Disclaimer: I own them all! I own everything! Muh ha ha, I am the creator of all things Stargate! Bow before me- Worship ME! No! No, not more meds- AHH get the white coated ones away! Not Sleepy... not sleepy... mine... mine...
Disclaimer: Stargate original characters and the Stargate universe are property of Showtime/Viacom, MGM/UA, Gekko Productions and Double Secret Productions. I am not affiliated with the aforementioned in any way. No copyright infringement is intended. Will you let me go home now?
Spoilers: Gamekeeper... kind of.
A/N : In this fic I'm going with the Gamekeeper side of events; Daniel is around six when his parents die. I've fixed up the format a little, but I'm still experiencing difficulty with WordPerfect. Stick with me! And please PLEASE please (please) R&R. It makes my shrink happy.
oOoooOoooOo
Daniel, Age Six, New York Museum of Art.
"I'm sorry. This area isn't open to the public." The museum worker bent down to see past the bangs in the six-year-old's face.
"But my parents are in there."
"Oh, you must be Daniel. You can come and watch, but be careful. They are just finishing up the first temple." Daniel let her take his hand and lead him through the bustling construction zone. "Lets find you a safe spot, Daniel." Said the museum worker, looking around purposefully while dragging Daniel behind her.
"Can I sit here?" He asked, pointing to an unused corner of the stucco walls.
"Sure you can, honey." She said sweetly. Daniel craned his neck to smile at her as he sat cross-legged in the saw dust. She turned to return to her post, and Daniel surveyed the room. A skeletal crew of construction workers was taking instruction from his parents, who were eagerly reconstructing their temple. Everything was carefully positioned to look as it had in Egypt, minus the miles of sand and sun. The thin layering of sand in this exhibit ended about a yard from the temple walls, where the usual New York Museum of Art's architecture look its place. Ignored by all, Daniel began to trace hieroglyphs in the sawdust. He pretended he was excavating an ancient stone, uncovering secret codes and instructions. He drew the Glyph for feather, just because it was first to come to his mind. Then a Glyph to represent the god Isis. Feather... that Glyph could also mean goddess. Could this discovery indicate a relation to Isis? A secret God? Daniel imitated in his mind a dialog he could imagine his parents having upon discovering the message in the sawdust.
"Be careful with that cover plate." said Melburn. Daniel looked up. His mother was checking the positioning of the temple for the third time, comparing it with the blueprints they had carefully graphed back in Egypt. The Museum had offered to have a professional architect set the exhibit up, but Daniels's dad had insisted on doing it himself. Both his parent's wanted to recreate the temple to look just as it had back in the XII dynasty, a job only an Archeologist could do.
"Jake, it's swinging a bit." Daniel's mom said, looking up at the cover plate. The walls surrounding them were not secured, (just as in Egypt) so the cover plate would have to be balanced in exactly the right way. Melburn said something to his father, who consulted the blueprint. Daniel watched from the floor worriedly, but didn't want to say anything in case he distracted them.
"On your left. Jake, can we bring this in? Careful, bring it down. Let's look at the front." Melburn moved out from behind the crane to check the alignment from a different angle.
"It's swinging." Daniel's mom said again.
"Mom-" Daniel said tentatively, unable to keep silent any longer. This didn't look right. He stood up from the saw dust.
"It's okay, it's fine, we'll be fine." Said Melburn, motioning for Daniel to keep quite without looking at him. "Careful." he said to the eager Archaeologist beneath the stone. Daniel's mom buried her face in blueprints again as Melburn brought his hands up to check out the alignment.
"A bit more level, Jake." said Daniel' s mom. Melburn acknowledged her, and motioned to the crane operator. Daniel hoped he knew what he was doing. That stone didn't look safe to him.
"Okay, Jake, let's bring it dow-"Something above the plate snapped with a ferocity Daniel would not have thought possible. He tried to yell out to his parents, but his voice came out as a strangled rasp. The cover stone slammed down upon the pillars. Daniel's ears heard his mother's scream, but his brain didn't process it. The temple collapsed inward, hiding them from view.
People were shouting all around Daniel, gathering around the wreckage and calling to the people inside. He didn't move. None of this was real. It was just a nightmare. They weren't dead. They couldn't be dead. This was America, people didn't die in America.
There was blood seeping out from beneath the pillars, turning the thin layer of fake sand to a dark red color. Daniel's body was not obeying his mind, so he left it behind. He wanted to scream and run and tear, but his legs wouldn't unlock. He was flouting out above his parents. He watched the paramedics arrive. He watched as mangled bodies were extracted from the mess of sandstone and blood. He watched his own face as an EMT felt for a pulse, then shook her head.
Three lives ended that day, but for one, the suffering had only just begun.
oOo
SG-1, Present Day, Briefing Room.
The actions of the NID had caused problems for SG-1 yet again. The team was gathered around the table in the briefing room, huddled around steaming coffee and hot-off-the-press reports. Jack was eyeing his mug with a look that said he wished it were something stronger. Daniel was looking eager and worried and dead tired all at the same time, and yet still managed to seem pensive. Sam and Teal'c were engrossed in the papers in front of them, and didn't seem to notice anything else. Hammond appeared at the door.
"Good morning." he said gruffly. Only in the military did 12:30 count as morning. The team rose to their feet with barely silent groans of protest. Hammond didn't wait for them all to sit again before beginning. "You have all been briefed on our situation. We have a meeting with the alien rep scheduled for 0200 hours, at which time we will try to persuade them to consider a different course of action. The president has been notified of their most recent threat, but no one is going to go public just yet. Our orders are to stop this by diplomatic means, and gather as much information as possible about what exactly it is the NID stole. Returning the item is, at this point, not an available option."
"What have we got to offer these guys?" Jack asked, rubbing sleep from his eyes.
"Nothing." Hammond answered without hesitating. Jack bowed his head into the steam from his coffee.
"Sir, if the aliens don't know who stole their machine, how do we?" Sam asked.
"We don't have any proof it was the NID, but it's looking like the most plausible explanation at the moment. It doesn't really matter. These Aliens don't seem to care who did it, their just going to blame the entire planet."
"Why?" Sam asked.
"Daniel?" Jack turned to the Archeologist beside him. "What do we know?"
"Well, their mentality probably has something to do with their own social structure." Daniel began, "They are definitely an off-shoot of original earth humans, but they seem to have developed into a far different race. From the information here," Daniel gestured to the paper in front of him, "I'd say they were taken from earth very early. These people have been evolving on their own for quite some time, although they show some signs of Middle and Upper Paleolithic hunter-gatherer type culture. But their bone structure suggests-" Daniel stopped as Jack let his head droop back to his coffee. He frowned, then finished sheepishly. "They seem to be a very advanced race. Their technology could possibly rival our own."
"Thank you, Dr. Jackson." Hammond said, before Daniel could start speaking again.
"Did he just say these Aliens are doing this because they don't know any better?" Jack said incredulously.
"Basically-" Daniel started to explain.
"That's a yes, then." Jack interrupted. Daniel looked at his coffee dejectedly, attributing Jacks mood to the current time. He nodded.
"Right, we're getting somewhere already."
