The others all looked up when he came back to the overhang, and Daniel immediately noticed that he came back alone.

"Where's Jaffer?"

Jack scowled. "I sent him to go find Carter."

"Will he?"

"Yeah. Will she understand what we need from there? Who knows?"

Thorpe shook his head. He didn't have as much faith in Jaffer as Jack did, although the dog was practically a legend around the SGC by now. Mainly because it was rumored that Jack O'Neill, tough guy extraordinaire was firmly wrapped around the black lab's paw and would let him get away with anything.

"You know..." Daniel had been looking around the gloomy ravine, which wasn't exactly a ravine, more like a bowl shaped depression in the ground about the size of a football field. "I wonder where the water's going...?"

"What?"

Jack looked over, and so did Thorpe and the others. Daniel held his hand out to the rain that was still falling furiously.

"Look how hard it's raining, but the puddle we landed in wasn't very deep. Unless the ground has an incredible absorption rate, the water has to be going somewhere. I wonder where."

"Who cares?" Thorpe asked, scowling. He'd been pretty much all over the bowl in the last six hours, and he hadn't seen any water going anywhere. Of course, the visibility was so low that there was always a chance he was missing something, but he wouldn't admit that.

"Well, if the water can escape, maybe we can, too." Daniel said.

"I didn't see any place big enough for us to get out, Doctor Jackson," Thorpe told him. The other members of SG-3 nodded their agreement, and Daniel shrugged.

"It was just a thought. I think I'll take a look and see if I can find it."

"Sounds like a waste of time, Daniel," Jack said, holding his hands out to the stinging rain to get the blood off them.

"It's not like I'm doing a whole lot of anything else, Jack."

Yeah, good point.

"In that case, I'll come with you." Besides, someone had to keep him out of trouble, right?

They walked back out into the rain, which showed absolutely no sign of slowing even though it'd been raining for what seemed forever.

"Are you sure you don't want to just go sit and wait for the rain to stop?" Jack asked Daniel, shivering.

"You can go back, Jack. I'm not going to get lost." Daniel had a very good idea why Jack had opted to accompany him. He knew O'Neill didn't care less about where the water was going.

"I know you're not going to get lost..." He didn't show any sign of going back, though. Instead he gestured for Daniel to decide where to go.

The archeologist shrugged, and headed towards the steepest side of the bowl, which was almost a vertical wall. They slogged through the puddle they'd landed in, water almost to the top of their boots, which meant their feet were far from dry, and if there was any part of him that had been dry before, by the time they reached the vertical wall, Jack was completely soaked. There was a sheet of water running down it, making the wall almost appear to be formed entirely of water, but Jack was far too wet to be impressed by the sight. Daniel, of course, immediately forgot about how miserable he was in his enthusiasm for the sight.

"Wow."

Jack scowled. "Yay."

Daniel ignored the sarcasm. He was far too used to it to be offended. He reached his hand through the water, touching the solid wall, looking for an opening, even though there wasn't any indication that the water was escaping from there. Closer to the wall the water was roaring loudly, and Daniel had to yell once more to be heard.

"Go along that side of the wall and see if you can find any opening, Jack!"

Joy.

He did what he was told. He didn't do it with a smile. He didn't even try to pretend to be enthusiastic. But he did it because Daniel wanted him to. Stupid friendship thing, anyways.

Jack ran his hand through the cascading water, and of course was immediately drenched by the diverted water, which coursed down his arm – under his sleeve, of course – and from there into his shirt. Just when he thought he couldn't get any wetter.

"I don't feel anything, Daniel! Just a whole lot of wet!"

"Just keep looking, Jack!"

He grumbled, but he ran his hand along the wall, noticing that it was smooth. Probably from constantly running water. Jack figured by the time the day was over, he'd have been rained on until he was smooth, too. He walked one direction and Daniel walked the other. Both of them feeling their way along the far wall of the bowl, and finding nothing.

Then Jack felt the water pressure increase on his hand, and he realized that some of the water that should have been going down towards the ground was actually running sideways, away from his hand but in the general direction he was heading.

"Daniel!"

He didn't know if this was what his friend was looking for, but it was different, and that was something, right? He looked over and saw that Daniel was still looking at his wall.

"Daniel!"

This time he heard him, and Daniel turned and started walking towards Jack, who was running his hand along the wall going along with the odd flow of water, which was beginning to grow stronger.

"What did you find?"

He shrugged. Even if he didn't have to yell to make himself heard, Jack didn't know what he'd found. He'd just found water flowing the other way. He moved slightly over so that Daniel could come over beside him, and put hi hand next to his.

"That must be where the water is going!" Daniel yelled over the rushing noise.

"Ya think?"

He knew Daniel didn't hear him, but it was the thought that counted. Jack started to move away, figuring it was time to head back now that the mystery was solved. He wanted to get out of the rain.

"Come on, Daniel!" He called, and took another step, then felt what was becoming a familiar sensation. The ground under his boot was already inundated with water, and covered with another five or six inches, but what the guys hadn't known – there was no way they could – was that this area of the bowl was incredibly unstable after eons of rain storms working under the rock and shale, and Jack's added weight was the last straw so to speak. The hole that the water was escaping from was actually on the ground in front of where Jack had originally found it – not in the wall as Daniel had assumed – and suddenly the small gap which had been about a foot wide became a small chasm about 6 feet wide as the ground crumbled under Jack's boot.

He couldn't stop himself and couldn't slow his momentum. It was like stepping off a cliff, and he found himself falling once more, again tumbling like a rag doll down a steep incline, although this time he was falling alone, in the middle of what felt like a raging river as the water came rushing down around him.

"Jack!" Daniel wasn't close enough to fall into the sudden crevice, although the sudden increase in the water flow almost managed to pull him after O'Neill, but he braced himself against the wall and watched helplessly as Jack vanished. A moment later all there was was water again, with no sign of his friend. Not even a curse.

............

Author's note: It's times like these that I wish I had a place I could draw out what I'm trying to write, since it's hard to describe what this bowl looks like... So I'll try to do it here:

It's about 100 feet down a slope (the original one Jack and Daniel fell down) where there's a bowl made of mostly stone - both loose and solid. It's shaped that way from years and years of water. Under the bowl is a depression that has been cut by the water running, and this is what Jack just went down.