Thank you very much for all the reviews, I'm glad you enjoy reading my story. Gater101- I didn't originally plan the whole green=jealousy thing but as the story went on it kind of developed into that. Well done for noticing. Thank you very much to everyone else too.
I wasn't sure whether people were going to like this story, as not much happens until right at the end- in the last two chapters when we get to the two 'rivals'- Jack and Pete. I'm going to do Jack's POV first then Pete's. In Jack's I will just tell the same scene but from his point of view but in Pete's I will continue the plot after that scene and to a conclusion.
Glad you like! Review if you want, just read if you don't.
Rivergem.
Jack stretched out a finger and touched the condensation on the table. He began to move it round, drawing circles in the moisture. His mind was not where his body was; at a small street-side café bathed in afternoon sunlight, sitting with Carter, Daniel, T and Pete. His mind was eleven miles to the west, and almost one mile underground in a shadowy room lit only by the dim blue, and unfortunately red, light of an alien device. He sighed, paused his doodling and glanced around.
Carter was staring at Pete. O'Neill hastily looked away again, feeling extremely intrusive. Instead he contented himself with studying his other teammates.
Teal'c was also looking at Pete but his face was set and it was almost impossible to know what he was thinking. Almost. O'Neill had known Teal'c a long time and was used to his many different, but subtle, facial expressions and this one, O'Neill knew, was mistrust. He felt a strange rush of companionship towards the Jaffa.
O'Neill looked over to Daniel who was sitting next to Sam but facing Pete. He was in full archaeologist mode, currently babbling on about some trip or other, whatever it was he had probably told SG1 about it umpteen times. At least he had someone to talk Egypt with now. But, as O'Neill glanced casually at Pete, being careful to keep any emotion from showing, he could see that he was gazing, glassy eyed, at Daniel, obviously not paying the slightest bit of attention. O'Neill was amazed at how angry this made him.
Then he tried to rationalise; he, O'Neill, had ignored Daniel during his countless lectures about other civilisations in briefings, off-world and in general everyday conversation. How could he be angry with Pete for doing what he did every other day? He sighed again and glared at the table. O'Neill knew deep down that he was afraid to criticise Pete, he was afraid of being wrong, afraid of letting his feelings cloud his judgement, that by hating Pete he was being inexcusably selfish.
O'Neill was not stupid, he could see how Carter was looking at Pete and, as he leaned back in the flimsy plastic chair to get them both in view, he could see how Pete looked at her, his slight half-frown changing to a faint smile when his eyes met hers. They didn't even want to be here, he thought gloomily, they wanted to be alone, together, without Daniel's incessant talking, without Teal'c looking suspiciously at his milkshake in between glaring at Pete and without O'Neill.
He picked up his bottle and peeled off the label. His beer was Guinness, he noticed, like Daniel and Sam's (Teal'c of course didn't drink alcohol; he had once told a shocked O'Neill that he didn't like it). Pete, on the other hand, drank Budweiser.
He slowly raised the bottle off the table, so the sunlight shining through it made a green shadow dance on his hand. What did it remind him of?
O'Neill suddenly scraped back his chair and raised the bottle to the sky, staring at the green sun behind the glass. He tried to block out the dangerous thoughts that coursed though his mind. He slapped his sunglasses onto the table, misjudging the distance but not really caring, never taking his eyes off the bottle.
The future stretched off into the distance; Daniel would stay on at the SGC, probably ending up with Sarah, Teal'c would return home to his son, Sam would marry Pete and he would be lost once again.
Slowly, gradually, he felt people looking at him. He twisted around in his chair and met the narrowed eyes of Pete who was looking at him. All O'Neill's muscles tensed as he set the bottle down and turned towards him. As he looked at Pete, a tingle of surprise ran through him because what he saw in Pete's expression was not annoyance or embarrassment as he expected but a disturbing mixture of jealousy, hate and even fear. O'Neill was genuinely shocked; he didn't think he had done anything to rile him; he had been withdrawn yet polite all day. O'Neill inwardly panicked. What if…? But then it was gone and Pete simply glared at him. In his confusion, O'Neill responded with familiar sarcasm.
He gave Pete what he privately called a 'Daniel Look', so named because the primary receiver of the 'Look' was in fact Daniel. It consisted of raising the eyebrows, tilting the head slightly to the right and smirking faintly. O'Neill liked it because it was a sure-fire way to infuriate anyone but Danny, who had been given the 'Look' so many times over the course of the 9 years that they had known each other that he was practically immune to it. Pete, however, was not and as he frowned and turned his back, O'Neill felt a guilty sense of satisfaction.
Not wanting to look at the others just in case they too were glaring at him, he went back to his bottle, moving it this way and that. He heard Pete turn away and begin to talk to Daniel again but he could still feel eyes on him. O'Neill set down the beer bottle carefully and shifted around to face Carter. She was gazing at him, wide-eyed and unblinking. His mind raced. But then his heartbeat slowed; she was probably thinking about Pete.
After a few moments she snapped out of her trance frowning and he grinned at her. She grinned apologetically back at him and all of a sudden O'Neill felt a whole lot happier. Then the world seemed to fade into blue, the exact same shade, Jack mused, as Sam's eyes. And for one blissful second he forgot about Pete, he forgot that Charlie, Kawalski, Janet and countless other people he knew had died, he forgot about regulations and he forgot about all the bad things he had done. He was conscious of nothing but her.
"O'Neill." Teal'c voice brought them crashing back to reality and Carter stared resolutely at the table. "I believe it is time for us to depart for the hockey fixture."
O'Neill fiddled with his watch. "So it is." He stood up awkwardly. "You sure you don't wanna come Carter?" He said, keeping all emotion out of his voice.
"Sorry, we've got plans." Said Pete before she could answer and anger surged up once again in O'Neill.
"Nice to meet you." Said Daniel, always the diplomat.
"Indeed." Teal'c inclined his head.
"Yeah." The word hung in the air. "Well we'll see ya tomorrow then Carter." He said pointedly and then walked off with Teal'c and Daniel trailing behind him. As soon as they caught up Jack began to talk loudly about hockey, resting his arm on Daniel's shoulder as if for support and trying, unsuccessfully, to keep at bay thoughts that were triggered by the green shadows made by sunlight shining through the tinted windows of a nearby parked car.