of an archeologist, excitement one day to make up for the stretches of boredom in between.

It was not too long after she had begun to translate once more when she heard a slight tapping, not very loud, but consistent. It seemed to be coming from above her head and sounded like someone had left on a bathroom faucet. She knew there were government offices above them, Kyro had said they were in the basement level, but she thought it was bizarre that she would hear a restroom or something similar from a whole floor above.

The sound continued: Tap, wait, tap, wait, tap, wait. She tried her best to ignore it, but the noise was overpowering.

"Indy, do you hear that?" she asked as she continued to try to find the source of the tapping.

"Huh?" he answered, as usual, not looking up.

"Tapping, do you hear that tapping?" she asked, clarifying.

"What tapping?" he questioned. Looking up at her, Daniel took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. He stared at her lost and still partially back in translation land.

"That tapping," she repeated, standing and looking around the gray chamber.

The room was painted gray, not unlike US military installations, with four metal tables scattered about, the contents of the ancient lab carefully placed into large wooden crates, lined neatly on the wall for their use.

The ancient lab had been damp and dusty, as had the old archives, and it had sent Daniel into allergic convulsions, so Moreed ordered the contents moved here. Since the laboratory itself had not been of value, the two of them had begun to work right here where the items were being stored, but Adrienne couldn't concentrate on those items with that infernal tapping sound.

"Don't you hear it?" she continued, "it sounds like it is coming from above us."

It was getting louder.

"What if it is a broken water main? If it were to burst through, we could lose ALL of this research?!"

Daniel was still looking at her confused.

"Ad, I'm not sure what you're hearing. There's no sound, no broken water main. Just piles and piles of useless information that's telling me nothing and getting us nowhere. Might as well be a monsoon so we can just go home."

Adrienne shook her head and squeezed her temples. The sound was still there, but fainter if she tried to focus elsewhere.

"You're right. I think my frustration is just making me imagine things. I'll get back to work. Sorry to bug you Indy," she apologized. He did look upset, frustrated over probably the same thing that she was.

She didn't need to bother him with such silliness.

Daniel shrugged, putting his glasses back on and continuing to work. Adrienne could hear him fidgeting with the papers, with his pencil and chewing his lip. He tended to do that a lot and she was forever running tissues over to him in their lab when he would bite his lip clear through. Thinking that might just happen right here, she looked around her for a box just in case. She found a small pack in her backpack, refocusing herself and pacing around the room a few more times before returning to her own workstation.

I'm just bored, she thought. This planet was very dull and drab, even the colors seemed to scowl at her, contrasting with her personal tastes. Why not a dash of pink, or god forbid some yellow.

Just drab, drab, drab.

Their shared workspace at the SGC at least was accented with various ancient artifacts or reproductions and made for a museum-like look that was aesthetically pleasing.

This was just bleh.

However, that wasn't something she could fix so she forced herself to continue to translate what appeared to be the third dynasty of ancient colonial leaders.

The longer she sat, the harder she found it to focus on the task at hand. That tapping sound was back and Daniel was mumbling to himself in some ancient language she didn't know. Add to that, the pages in front of her began to smell something awful, a combination of old paper, mold and some other sweeter smell, the cold in the room now unbearable.

"Indy?" she asked meekly.

"Yes Adrienne… " he was coldly polite and not calling her Ad. He must really not be happy.

"I'm really not feeling very well, I think I'm gonna go lay down," she said, her stomach flipping a little bit.

"Ok fine," he said but he didn't look up. That's odd, she thought; it wasn't like him to at least tell her to feel better, worry about her, something…

What was going on with him?

Adrienne stood, adjusting her uniform and pushing the stiff stool under the table. She carefully arranged the smelly papers into a pile, placing them back into the small crate on the wall nearest to her table. She looked back over her shoulder to see if Daniel had even noticed her, but he hadn't, so she quietly slipped out of the lab, heading down the hall to their rooms.

When she got there she paused, looking from the girl's room to the guy's room, deciding where to go.

In the end, she entered the guy's room, sliding into Daniel's bunk, wanting at least the comfort of his smell if she couldn't have the comfort of his arms.

Normally death would not affect him so, but to see those warriors killed in the manner in which they were killed was too much for him. Teal'c knew in his heart that these men had not been attacked or murdered; the cuts were too clean.

These Jaffa had committed mass suicide.

But why?

These warriors were of Atum, who had long since been defeated by Arkad and was of no consequence to SG-1. These Jaffa by now should have heard of their freedom, of the Jaffa council and of their chance at a new life. This was old news and these bodies could not have been more than six months old, by his best guess, but with this cold, he could not be certain.

He had been reluctant to leave the bodies of his brothers, but CameronMitchell assured them that they would return at first light tomorrow. He had not been able to ascertain very much, just their tattoo markings, the suicide and their approximate ages. They were young Jaffa, even less likely to commit such an act, and more likely to join his cause. He would need to dial the Stargate when he returned and consult with Bra'tac who may have more insight into what might have happened. Shaking his head in disbelief, Teal'c climbed forlornly into the vehicle.

What would cause such despair? He could not get the question off of his mind as the transport jolted and bounced back to their temporary residence. He sipped some hot tea, pondering what he was doing in the Jaffa leadership.

What if these young warriors had indeed come to a desolate planet to kill themselves?

Were they in such despair over the plight of the newly formed Jaffa nation that they could see no other solution than to end their own lives?

Were there factions in the newly founded Jaffa government that were mistreating their citizenry?

Was his failure at leadership on the council and his rejoining of SG-1 part of the problem?

Was he not fighting hard enough for his people?

He was so lost in his thoughts that he barely realized they had arrived back to the headquarters until he saw ValaMalDoran out of the corner of his eye leap from the Jeep, shouting something nasty to him about not helping her with the archaeological supplies.

He paid her little mind.

"Hey big guy, you feeling any better?" ColonelMitchell sincerely asked his friend.

"ColonelMitchell, I believe I need some time to think," Teal'c responded reflexively, his eyes already gazing down the hall.

"Sure T. That's gotta be rough, especially if they did it to themselves. Head on back to the room and I'll bring some chow down to you," the team leader offered, leaning forward to try to examine his comrade's face.

"Thank you ColonelMitchell" was all he replied and with that Teal'c headed through the double doors and down the long hallway.

In silence he passed by the cafeteria area, SamanthaONeill's lab and the room where DanielJackson and AdrienneRowan had been working without taking much notice. Soon, he was at the door to their room, the dull walls flashing by in an instant. He turned the knob, opening the door, making his way over to his cot and his pack where he had brought his supplies for meditation just in case he needed them. He was shuffling through the bag when a sleepy voice spoke to him.

"Teal'c? Is that you? What time is it?" It appeared that AdrienneRowan was yet again sleeping in their room, but he was not certain as to why.

"It is 1700 hours Earth time AdrienneRowan. Sorry to have disturbed you. I need to Kelnareen," he answered her.

"No, Teal'c. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have come here. I wasn't feeling very well and for some reason I'm just not comfortable in our room. I'll leave," Adrienne answered and started to sit from the bed.

"No, that is not necessary. I must Kelnareen in a place where I will not disturb anyone or be disturbed for many hours. I will seek out quarters elsewhere."

Without giving her a chance to respond, he left her in the lower bunk and re-entered the hallway. He knew that straight ahead were the labs, the cafeteria, and the exit, but there were also corridors to the left and to the right. Looking slowly from side to side he turned left, heading into a part of the building he had yet to visit, hoping to find a place to search out his answers.

This is useless, Daniel thought, as he finished the last page of his translation. It was so useless that even Adrienne had given up and she never gave up on anything, especially when they worked together, especially now that they were together.

If that wasn't a clear indicator of failure he wasn't sure what was.

Despondent and depressed, he decided to see what everyone else was doing.

Someone had to be having some success or this would be yet another planet Earth would be essentially supplying with everything and getting nothing in return.

He stopped at Sam's door and saw her rushing back and forth between her stacks of papers, a chalkboard and some machine she seemed to be constructing.

Well, at least she seemed to be having some success.

Not wanting to bother her, he moved on.

As he turned the corner, he heard the doors open and saw Cam and Vala enter along with their guide. He noted how dark it was already, yet his watch indicated it was a little past five p.m.

"Daniel! Wait up man, we've got some things to tell you!" Cam shouted down the corridor, appearing very excited and seemed to have a lot on his mind. Great, someone else had managed to discover something and he was stuck with a worthless pile of papers. Vala, however, didn't seem as happy. The two approached him quickly and Vala marched right up to his face, slamming the bag of research supplies into his chest.

"Look! I gridded the damn place and took some samples but the sun doesn't stay up on this blasted planet long enough to get anything done so don't even start lecturing me on my time management," she shouted at him.

"Jeez Vala," Cam spoke up, "Lighten up. We're going back out there tomorrow and you're not even giving the man a chance to speak."

Daniel took a deep breath and tried to be positive but he just didn't seem to have it in him to do so. On the other hand, maybe if Cam had brought him back some news of use it would improve his mood.

"Thank you Vala. Anything you can find will be better than what I've found. I feel like I've spent an eternity in this cold cell to discover nothing. I'll go over tonight what you found so far," Daniel assured her.

"Fine, great. So far. I hear your tone Daniel and I don't like it," she said and stormed away down the hall.

"Just ignore her," Cam responded immediately, "she's had a bug up her ass all day long and I'm not sure how to chill her out. And Teal'c, wow, today hit him pretty hard."

It was then that Daniel noticed their fearless Jaffa was missing. Before he could ask, Cam continued.

"Got down to that site and there are bodies all right. Four of them. Atum's men, young and each one slit from," he paused his story to give a visual with his thumb, "ear to ear. Teal'c says the cuts have to be self-induced. That kinda messed him up a bit. Apparently Jaffa don't commit suicide."

"Wow," Daniel was intrigued, "How long do you guys judge they have been down there?"

"I think those samples that Vala took will give us our best estimate, but Teal'c and I reckon at least six months but no longer than a year. Strange too. If the Jaffa are free then why would they still be in Goa'uld uniform and come here to kill themselves," Cameron answered.

"That is odd. Well, I can run simple carbon dating myself, so I'll take these back to the lab. That will at least give us a better idea of what we're dealing with. After all, this is the warm season, those Jaffa could have been frozen for longer," Daniel added, Cameron nodding in agreement.

"I agree. Well, I'm gonna get some grub and then try to work out some. I promised Teal'c I'd bring him some dinner," he said, slapping Daniel on the back, starting toward the make-shift mess. Deciding he might as well, Daniel followed, the two men heading through the double doors, looking at the assortment of food laid out for them. It wasn't the feast they had been offered their first night on the planet, but there was a decent enough variety of bread, meat and cheeses.

As they ate, Cam gave him more details of the site: the placement of the bodies, the approximate ages and different things Teal'c had noticed about the armor. The armor had been pristinely clean as if these young men had never seen battle and they were also dumped into the ravine as if they had either stood on the edge of the ravine, slit their throats and fell into the pit or they were transported there. Again, as much to Daniel as it was to Teal'c, the suicide aspect was the most disturbing part of Cam's story. When Cam had finished, Daniel just shook his head and sipped some hot tea.

This was probably the worst news of all.

"I can see why Teal'c might be upset. The Jaffa are free and have been so for a while now. Why would they still be wearing uniforms, of a long dead overlord and then commit mass suicide? Are you sure this wasn't Anubis?" Daniel asked as Cameron shrugged.

"As much as we can ever be sure, but unless he's changed his MO, so this looks like something else," the colonel replied.

"Teal'c has been concerned about corruption within the Jaffa council and this may just prove his suspicions. I can take him his dinner; try to help him through this. He's helped me through rough times before," Daniel offered, a million thoughts running through his head one of which was it would give him a chance to check on Adrienne, wherever she had gone.

He was worried about her too.

"Sure, and tell him I'll be going for another run if he needs me. It's too damn cold to sit still here and I just don't feel like looking through pictures of those bodies just yet," Cameron agreed, wiping off his hands, stretching his legs in anticipation already.

The men stood, Cam waving back behind him and heading out in the direction of their room as Daniel walked over, picking up a small, clean metal plate to begin to fill it with food for Teal'c. He looked up, hearing a rustle and saw Moreed entering the room, this time wearing bright aquamarine robes.

"Dr. Jackson, how has your day fared?" the ambassador inquired, curious.

"Well, thank you for asking," considering the information that he just learned, Daniel felt it best to remain cryptic.

"I heard that your team is not doing as well. Apparently the bodies we discovered in the ravine are a great source of discomfort for your Jaffa and your Lucian woman," Moreed pried.

Odd, Daniel thought.

Of all of the things for that commander to report to Moreed, the mental state of his teammates seemed trivial compared to the fact that a group suicide had occurred within hours of the capital.

And he'd called Vala that Lucian woman…

"I think we're just tired after a day's work. Research does take a lot of effort and our team is very meticulous in our methodology," Daniel defended.

"Of course," the man answered, "And I hope that accommodations are again to your liking."

"Yes sir," Daniel responded, thinking of Adrienne again, hoping she had returned to his bed, "I was actually taking Teal'c some supper down right now to compare notes with him."

"Excellent. Then, I will check with you in the morning."

And with that he glided out of the room.

That man certainly gave Daniel the creeps, and he seemed to doubt the team's ability.

Had they lost their edge?

True, many of them had been working on their own projects throughout Stargate command, some of them involving the Destiny, but they were still the elite team for analysis of Ancient knowledge.

Weren't they?

Once again, drifting into a slight depression, Daniel made for their quarters, wanting to check on Adrienne first.

When he arrived in the room he found he had just missed Cam, his boots now placed neatly where his sneakers had been, and Adrienne was reading a novel in his bunk.

"Where's Teal'c? " he asked Adrienne first, also thinking how strange it was that she had abandoned work to read…

"He came by a while ago. Said something about not wanting to disturb anyone. That was about it..." she began to gag, " what's that smell?!"

"What smell?"

First Vala, then Teal'c and now Adrienne was acting like a crazed pregnant woman, picking up on every little sound or smell.

"That disgusting spoiled smell. What's on that plate?" Adrienne pointed to the dish in his hands.

"Dinner," Daniel responded, "Ad, are you alright?"

"Yeah. I think so," though her concern did not express that confidence.

Concerned, he set the plate gently on the floor, walking over to her and ducking to sit on the edge of the bunk.

"Ja-wer, are you sure you're alright?" he asked, as Adrienne smiled slightly, setting the book aside.

"I will be, I was just getting a little out of it down there," her voice was strange, and she smiled softly, inching her way closer to him, "But not now. Cho, you smell so good Indy, like sweat and man…"

She was on her knees before he realized it, nuzzling his neck and kissing and sucking that place that drove him wild. He started to push her away, they were on a mission after all, and Woolsey and the IOA had finally stopped punishing them for the magnifier incident, but her kisses were electric, and he suddenly had an urge deep inside him that he couldn't control.

She was already at his waist, making quick work of his belt and zipper, and he did the same, not bothering with any other article of her clothing other than getting her pants off.

"Fuck Daniel, you smell so fuckin good…" she was whispering in his ear, reaching into his pants, but he was ready, pushing her back and slamming into her so hard the entire bunk shook, but he didn't notice.

Adrienne was moaning into his ear, holding onto him, smelling him it felt like, but he didn't care, pushing him into her with such force that he felt like he might explode. There was pressure at his neck, her teeth, was she biting him, but he couldn't stop, as if something was taking over his entire body, willing him to just keep going. There was pain, but good pain, and she gasped, and almost as quickly as it began it was over, Daniel collapsing onto her. There was a pain at his neck again, and he reached to touch it, feeling wetness, and pulled his hand to see blood on his fingertips.

"What was that?" she gasped out, "And merde, metal, what did I…"

"You bit me," he said, sitting back in shock.

"Sorry, Indy, I just, I," she stammered, tears in her eyes, "I have no idea what came over me, I'm sorry, oh my god, this metal taste," she heaved, leaning over and throwing up onto the floor, sobbing as she did so.

"Ad," Daniel stood quickly, with nothing to clean themselves nearby, "Don't cry, it's ok, I'm so sorry, I have no idea what that was, let me find a towel or something, hang on."

Racing around the room, Daniel found their packs, reaching inside to find anything, finding only a pack of wipes Adrienne kept to clean her hands after digging through old stuff. They would have to do, he thought, rushing over so she could clean up both the blood and other things, still trying to figure out what to do about the vomit on the floor.

"Oh god," Adrienne began to heave again, "I've gotta get outta here, the smell, blood, vomit, semen," she shouted out, so uncharacteristically her, standing and pulling up her pants.

"Sorry cher," was all she spat, grabbing her backpack and dashing out of the room, headed to the showers.

He was completely confused, what was going on, with her, with him. He flinched again, reaching his fingers to his neck, hoping he had a bandaid in his pack. Kneeling, thoughts swirling through his head, what had happened, what had come over he and Adrienne to take such a huge risk on a mission, the pair of them acting like animals, and she had bitten him, before being disgusted to the point of throwing up by things that not only normally didn't bother her, but in such a way that she had dashed off. He found a towel, thankfully, in his pack, along with a small first aid kit, taking a moment to bandage himself and clean up the vomit.

The wave hit him, the worry, the sorrow.

She was disgusted...by you…

He tried to push it away, shaking his head and going back over to where he had set the food for Teal'c. The items were fortunately untouched, so Daniel grabbed the plate, checking himself once more to ensure he had no bodily fluid on his person, before setting out again.

The rooms were at the top of a T shaped hall, so he could go left or right and the archaeologist paused, debating his options. Through the drab darkness and fluorescent lighting of the hallways Daniel could see a soft glow from the left hand side of the hall. Guessing that his friend was using his standard candle setting, he turned left.

It was maybe a hundred feet down the hall when Daniel located the soft glow through a crack in the door. In a small room, although every room on this planet seemed to be a small one, Teal'c had positioned himself in the center of a circle of candles. He was deep into meditation, Daniel hesitant to disturb him.

There was a small table to the side of the door so Daniel set the plate there and sat down crossed legged in front of the Jaffa. He began to meditate as Teal'c had taught him, releasing the flood of emotion that had been building up inside of him all day.

Why was his life like this?

It seems that everything Daniel touched just turned into a disaster. Everything, right down to the discovery of the Stargate, which while wonderful in some aspects, had brought death and destruction to many worlds and many brave men and women of Earth. Even this simple assignment was quickly blowing up in his face.

He flashed back to the strange animalistic sex he'd just had with Adrienne moments before, sex that she'd fled from in complete disgust.

He felt a sinking in the pit of his stomach.

Daniel meditated for a while, without a sound from Teal'c. Eventually, he realized that Teal'c wasn't going to move and feeling no better, he got up, leaving the plate on the table and headed back to his lab.

He'd try to get some more work done and then just crawl into bed with Adrienne.

If she was there…

The run made Cam feel better and warmer as he expected but he was going to have to be careful to walk the fine line between keeping warm and feeling good and overdoing it. He was thirsty, but since the Skalaraans only seemed to drink that disgusting smelling tea, he was going to have to get some water from the bathroom.

Not his first choice, but it would have to do.

He started back down the hall, toweling sweat off of his head and deciding he would shower yet again before turning in for the night. As he neared the rooms he could hear strange noises coming from the girls' room. Confused, he cautiously approached the door and knocked, trying to figure out what was going on.

No answer.

He knocked again, but still there was no answer. He tried the doorknob, the door swinging open easily to reveal Vala raging against a wall with anything she could put her fists on.

"Vala, what the hell is going on? What are you doing?" Cameron was shouting.

"Leave me alone Cam, I'm not in the mood," Vala hissed at him.

"Listen, you were pretty upset out there today and I just wanted to check in on you. Did I do something? Did anyone do anything?" Cameron asked, trying to ascertain what was going on with her but Vala threw the chair she had in her hands down on the ground, marching right up to him, standing nose to nose.

"You know what I'm tired of? I'm tired of being treated like an idiot. I was treated like an idiot by everyone for years, and now, even though I'm one of the damn heads of intelligence, I'm still treated like I'm incompetent! Vala, take this equipment with you because you are too stupid to work with us. Don't break it! Vala, mak grid, you know, like a checkerboard since you're too blasted stupid to understand dimensions!" she screamed. Cam did notice that Daniel did have a tendency to still treat Vala like a child, maybe a bit more than he should, but she was generally a good natured person and he had never seemed to make her quite so angry before.

"Ok, girl. Let's take a deep breath. I think we all just need to grab some dinner, calm down and turn in early. Last night's craziness, today's excitement and the cold temperatures are really wigging out our systems. Come on," he took her arm, "let's go for a walk."

He could tell she was still angry, but she let him lead her from the room and toward the mess.

When they arrived they found Sam sitting and eating, but Adrienne nowhere in sight. It seemed that Daniel had taken the food down to Teal'c but had chosen not to return. Deciding that his next task was to check on the three of them, Cam led Vala over to the table to sit down and chat with everyone, hoping that her friends would be able to calm her down and ascertain what was really wrong.

"Hey Cam, Hey Vala," Sam shouted, much more cheerful than usual.

Maybe not cheerful, but loud.

Her legs were tapping a mile a minute and she looked like she needed to relax, big time.

"Listen Sam, Vala's not really feeling that terrific today and I need to check on Teal'c. Can ya'll keep any eye on her?" Cameron asked.

"Sure! – Sam answered enthusiastically, again, for the general it was way too chipper, "and afterwards she can come back to the lab and help with the chemical analysis of those compounds I've discovered that seem like nothing that you can find on Earth..." Sam trailed over babbling in some kind of physics babbling. Leaving Vala with Sam, hoping that was safe given her odd behavior, Cam left in search of Teal'c.

As he had half expected, Teal'c wasn't in the room, so he set out exploring the hallways. Turning right out of the room, the colonel began searching the series of rooms along the hallways.

The water in the shower area they had set aside for them had long since grown cold, but Adrienne didn't care.

She could still smell it.

She could still taste it.

The metal smell and taste of blood, the rotting odor and flavor of vomit, the scent of semen coming from her.

It was making her crazy because in her rational mind she knew that none of those things had ever bothered her before, especially when it came to Daniel, hell she had taken care of him injured, sick…

She dry heaved into the floor of the shower, as she had nothing left in her to vomit.

She kept scrubbing, her skin pink and turning raw.

It hurt, but so did the smell, and the shower was so loud, the droplets hitting the floor, her shoulders, her bottles of shampoo and conditioner…

She scrubbed harder, now the sound of the scrubbing grating, like fingers on a chalkboard.

Metal, rot, salt, drip, drop, scrape, scratch.

The archaeologist collapsed onto the shower floor, sobbing.

Sam was genuinely annoyed that not one member of her team, at least not one member she had seen, had taken an interest in her near breakthrough. Granted, they didn't understand the basics of organic or even elemental chemistry enough to fully appreciate what she was trying to do, but they could at the very least feign interest.

After only about a half an hour at dinner, Vala, still steaming about something, had left shortly after.

Sam, however, couldn't see the sense in wasting perfectly good time on something as trivial as sleep. They only had seven, well six days taking packing, night and travel into consideration, here on this glorious planet and she only had four days left at this point as it was.

Who knew what the Skalaraans would allow her to take home?

It seemed that while she had found great success transcribing the periodic tables, she had also stumbled upon a few compounds that, while similar to the ones known on earth, were just different enough to be viable. In particular, the extra electrons present in the lithium on this world might allow her to use existing nuclear theory to create a stronger yet better contained power device.

Definitely much more important than sleep.

Thankfully, she really didn't need to worry about sleep. That tea was great; not only did it keep her warm but it managed to keep her alert and awake. She had passed on it the first night, but after it managed to keep Adrienne warm and happy, and she never seemed warm, Sam thought it was worth a try. Since, she had experienced a jolt of energy, in fact much more energy than from her normal vitamin B supplements.

Finishing her cup, she glanced at her watch.

3 a.m. Earth time.

Plenty of time till Skalraan sunrise and until she could get down to the mess to get some more refreshments. In the meantime, she decided to do some jumping jacks to get her brain flowing and to take out some nervous energy. She felt like she was in college again pulling an all-nighter; it was a rush she had missed sitting in her command office all day.

She needed to go off-world more often.

Vala awoke the next morning to an empty room. Sam must have never left the lab and Adrienne most likely had crawled her way into Daniel's bed again.

Figures.

The two of them lived in their own little world where no one else mattered now that they were together.

Why pay any mind to Vala when everyone and everything else is much more interesting?

As she showered and dressed she wondered why she was bothering to head back out to the site again. No matter what, the smell would be bad, the time would be too short, or her samples would not be good enough for Daniel. Regardless, she threw on her uniform jacket and stormed out of the room, figuring that she had nothing else better to do.

When she entered the mess she saw only Cam and Adrienne, the latter looking like she could throw up at any second. Cam, however, seemed just fine, sitting across from her with a Powerbar and his canteen trying to lift her spirits.

"So are we the only ones bothering to work today?" Vala asked, attitude in her voice.

"Good morning to you too Vala," Cam answered, "It seems Sam pulled an all-nighter and Daniel has been trying to get Teal'c's head back in the game. Addy here is pushing through on a sour stomach."

"Great," she answered, her voice getting louder with each word, "so are we heading down to the site on Teal'c's time or what?"

Once again, everyone else's problems and issues came before hers.

She had work to do.

This was crazy.

"Vala, please stop shouting," Adrienne answered her, "I can come down with you if you need. Daniel and I have hit a big zero and I think we are wasting our time at this point."

She hadn't actually expected anyone to volunteer.

Feeling calmer, that was rather nice of Addy, she went over to the table and half way filled her plate with that disgusting fruit and stale bread, lastly pouring herself a mug of Oklug. She returned to the table where everyone continued to sit in silence, glancing down at her watch as she popped a berry into her mouth.

8:32 a.m. Earth time.

At this rate they were never going to get back to the site but fortunately, Cam was on the same page.

"Ok, guys, I think I'm gonna find Jahwna and steal Addy for the day. We can get the rest of the information we need if we work fast and work together," he declared.

Oddly, as if the commander had read their minds, Jahwna, accompanied by Moreed entered the room. Today, they were wearing matching amber robes and more than ever looked to be akin.

"Sir Cam," Jahwna spoke as Cam nodded in acknowledgement, "I have told Moreed of our findings yesterday and he is quite interested in the results of Dr. Jackson's analysis."

"Um, sir," Cam started, "I'm not sure how far he was able to get on those samples. Last I saw of him he was nose deep in translations and might not have gotten as far as he wanted to..."

"What findings?" Vala interjected, "You mean MY samples and MY findings!?" she shouted and stood, "Basically what we know is this: For some unknown reason those young Jaffa, who are free to settle on a nice NORMAL planet like Chulak instead of this godforsaken cold rock, came here to off themselves in a ditch. And since Daniel has been too damn busy comforting our big baby to run any of the tests and our REAL scientist is onto some amazing breakthrough or something, no one has had time to analyze anything. On our planet we do have to sleep once in a while."

Now standing himself, Cam carefully placed his hand on her shoulder as she flew off the handle for no reason at all but she shooed away his comfort, lashing out and slapping it off.

"Furthermore," she continued, her eyes wild with fear and anger, " I'm not sure what you people EAT on this planet, but no one can survive on this shit. It's cold, I'm hungry and this tea DOES NOT warm you up."

With a cautious look to his superior, Jahwna approached her, reaching out his hand to calm her as well but all she could think was how dare he?

How dare he touch me?

Instinctively, she recoiled, punching him square in the face and the slight man toppled over, crashing to the floor.

In a flurry of action, no time to even say a word to Cam or anyone, to demand an explanation for their treatment, she could feel herself being forced to the ground.

"Colonel Mitchell, please inform Dr. Jackson that we are taking Miss MalDoran into custody. To strike another soul is one of the highest offenses in our culture and until he and I can meet to settle this she will be taken to a holding cell," Moreed addressed Cameron.

Vala fought and kicked with all of her might. The guard to the left had very long golden hair that might have been beautiful had he not been hauling her to a cell, hair that she grabbed the best she could. Her fighting and pulling was futile and just as she thought she could hear Cam trying to reason with Moreed, she felt a pin prick on the side of her neck and the world went black.

"Sir, look, something is really wrong with our team. I think we might be ill. Please, let me go and find Daniel because I'm sure that he can straighten it all out," Cameron pleaded with their host.

"Colonel Mitchelll, I certainly hope so. We have brought you into our home as honored guests in the hopes that our worlds will have many things to share. That, however, is no longer looking as likely."

With that, Moreed swept up his robes, motioning to Jahwna to accompany him in his exit. His own face wearing a mask of shock, Cam looked over at Adrienne who was sitting there clearly stunned.

"Ok, look," his training in command was once again kicking in, forcing the panic away, "you need to go to the lab. I know Sam pulled an all-nighter, so I need you two egg heads to act like everything is alright and keep working. I'm going to go get Daniel, try to reason with Teal'c and clean up this situation. Understood?"

Adrienne simply nodded.

A plan in his head, Cam turned on his heels, racing down the hall. Jogging at near full speed he traced his way back through the corridors that he had explored last night since he had found both Teal'c and Daniel in a small room meditating just hours before. This was something he had seen them do a million times before, so he had left them to it and hit the sack. It did, however, bother him that neither of them made it back to bed last night.

And it bothered him even more that Adrienne had just gone to sleep in Daniel's bunk, not seeming to be concerned in the least, instead curled into a ball as if she were in pain.

When he arrived at that same room, Teal'c was still sitting in the center of small wax piles that had once been candles, their flames long since burned out. There was no sign of Daniel in the room and Adrienne hadn't mentioned seeing him at breakfast, which Cam found most unusual of all. Focusing on one friend at a time, Cam knelt in front of the great warrior.

"Teal'c, buddy, hey man, can you wake up?"

The Jaffa did not move.

"T, we've got a bit of a situation here. Teal'c? Where's Daniel? I need to find Daniel. Damn it Teal'c, I need you to wake up!" he shouted, repeatedly, shaking his friend, but the Jaffa did not respond.

"Teal'c! Vala has been ARRESTED! They're LOCKING HER UP!" Cam was screaming in his face, a face that did not break, did not move.

This was bad; this was so bad.

What was going on? The entire team was falling apart. Vala had been arrested, Teal'c had completely shut down, Sam was on some manic research binge and Adrienne looked so ill he was sure she needed a hospital.

And where in the HELL was Daniel?! Why was everyone acting like this? And then he remembered...

There was only one thing Cam could do. He took out his zat gun and made his way to the Stargate.

Teal'c was vaguely aware of ColonelMitchell entering the room. His friend had been trying to tell him something about Vala, but that was not important.

The only thing important was his failure.

He understood, he understood it all.

Those young Jaffa had made a dishonorable decision and it was due in part to his failure.

He needed to leave at once and return to where he belonged.

Daniel arrived back to an empty room. His watch was gone, to where he wasn't sure and he had no idea as to what time it was. He'd hoped it was early enough to find them but they were all gone.

He'd checked the girl's room first. They had all left him, even Adrienne, the love of his life, was nowhere to be found. Here he was fighting with desperation and despair and this proved it all to him.

You said you loved me Ad.

The team didn't need him any longer. They had risen that morning, and continued with their work and research without him.

Some leader he was.

Even Teal'c wouldn't snap out of it for his old friend.

He had at least hoped that Adrienne would have come looking for him, Adrienne who he cared so much about, who he loved more than any person in his life and who had said loved him the same.

Not even she could be bothered.

You said you loved me…

You were a monster yesterday, and she is disgusted by you...

Daniel walked into the room and closed the door behind him.

Adrienne had done as Cam asked and went straight to Sam's lab despite her burning desire to find Daniel but the colonel was right, Sam was not acting like normal and Daniel could take care of himself.

A wave washed over her, the blood, the metal taste, the smells…

She willed herself forward anyway.

There, Sam was calmly transcribing more elements on the periodic table, so Adrienne decided that maybe she had overreacted and that they should just return to work and let Daniel deal with the Vala situation.

Daniel having to deal with a Vala fit; so what else was new?

Despite her continued nausea and headache, Adrienne headed back to their work room, resuming where she had left off yesterday.

She had been bent over the desk for hours, translating what were just more and more pages of family lineage. After she had closed the last of the small stack of books, she stood up, stretched, took a swig of Oklug and checked the time. Earth time, it was well past noon.

No sign of Cam.

No sign of Teal'c.

No sign of Daniel.

Not having Daniel come to work was the strangest of all.

He hadn't come to bed either, much to her dismay, she felt so sick and wanted more than anything the comfort of his embrace, and to check on that bite, she bit him, she bit him while they were having sex, not making love, but having terrifying near violent sex...

...but there was not even so much as a peep.

Maybe he had stopped by the lab to see what Sam was working on and was heading her direction; he could have very easily worked through the night being that he had to carry on without her. Nothing else to translate in her stack, she decided to find Daniel and Cam and see what was going on with the rest of the team.

The lab where the Sklarans had stationed Sam was just two doors down. The door was slightly ajar when she arrived, so she pushed it open the rest of the way to find Sam frantically working with a small electronic machine.

"Huh," she said aloud to herself, even more curious and with slight worry, "Daniel's not here either..."

Sam completely ignored her, "If I place this wire here it should act as a counterbalance to the Lithium 6…."

She smelled something, a familiar smell from the night before...

"Sam? Have you seen Daniel? Has Cam come by?" Adrienne asked but Sam continued to run back and forth across the room ignoring Adrienne's arrival.

Adrienne grew frustrated and tried again, raising her voice, causing further pounding in her head.

"Sam, what are you doing?"

"Adrienne!" Sam finally looked up at her.

Her face was unnaturally frenzied and she had large dark circles under her eyes, her face pale and sickly making Adrienne instantly catch her breath.

"Adrienne! I think I may have found a way to write the basic component ideas for a Teller-Uman Hydrogen Bomb to create a non-explosive submodel which might generate enough power for use to dial the 9th chevron…"

She kept talking, frantically, directing her attention back to her work. As Sam continued to move parts and mumbling to herself, Adrienne could see a soft red glaze trickling down the wires, making the archaeologist squint and lean forward for a closer look. It took her a moment, Sam still dashing around the table, to realize that it was blood.

Sam was bleeding onto the machine.

It was no small cut either; her fingers were raw and torn and there was blood everywhere.

That metal smell hit her again and the sounds of Sam's movements, of her words, it was a swirl of scents and sounds that slammed into Adrienne, sending her head into a tailspin.

"If I could get a team here, maybe 5 or 6 scientists, we could use an Asgard conduit and poof! Welcome home Colonel Young!" Sam exclaimed, pointing to the end of the machine, blood flinging from her fingers, slapping sickly on the wall. It oozed down the wall like paint on canvas, the brilliant scientist paying it no mind as her bloody fingers continued to work frantically at her task and mumbling about power sources and conduits.

The cajun felt faint…

Addy, keep it together.

What is going on!?

Terrified, Adrienne decided that she needed to find the rest of the team. Maybe Cam was with Daniel already and they would be working to get the situation under control and would be able to figure out what was wrong with everyone. After Vala's violent outburst at breakfast and now this, Adrienne had gone from worry to full panic.

Daniel wasn't in the cafeteria either, leaving only the male's quarters to check. Her heart racing with worry, Adrienne approached the door to the room noting that no light seemed to be coming from the crack underneath. Daniel might be asleep, especially if he had worked through the night, so she knocked tentatively as to not jolt him awake.

No answer.

Growing more and more concerned by the moment, she tried the doorknob, finding that it was unlocked, opening the door slowly.

Hesitantly, Adrienne entered the dark room, feeling around for the switch. Remembering it was on the left hand side of the door, she found it with ease and flipped it upward but nothing happened.

"I cut the lights."

The voice was coming from the bottom bunk.

It was Daniel's voice.

"I needed to think. I wanted it dark. It's just not dark enough."

"Indy, are you ok?" Adrienne whispered, cautiously approaching the bunk, stepping carefully through the pitch blackness. She could hear his breathing, intense and deep.

It was so loud, beating through her head like a drum.

"Daniel, cher, something really crazy is going on. Did Cam find you?"

He didn't answer, just continued to breathe in and out loudly and slowly, terror growing inside. Daniel should be comforting her, holding her, she was sick, he knew her well enough to hear it in her voice, he should be at her side, not sitting here like this in silence.

"Daniel, what's going on?"

"I'm finished. There's no need for me, you all don't need me. I'm just tired of it all," he whispered in the dark, "So I came here to end it."

"What are you talking about Daniel? Of course we need you. I need you. Why are you acting so strange? End what?" she asked him, inching closer and closer to his side.

She could hear his heart beating, so loud, so very loud and she could hear tears running down his face.

"But I can't find anything to do it…"

She could hear all of this, magnified like speakers were inside of her head.

It was all so loud, and so unnatural. Trying not to be ill, she could smell the wound she had made on his neck, a dry metallic smell now, Adrienne sat beside him, trembling, internally debating whether she should stay or go for help, wherever help could be found.

In the dim light from the glow under the door, Adrienne could see large, long, scratch marks on his inner forearm, as if he had been trying to dig at himself, hurt himself, with whatever he could find, but given this world and what they had, he had most likely not been able to find anything.

"I don't know what's wrong with me," he cried, "I can't take it anymore. The books, the work, I'm hollow, and I'm alone. I'm so alone."

He leapt from the bunk before she could reply, before she could assure him that he had her, that he would always have her, falling to his knees on the floor, screaming.

"I HATE THIS! I HATE MYSELF! I WANT THIS PAIN TO END! LET ME DIE!"

Adrienne had never seen him act like this, or anyone act like this for that matter. His screams were so loud, she could hear him panting, she could feel his self-hate and anger coming off of his body in waves.

It was as if she was in an energy cyclone, with the winds beating her body violently.

She heard shuffling, Daniel tearing through something, her bag, and she heard him cursing that she only had vitamins, composition books and a novel.

She must have left her pencils in the room where they had been working.

She was instantly grateful.

Not knowing what else to do but understanding that something was so very wrong, that something outside of himself had driven him to this despair, she got down onto the floor with him, wrapping her arms around him, holding him close to her. He started to fight, rambling about dying, but he came in, letting her arms envelop him.

"Daniel, I'm right here, it's me, it's Adrienne. Everything's gonna be alright, please calm down," she whispered, running her fingers through his hair, holding him, kissing his temple, fighting to contain her own tears.

He was still babbling and completely falling apart in her lap, much worse than when the Ascended had invaded his dreams or when he had told her about Hathor.

"Ad, let me go, I can't anymore…"

"Stop," she held him tighter, "No, you are not allowed to leave me, ya hear?"

He tried to struggle, to free himself from her, but he seemed to be as weak as she was. Wishing she had a flashlight, Adrienne tried to remember if there were any weapons in the room, and there shouldn't have been anything he could use to hurt himself. The only thing she could think of would be one of his fancy ink pens, but his bag was back in the lab so there shouldn't be anything he could use to hurt himself.

"If I die Anubis won't care about hurting me and he won't come after you…" he now wept, Adrienne shaking her head before kissing his.

"Yes he will," Adrienne countered, "because he still wants the Pegasus, the Milky Way, so you'd just be leaving me behind to fight alone and I can't do this alone."

Daniel sobbed harder, shaking.

"I can't stand…" he tried to pull away, but Adrienne could tell he was so weak, "Ad, I can't stand…"

Where was Cam?

"Adrienne, please let me die…"

If he hadn't found Daniel then where did he go?

Sam needed a doctor soon, Adrienne just hoped that she hadn't injured herself worse, she had heard nothing of where they had taken Vala and she felt so sick and so contaminated, all the while holding the love of her life in her arms as he completely fell apart.

It was then she smelled something else on Daniel, a strange and familiar smell.

A smell she had been close to for almost three days now.

The tea.

Her eyes widened.

"Daniel, look at me," she pulled his face to hers, trying to find his eyes in the darkness, crying as she spoke, "Daniel, listen to me. Please don't do anything. Stay here. You're sick, ok, sick, I am too. We all are, except for Cam. I think he's trying to get help so I'm gonna go find him. Please stay here and be safe, don't do anything. Indy, look at me, let me know that you understand what I am saying to you."

He lifted his tear stained face and nodded slowly.

"I love you and I need you, just keep thinking that."

She led him to the bunk to rest, laying him down gently and kissing him as she covered him up.

"Daniel, are you listening to me?" she asked before leaving.

"Yeah."

"You said forever," she whispered, "Remember? You said that this, that we, me, was it for you."

Daniel nodded weakly.

"It is for me too, ok, you're endgame for me. Ok? You're it for me too, forever. But to do anything about that I need you here with me."

He started to fall back, his skin clammy and cool, but his pulse was strong, it was just as if he passed out from the exhaustion of it all.

"Ok, good," she whispered, "Pass out and rest," she kissed him again softly, "I'll be right back. I love you."

Moments later, after throwing up the corner, Adrienne was running through the hallways looking for the Colonel.

Cam was racing down the hall toward the Stargate as fast as he could so it was virtually impossible for him to stop when he saw Adrienne running straight for him. They slammed into each other and he caught her, pushing her back. As he moved her away he could see that she was crying, her face red and tear streaked.

"Adrienne, oh my god, what happened? Are you alright?" he asked.

"Daniel, he keeps saying he wants to die, I can't leave him long, what if he tries when I'm gone..." she choked through tears, her chest heaving with rapid breath. Cam stood back in shock and disbelief as he suddenly understood what had happened.

"Adrienne, does he have anything he can hurt himself with?"

"No, no, I think I checked but something's wrong. It's the tea. We've all been drinking it. Everyone but you. And we're all so messed up," she continued, her body convulsing. Without asking her anything else, Cam reached out his arms, pulling her into an embrace.

"I know Addy, I know. I'm the only one who seems to be alright and I'm the only one that didn't drink the crap. Ok, Adrienne listen to me," he paused, "Where's Sam? I thought you were with Sam."

Adrienne was still sobbing, holding onto him tightly, tearing Cameron up to see his friend so scared, "I was, but she's all messed up. Babbling on about this machine, bleeding, she smells like metal. It's awful."

Cam took a moment to consider his options, as he could smell a trace of vomit on Adrienne, a clear indicator of how sick she really was.

"Go back to Daniel," he gave her his zat gun, "Zat him unconscious if he tries to hurt himself. I'm heading for the gate. I'm gonna get us some help."

Faster than he had run in a long time, Cam made a mad dash to the gate.

When he arrived there, Moreed was awaiting him.

"Colonel Mitchell. Why are we in such a hurry?" the man asked.

"Look Moreed; I'm not sure what's going on here, but my team is seriously ill and I need to contact our commander and get our doctor over here," Cameron explained.

"I am afraid that will not be possible," he replied. On cue, a group of identical Skalaraan guards came out from behind the gate to surround him.

It was a trap.

Realizing it much too late, Cam looked left and right pointing his zat gun in both directions trying to determine where to open fire first. As he had decided left, he saw the soldiers to the right crumble to the floor out of the corner of his eye, the colonel taking out the rest before pointing his weapon at Moreed, firing without hesitation.

"ColonelMitchell," Teal'c called out to him, "I believe that we have been poisoned. I was coming to the Stargate to contact O'Neill and request reinforcements."

"That is the best thing you could say to me right now old buddy," Cam replied, dialing the sequence home and watching the crystalline waters materialize in front of him.

Slamming the button on his call sign, he tore through the wormhole for home.

Once Cam had called for reinforcements Sam's very concerned and very angry husband personally sent three SG teams to rescue them and secure the Skalaraan facility. Once he awoke, Moreed was tended to and then interrogated as to their intentions concerning Earth and what they had done to SG-1, the IOA buzzing immediately with concerns of Anubis.

Upon investigation, it seemed that the Skalaraans were not as isolated as originally thought, but used Oklug as a way to drive their uninvited guests to madness and eventually suicide. The young Jaffa team had been sent about eight months earlier by the Jaffa council to make "first contact" and set up trade. Jahwna had reluctantly revealed that they were driven to madness after five days of drinking the tea and had committed suicide in their rooms. The Skalaraans dressed them in some old Jaffa armor, polished it up and tossed them into the ravine.

When it seemed that Stargate command was coming through, like it or not in their view, they used the Jaffa bodies to separate the team so they would not be able to tell that they were being poisoned. Meditating, Teal'c had finally realized that there was a lack of blood at the site and that the bodies must have been moved. Coupled with his own despair, he knew something had driven these Jaffa to kill themselves as it was driving him to desire the same. He knew he needed to call for a rescue team and had arrived just in time to assist Cam.

After reviewing the facts, Sam decided not to deem them hostile, it was apparent they simply wanted to be left alone, instead choosing to have their gate de-activated and the planet marked uninhabited with a star by the note.

That should keep most unwanted visitors out.

It had been three days since they arrived back at Stargate command, three long days spent in the infirmary flushing out their systems. Daniel, near suicide, was the worst, having consumed by far the most, and was released last from her care. He'd slept most of that, Adrienne refusing to leave his side even after she herself was released and Carolyn looked the other way just the night before when Adrienne crawled into the bed with him. He had been allowed to leave this morning, and wanting to finally address the group Sam had called a meeting in the briefing room to discuss what she had found. It was intriguing, the sample of Oklug that Moreed had generously given them, in exchange for his freedom and for immunity for his planet.

It was intriguing enough that she wanted to share with the group exactly what had happened to them.

As the team filed in silently, Daniel lagging behind, Sam couldn't help but notice that Adrienne didn't take her eyes off of him. The archaeologist took his seat, the cajun slipping in beside him, giving him a look that only someone in love could give. Trying not to stare, Sam adjusted her notes, starting the presentation.

"It seems that the main ingredient in the Oklug is very similar to a class of stimulants that we know on Earth as Nootropics. In particular, they're very closely related to Isoflavones, which have been found to act as sort of a hormone in mammals. Rather than change our behavior, per se, it simply enhances feelings, usually ones that are more negative and self-destructive in nature. These feelings increased exponentially based on the amount of tea consumed and it affected us in the same order as she began to consume it. Adrienne was the first to feel the symptoms, being the first to drink the tea, and her symptoms started that very night when she claimed that Vala was snoring so loudly that she couldn't sleep."

"I don't snore," Vala glared over at Adrienne.

"No, Vala, you don't normally. That was key to Cam figuring out what was going on. He's been on dozens of missions with you and he remembered that you don't snore, especially not enough to wake Addy."

"Nothing wakes Addy," Vala noted, "Once she's asleep she might as well be dead."

Adrienne frowned at Vala, rolling her eyes.

"That was the first moment that something was wrong, what Adrienne perceived as snoring was your breathing, enhanced due to the Oklug. Adrienne's the kind of person that picks up on small details, so the tea sent her senses into detail overload," Sam started to explain.

Adrienne shrugged sheepishly.

"That's true. I just notice things and pick up on sights and sounds that are out of place. I noticed how cold our room was and everything else was right away and then just started to pick the rest of the room apart bit by bit. And I had at least three cups of tea the first night," she conceded.

"Exactly! Then, when you went to the room with the guys, you weren't as hyper vigilant. You're with Daniel every day, so there was nothing new to notice about him, it is just the same old Daniel," Sam paused and was pleased to see that Adrienne was looking at her but she couldn't help but think to herself that Adrienne had also crawled into bed with Daniel, smiling at the thought.

She really was glad they were together.

"Teal'c was next," Sam redirected her attention to her friend, "Again, Teal'c's episodes began after seeing the Jaffa bodies and how they had been mutilated. This drove him into a depression of his own, given his concern for the issues that continue to arise within the Jaffa council. While he didn't recognize something was wrong on a conscious level, he did on an unconscious level, and by habit went to Kelnareen. That explains why he shut himself into the room for hours on end."

Teal'c had taken his actions to heart and he felt as if he abandoned the group; after what had happened to Vala and he was blaming himself for his inability to protect his team.

"Teal'c, without your symbiote," Sam continued, "you are much more susceptible to the same things as we are. Tretonin keeps you alive, gives you strength, but this was essentially poison and no amount of strength or fortitude can fix that. But, you were strong enough to fight back and that led you and Cam to the gate."

Without warning, Daniel got up and left the room.

Sam continued with her explanation to the rest of the group, cutting her eyes at Adrienne, urging her, hoping the cajun could read her mind.

It took only a few seconds before Adrienne was standing by herself, slipping away from the meeting.

He had known.

He had known from the moment Adrienne had told him he was sick that it had been the tea, that he was essentially drugged.

That didn't matter.

Things were far worse than he had recognized.

Daniel entered the room and walked over to the bed, sitting down robotically, his head dropping down into his hands. He wasn't sure how long he had been sitting there when there was a tap at the door.

"Cher? Are you in there?"

It was Adrienne, the last person he wanted to talk to and the last person he wanted to see.

How could she even talk to him after what had happened?

He told her he would never leave her, and then had gone to that room to take his own life.

"Daniel…"

She wasn't going to take no for an answer. Daniel arose, walking over to the door and opening it, peering around the door jam.

"Can I come in? Please?" she asked, her face pressed into the small space he had created. Unable to say no to her, he stepped back, allowing her to pass. She turned and put her hand over his, shutting the door behind them, reaching back to slip her fingers into his belt loops, pulling him close.

"I don't think that's a good idea," he said flatly, pulling away.

"Now you're just being ridiculous," was her response, "Let's go back to my apartment. We can order in, watch a movie, play a game, do whatever you want."

Shaking his head, he made his way over to the bed, and sat down, keeping his gaze toward the ground. He could hear Adrienne pulling a chair from his desk, positioning it facing him, pulling his chin up so his eyes met hers, reaching to hold his face in her hands.

"Why did you leave the briefing?" she asked sweetly and he shrugged.

"You heard Sam," he replied, pulling away slightly, "That tea or whatever was enhancing our moods not creating them."

"I'm not following…" she admitted. Daniel took a breath, reaching for her hands to hold them in his own.

"Remember that night, when I told you about Hathor?"

"Yeah," she replied.

"And I told you there were other things that happened to me?" he continued, but still asking questions rather than giving answers.

Adrienne nodded.

"This isn't the first time I wanted to take my life," he whispered, "Or tried to."

She scooted closer to him, lifting his eyes to meet her and kissing him softly.

"I figured," she answered as she pulled away.

"And I guess, like everything else, I just assumed I was better," he explained, "When in reality I have just had one trauma after another compound."

She stood now, taking a step to sit beside him on the bed.

"Daniel, that very morning and the night before, you were just as frustrated as I was, if not more. Hours and hours of work and nothing to show for it but supply lists and family lineage. Nothing to answer any questions, any of YOUR questions. You had to feel out of control. And, I haven't experienced a fraction of what you have on this team. You had to feel alone. Enhance that, times what two, three, FOUR cups of Oklug in less than a 24 hour period," Adrienne started to lay out what she remembered from Sam but he couldn't even look her in the eye.

"Daniel Anthony," she said his name again, throwing in his middle name that he hated in for effect, "Are you hearing me? That was not you. You were desperate. Desperate for control in your life. I mean, think back, think about it. Of all of the things that you have to be frustrated about, you have got to feel a lack of control, a loss of power. Everything you said," she paused, "everything you did," he heard that word roll slowly off of her tongue, "was a reaction to this feeling that you're not in control of your life."

Adrienne took a deep breath. "But you stopped. Even in that state, you snapped out of it and stopped. I think that says something about how strong you are, despite the trauma, despite everything."

He had stopped.

But why?

He searched his cloudy memory of that night, trying to remember the exact moment that he had come back to himself somehow, the moment where he realized he needed help and let her help him. A tear streaked down his cheek.

She'd asked him to stop, to not leave her, because she wanted to spend the rest of her life with him too.

She had said forever.

"Daniel, look at me, it's gonna be ok, I promise."

"I love you, so much," he whispered to her, starting to lose it again. He'd always been the one looking out for others but here she was, this perfect person for him, ready and willing to be there unconditionally.

"I love you too," she answered, her own tears no longer swells, escaping in long streaks down her cheek and he couldn't resist. Hoping she wouldn't shy away, he reached his palm to her cheek, drawing their lips together, pulling her into a tender kiss. She was sweet, like soda she'd been drinking at the briefing and she moved her mouth so slowly, so deliberately, so full of love. Lying there, in his bed, in his room, they kissed softly, before Adrienne pulled away, nuzzling him with her nose, pecking it lightly and gazing back into his eyes.

"No one blames you, I don't blame you and I don't want to lose you. Regardless of what you're thinking of yourself, in a complete state of despair, drugged with levels of poison beyond what any of the rest of us had in our systems, you were still able to be stronger than the pain. That shows me who Daniel really is, who the man I fell in love with really is," she whispered, wiping a tear from his face before reaching across him, clicking off the light. Curling her body around him, she reached back for his waist again, bringing their bodies close, drawing her lips to his. He let them kiss for a moment and he started to feel desire build up inside of him, a feeling he knew she was experiencing as well, as her hands began to wander. He pulled away, finally smiling and chuckling lightly.

"What's wrong?" she asked, confused.

"Don't bite me this time," he joked, feeling her stop everything.

"You ass," she whispered, laughing, "that was the damn tea."

"That evidently turned you into a vampire…"

"I hate you," she said with a giggle, rolling away from him when he caught her, pulling her back into his arms.

"How did I get so lucky?"

"Sam's got mad hiring skills cher, that's how," she whispered back, kissing him lightly again, "Can you go talk to the docs tomorrow? Just to be safe. If you need to go to, I dunno, therapy, anything, I'll go with you if you need me, or just be there with comfort food or something when you are done. I'll do whatever you need."

"I know you would," he muttered back, "And I appreciate it."

She sat up slightly, "Let's get out of here. Go to my place and get something ridiculous on the way to eat. We can watch a movie or something, eat dinner, and then I can prove to you that I really don't bite…"

"I think that's a fantastic idea," he replied, standing to collect his things.

Everyone has their limits, but what everyone doesn't have is someone standing at the edge to pull them back.

Daniel, however, finally did.