Whilst Daniel had been yelling at Jack, both Teal'c and Andarna had remained silent. Feeling that she should try and put the archeologist at ease, Andarna came forward.
"There is something we must confess Dr Jackson." Daniel looked at her with something akin to dread in his eyes. "You see, the reason that Jack and I have been acting so, was not because of any attraction to each other, it was, rather, to make Major Carter jealous."
"To make her jealous? Why? What could possibly come from making her jealous?" he said, folding his arms and raising his eyebrows.
"I too, do not understand how you would expect to accomplish anything from this activity." Teal'c's eyebrows put Daniel's to shame.
"You know what? Me neither. It was all Harry's idea. I-" He was cut off by an irate Dr.
"Maybourne? You listened to Maybourne." 'No wonder it's such a stupid idea' he added silently.
"Well it sounded good at the time!" Jack defended.
"Exactly what is this idea?"
"The idea," Jack said, his voice thick with sarcasm. "Was to make Sam jealous so that she'd want to be treated like a woman again, instead of one of the guys."
"Since when has Sam ever wanted to be treated like a woman? From what I've heard about your first meeting, she was quite adamant about being considered 'one of the guys' as you put it."
Jack was about to launch into how Sam actually liked being treated like a woman, until he realized that the truth was, it was he who liked treating her that way. The words died on his lips before they even had the chance to be uttered. He released the breath that had been taken in order to propel his argument, his body and heart deflating as he accepted this information.
Was it merely the fantasies of a tired old soldier that allowed him to believe she wanted to be treated as the fairer sex? Was it because he felt that if he treated her as a woman, she would respond to him as a man? But surely these fantasies were based on some semblance of the truth. For if Daniel was correct, Sam was crying her eyes out over him right now.
"What a royal mess!" Jack muttered, wishing he knew how to fix things.
"Ya think?" Daniel responded sourly.
More to come...