Mother-In-Law
Chapter 4
Deadbeat
The plan is actually genius, one of the Jacksons' better for sure.
Initially, he's not onboard with asking an outsider for help, especially when Vala has a tendency for screwing people over and burning bridges. They have to be careful that the person actually wants to see Vala return home safely, or they have to offer such a crazy reward for her safe return that the person guarantees it.
Two does even better by suggesting someone who wants both.
Thinks that finding him isn't going to be easy though.
He's been at the grift game for years and covers his tracks pretty well—not as well as her, but it's always up to the pupil to overthrow the master.
They put out a bulletin for him on all friendly planets and offer a huge amount of money for his capture and surrender—alive. The next step is contacting jailers and bounty hunters willing to take up the call—but it never comes to that.
If he loves one thing more than his daughter, it's money.
Jacek turns himself into SGC airmen on a neutral planet just a gate ride away. After being searched and cuffed for good merit—although he tried to sweet talk his way through the whole thing—steps through the gate unarmed two days after posting the bulletin.
"I came here unarmed. I listened to your requests." He holds up his zip tied hands from under the interrogation table. "Is this the way you treat prisoners of war?"
"Who says you're a prisoner of war?" Jackson questions from where he and Two sit on the opposite side of the table.
Pleaded with Landry to let him do the interrogation, because he knew Jacek better than the Grady Girls, he knows a bit more about his estrangement with Vala, he could get it done quick—but the general said his mind wasn't in the right place.
He's probably right because every time he closes his eyes he sees a charred farmhouse and a melted pile of plastic that used to be a crib.
"All I know is you offered me an awful lot of naquadah to show up here and be treated like a prisoner." Jacek's face is calm, but from his viewpoint behind the raised double mirror, he can see her dad's hands move under the table, fidgeting, trying to get out of the ties. "Whatever information you have on me, I guarantee that you've been misinformed."
"Is that so?" Landry questions as he enters the interrogation room, crossing with his hands relaxed at his side.
Already knows which angle the general is going to play—the reformed deadbeat dad.
Right now, he just wants the chance to be a deadbeat dad.
"I have a lot of enemies—" Jacek abandons his plans to slip his hands out of the zip ties and instead, is trying to hook the plastic on any jag sticking out from the table. "A lot of people would pay a pretty price to get to me."
"Then why did you answer our request within two days?" Jackson questions almost scornfully—he hasn't had that much experience dealing with Jacek, was preoccupied during his last visit to the SGC. There's no doubt that Vala and the Jacksons are close, but they're probably not privy to the details she's fed to him over the years—how hard it was to break the habit of stealing things so easily, of tricking innocent people, of pulling cons when she brought up doing it, when it was the only time she received praise.
"Because your offer was too good to pass up." Jacek grins widely, lifting his hands, still zip tied, but no longer stuck together. No one in the room seems to react or care, and his father-in-law seems dismayed by the lack of reaction to his magic trick.
"Well—" Jacek clears his throat, his hand rubbing against he opposite wrist "—that, and I just assumed Vala wanted to see me."
"Why would she want to see you?" Two barks out a laugh, leaving Landry and Jackson a bit shocked by his attitude.
"To let me know I'm a grandpa." No one in the room speaks a word. "Again."
"You know she's pregnant?" Jackson questions, trying to keep an even stance. Usually, they're so better at interrogations, but it's way to close this time, too personal, and they're all looking for someone to throw the blame on.
Someone's ass to kick.
"She told me the last time I was here—Did she name them after me?" Jacek straightens in his chair, craning his neck to look around the cinderblock walls of the interrogation room, stopping at the mirrored window and waving. "Hi kitten."
Behind the glass he shakes his head, his face falling into his palm with a groan.
"Jacek," Jackson begins, ignoring the man's dramatic flair—as much as she likes to attribute all of her best traits to her mother, he can see where she gets a lot of her mannerisms just by watching Jacek still try to remove the ties, chuckling nervously from the side of his mouth. "We're here to talk to you about your wife."
"She's my ex-wife." Jacek almost immediately corrects.
"Fine, your ex-wife."
"Which one." The room remains quiet for a moment, and Jacek even stops tugging at the plastic before realizing that the Jacksons and Landry aren't in a joking mood. After enough silence, he clarifies, "you're going to have to be more specific, there's eight, well, that I know about. I'm a bit of a free spirit, always trying to—"
"Adria."
Two's patience has apparently run out.
So have Jacek's words.
Another silence consumes the room this time, but instead of being based on irritation, annoyance, or on running out the clock, it's based on fear.
"Wh—what?" Jacek chuckles again, no longer for show, no longer nervous, no longer just out the corner of his mouth. His fidgeting evolves into him flipping around in his chair, looking left and right, trying to plan a way out. "I don't—I have no idea who—what you're talking about."
"We're talking about your ex-wife." Landry leans back in his chair, more relaxed with the upper hand.
"Vala's mother," Two adds.
"I don't know who her mother is," it's another chuckle and it almost sounds like he's regained his composure, but the fear behind his body movements, his constant scanning of the room says otherwise. Finally, his gaze lands back on the mirror and his face falls expressionless. "I have seven kids I know of. I don't have that kind of time."
"We're not asking you to remember all your ex-wives and all your children," Jackson leans in a bit on the table, and maybe this is him playing bad cop—they contacted Teal'c to return from aboard The Hammond with Sam, but Jacek got here first. "We just want to talk to you about Adria—"
"Adr—who?" The nervousness returns as Jacek stands, his gaze never leaving the mirror.
Jacek doesn't think he's staring at him—hell, he'll be surprised if her dad even remembers him—he thinks Vala is up here, and the expression he's making is for her. But what he's trying to figure out is what emotion Jacek is trying to convey to her. Anger? Disappointment? Regret?
"Listen, it's been fun kids, but I've got to go." Jacek starts to move around his side of the room, pacing like a wild animal caged, trying to figure out the best way around the three men who stand in his way.
"Jacek, we just want to ask—"
"Let me make this abundantly clear—" her dad pauses, his body stiff, his arms at his side, and his fingers twitching. The humor, the jest drained from his voice, from his face. "—whatever question you're going to ask me—I promise you, I don't know the answer."
"Mr. Mal Doran," Landry is growing tired with having to deal with dramatic adults all day. He remembers how it is being the boss. One problem snowballs into two more, then four—how if the base problem, the Clava Thessara Infinitas, was dealt with, that none of these other issues would have happened.
How deep down, she didn't tell them and continued working on her own, because after five years, she still didn't trust them with her deepest secret.
Still didn't trust him until there was nothing he could do about it.
"All we're looking for is a gate address," two explains.
"I don't know the address—"
"You don't even know the one we're after," Jackson interrupts, sitting stagnant in his chair, growing more tired with Jacek by the minute.
"I know, and I'm telling you I don't know it—"
That's enough.
He always leaves these things too long.
Would wait too long when she'd go missing on missions. Always hesitated because he didn't know if she was worth risking his career for.
He knows now.
Silently he leaves the observation window—tired of watching the world's worse opera—and without pause, he barges into the interrogation room. All four men pause their arguments, pause auctioning off naquadah, cargo ships, and opportunities for just one single gate address.
Landry gives him a heavy glare, one that a couple of months ago would have meant to get his ass out of the room or face the repercussions, respect the chain of command, the order of importance.
But his order of importance has changed, and he's not waiting any longer to get her back. He's not sitting around staring down a list of gate addresses when he could be popping through each one and looking for her himself.
When they could be bribing the right people instead of the uncooperative ones, no matter how close to the cause they are.
Or maybe they're just not giving the right information.
He turns away from Landry, away from the Jacksons—one on each side of the table to block off Jacek's exit, and instead directly addresses his father-in-law.
"It's Vala."
Jacek stops his hemming and hawing, he deescalates from wanting to jump the hurdle of the table and take off for the gate room. His fingers still at his side and he's not to sure, but her father might wear the same pulled expression of trying not to fall apart that he does at her name. "Vala?"
"She's due at the end of the month, and they—" he takes in a shaky breath, his hand covering his mouth for a moment as he tries to focus on anything but anyone in the room. Tries to think about what she would say to calm him if she was here. "Anat's got her."
A thick silence envelopes the room as all five men think about what that could possibly mean. He tries to steer away from the worst-case scenarios because he thinks that with all that's happened in the last year, they deserve a happy ending.
Jacek finally speaks, his voice gravelly, his eyes glinting just slightly, "get me a pen and a piece of paper."