Chapter 6
It was almost sundown, and the inhabitants of Remana had begun to gather in the huge coliseum in the center of the city. Close to 8,000 people would be stuffed into the arena and its environs, a number that made Jack O'Neill's skin crawl with apprehension. If this plan failed, that would be 8,000 unhappy people looking directly at the visitors on the podium for payback.
Larinda had advised them that word of the arrival of visitors sent by Janus had spread through the city like wildfire. There was no way to avoid having them appear at the Janalia without arousing suspicion. But it had been decided that only O'Neill, Carter and Aurora would actually be on the dais with Larinda. Daniel would stay with his son in the backstage area guarded by Jansen, while Teal'c and Baxter provided cover for those on the stage from the wings.
A hidden stairway under the dais led underground to a passageway that connected with stairways leading from the backstage areas. If things went terribly wrong, the plan was to meet by the stairway closest to the street leading toward the transport station and travel as one group in order to provide the most effective cover.
O'Neill regretted now that he had not gone with his earlier instinct to send Daniel and the boy up to the transport station ahead of them. There had simply been too much to do to prepare for this evening, and Daniel had never expressed an interest in leaving early. By the time the thought had occurred to O'Neill, there was no one available to provide an escort, and he hadn't wanted to send them off alone in the daylight. There were simply too many people around who might see and question a stranger carrying a little boy into a supposedly deserted, crumbling building.
Now, looking at the growing mob filling the stadium, O'Neill could only think what a liability a man carrying a small child was going to be if they had to run for their lives.
Larinda ascended the dais dressed in the flowing white gown and blue robes of her office. Reaching the podium, she raised her hands, palms up, to the sky.
"Welcome home, Lord Janus! Join us in our revelries," came the cry from 8,000 voices.
As the greeting reverberated and finally died, Larinda bellowed in a voice that carried amazingly far for such a small woman, "People of Remana, give thanks to Lord Janus for he has sent us a special gift. His emissaries are here to greet you today and join in our revelries and our celebration of all that Lord Janus has provided for us. Please honor Lord Janus by greeting them as you would greet Lord Janus himself."
A huge, deafening cheer reverberated through the stadium. As the dais shook from the sheer power of that cheer, Carter glanced nervously at O'Neill. His face was set in the calm, neutral expression she had seen him use in the past to unnerve blustering adversaries. She tried to follow his lead and use her best game face, but the noise from the huge crowd was still unsettling.
Aurora stood on Carter's other side, perfectly composed despite the enormity of what she planned to do later that evening. Carter went over the sequence of events in her head again, introduction of guests, invocations and prayers to the god, the distribution of the drugged food and drink and finally the chimes ceremony. Aurora thought the introduction of the altered dna would be most effective while the people were going through the process of change, so that was when she planned to put on her grand show. The rest of the SGC group would make their getaway during the chaos that followed.
Carter nervously checked again that the bag containing the undrugged food and drink they would use during the ceremony was still by her feet. Thirty minutes and counting, she thought to herself, if I can make it that long!
The tinkling sound of the chimes sent a slow murmur through the crowd that grew exponentially. Screams began to rend the air and several people stood up and started flinging themselves around wildly in the wide aisles by their seats. Carter and O'Neill could only watch in horror as a woman directly across from them seemed to split in two from the waist up.
Aurora stood in dismay, watching some of the people scream in horror and agony, trying to stop the transformation that was overtaking them. "It's time," she shouted to O'Neill and Carter, raising her hands to the sky as her body dissolved into the form of the phoenix. Taking to the air, she allowed her phoenix body to stretch out until it formed a circle over the coliseum, then gently began to dissolve into tiny particles smaller than snowflakes that began to fall on the crowd below.
Carter and O'Neill held their places, trying to determine whether the tiny particles touching the residents of the city were having any effect. Neither of them noticed that Larinda was gone, having slipped down the back stairs from the dais that led directly into the tunnels under the coliseum as soon as the chimes had begun to ring.
Jansen was covering the hallway outside the room where Daniel waited with his son. Sitting safely inside, holding the drowsing boy in his arms, Daniel was relieved to know the man was out there. The sounds of the cheering crowd had penetrated even this deeply in the complex and he was increasingly nervous about the prospect of any of the owners of those voices making their way into the room before they could make their escape.
Daniel tensed as he heard the chimes begin to sound but was totally unprepared for the flashback that gripped him, dragging him back in time, forcing him to relive those terrible moments when he'd first seen Larinda turn into Lysandra. He tightened his grip on the child in his arms, trying to pull himself out of the memory but only succeeded in jumping forward a few hours on that same night to the memory of struggling through the streets toward the coliseum as people poured out of it, screaming and struggling as they contorted into strange shapes in front of him.
Finally, Daniel was able to regain control of his breathing and he heard the frightened cry of "'apa, 'apa," as the small boy beat on his arms to be released.
"Oh, god," he gasped. "I'm sorry. Was I hurting you?"
The boy struggled from his arms, screaming frantically, "'ama, 'ama."
"What are you saying, Daniel? Mama isn't back here, she's outside."
The little boy shook his head violently and pointed toward a stairway leading down into the bowels of the coliseum. "I sawed her, down dare," he said breaking Daniel's grip and running toward the stairs. Daniel stumbled after him, tripped and fell heavily, landing sprawled on his stomach. He struggled to pull himself upright, but by the time he had regained his feet, the child had disappeared down the stairs. Daniel's heart was racing with fear as he pounded down the stairs after him.
Daniel caught up with the boy just before he reached the huddled mass of his mother's body slumped against a wall of the dank tunnel. Grabbing the child and lifting him into his arms despite the boy's kicks against his chest and wails of "'ama," Daniel approached Larinda carefully, making sure to keep a safe distance between them. "Larinda," he said tentatively.
The woman's head moved slightly at the sound of his voice.
"Larinda. It's Daniel. Answer me. I'm not coming any closer."
Larinda turned her glassy gaze to him and he realized immediately that something was wrong -- one eye was Larinda's green, the other a rich dark chocolate -- Lysandra. "Daniel?" the voice was barely a whisper, but it was Larinda's. "I know it's too late Daniel, but I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. For everything. Really I am. I wish I could go back and change it all. I wish I could fix it so the three of us could be a real family. I'm so sorry."
"Larinda, what are you doing down here? Why aren't you in the coliseum with the others? Was Aurora able to touch you with the altered dna before you came down here?"
Larinda shook her head weakly. "After everything I did, I don't deserve to be saved. I came down here so I would be out of the way. So no one would find me until it was too late."
"What are you talking about? Too late for what?"
Wordlessly she shifted the right side of her body and he saw the gleaming knife laying on the ground underneath her.
"No," he said weakly. "You can't. Why would you do this?"
"What do I have left to live for, Daniel? Everything I've done, everything I tried to do, it all went terribly wrong. I kept thinking it was right, it was what I had to do, but even while I was doing it, I knew it was wrong. How can anything good come from doing evil? Look what I did to you. I won't ever ask you to forgive me for that because I know you never can. And I've lived the last few months in abject terror, wondering when I was going to lose control and murder my own child. I can't go on like this."
"You don't have to. Let Aurora heal you."
She shook her head, "It's too late. Just go! Take Daniel and go. I don't want him to see me like this." Her body convulsed violently and she let out a keening scream. Daniel watched helplessly, clutching the screaming, squirming child as jet black hair started to cascade over her face. Suddenly teeth clamped down on his arm and he let out his own startled cry as his arm jerked violently against the pain, allowing the squirming toddler to slide to the ground and begin running toward his fallen mother.
"Sir, I think it's working," Carter said excitedly, focusing on one man who had come running out on the field flailing wildly as an extra set of arms had begun to spring from his body. Now he was lying facedown on the field, his entire body twitching.
As they watched, the man's skin began to ripple and glow. Although they could not have seen it, one of the tiny particles of dna had landed on the man and been absorbed into the quickly changing skin. As it made its way through his system, it recognized a particular gene and locked itself on. Activating, it modified that gene and reproduced itself. Slowly at first, and then more rapidly, the process repeated until all the target genes had been replaced.
Slowly the extra limbs began to retract, disappearing into the body. The ripple effect grew stronger until it was like a steady pulse beating around the man. Finally, the effect began to weaken. When it was done, the man got unsteadily to his feet, then sank back down to the ground looking dazedly at the sky. "I'm whole again," he said with wonder. "I'm whole again," he screamed raising his hands joyfully in the air.
O'Neill and Carter stood engrossed by the spectacle, as the scene duplicated itself all over the coliseum. But their happiness at the successful outcome of their plan was shortlived.
"General O'Neill, Colonel Carter!" a frantic voice came over their walkie-talkies. It's Jansen. I was patrolling the corridor outside Dr. Jackson's room, but when I went in to get them ready to move out to the transport station, they were gone."
It was only when O'Neill's head snapped around to ask Larinda what the quickest way would be to get over there, that he realized she wasn't there any more.
"This way, sir," Carter said, heading for the tunnel entrance under the dais, her zat already in her hand and fully activated.
Teal'c pounded down the hallway, his heart racing, furious at himself for not having insisted he be the one to guard Daniel Jackson and the child. It had never occurred to him that the young lieutenant from SG-9 would be unable to carry out such a simple assignment. He refused to allow himself to consider the possibility that the child had been injured or killed. The knowledge of how he would feel if his own son, Ry'ac, were to be harmed because of the ineptness of his own comrades spurred his feet even faster.
He rounded a corner with his staff weapon at the ready, but was forced to halt in dismay at the sight that met his eyes. A woman was slumped against the wall, her features distorted in the midst of change. Her hair was uneven lengths some of which were blond, the rest jet black. Her right hand gripped a large, ornate sacramental knife, which she was holding against the throat of Daniel Jackson's son. The boy was whimpering in fear as Daniel stood frozen in the middle of the hallway trying to talk soothingly to her, encouraging her to let the boy go.
A brittle laugh filled the hallway. "Do you really think you're doing any good calling me by that name. It only makes me angrier, so perhaps you'd better think about revising your strategy. This blade is coming very close to tasting the whelp's flesh. And right now nothing would make me happier than to get to watch your face as I slit his miserable whiny little throat from ear to ear."
"Stop!" Daniel said helplessly. "Please, don't hurt him. Do whatever you want to me, but leave him alone."
A strangled cry came from the woman as she was wracked by another convulsion. Her grip tightened reflexively on the child, and the knife glanced minutely off the tender skin of his neck, leaving a pinprick of blood in its wake.
"No!" Daniel screamed panicking at the sight of the blood.
O'Neill and Carter rounded the corner behind him at a run, propelled forward by his scream, their weapons raised and ready to fire. "Oh my god," Carter said, helplessly surveying the scene. "What do we do? I'm afraid to shoot. The spasm from the zat blast could force the knife into his throat."
"Put down the knife, Larinda," O'Neill snarled or I'll put a bullet in your head right now.
"For the last time, you stupid piles of human sludge, my name is not Larinda. I am Lysandra, daughter of the mighty god Janus," the woman said imperiously, "and if you do not put your weapons down right now, all of you, I will cut his throat from ear to ear."
"Do it please, Jack. She means it. She'll really do it," Daniel pleaded.
Without further argument, O'Neill dropped his Beretta on the ground in front of him and used his boot to kick it several feet away. Carter followed suit with the zat. At the other end of the corridor, Teal'c tossed away his staff weapon.
The woman laughed maniacally. "Fools. What incredible fools you all are. Manipulating you is like having life size puppets on strings. What else can I get you to do for my amusement?"
"This isn't a game, Lysandra," Daniel said coldly.
"Isn't it?" she said just as coldly, shifting her grip on the boy to pull herself into a full sitting position.
"No." Daniel responded staring her down.
The boy's arm had come free when the woman shifted her grip. Daniel was surprised when the child laid his hand over the woman's arm. He was even more surprised when the skin under the hand began to glow and ripple. "'ama," the little boy said and the glow immediately shot through the woman's body ripping a pain filled scream from her throat as the knife dropped from her hand onto her lap, just beyond the child's reach. Her features reformed into Larinda's and the child sat against her chest, brushing his fingers against her cheek, saying "'ama."
"Yes, baby. It's mama," she forced out. "I'm okay. Now go to papa. Go now. Please. Daniel, come get him, before it's too late."
Daniel had already covered half the distance between them and quickly scooped the boy off of her and pressed him against his chest. But before he could grab the knife, one of her hands reached out and settled around the hilt. It lunged out toward him, glancing off his watch and opening up a jagged tear halfway up his arm.
Meanwhile Carter, O'Neill and Teal'c had lunged for their weapons, but before any of them could aim and fire, the knife changed tragectory. Standing right over her, Daniel could see Larinda's face clearly and watched mesmerized as the one brown eye slowly swirled back to its natural green. He could read the incredible sorrow and regret in those eyes, then, before he could move or react, she plunged the knife into her own chest.
Daniel let out a yelp of shock as blood gurgled out of the wound and Larinda's body went still. He pressed the child against him, trying to protect him from the sight of his mother's broken, bloody body.
Slowly a light began to form at the end of the tunnel behind Teal'c. Daniel stared at it, mesmerized and uncomprehending. Oma, he thought, then remembered the familiar voice he thought he'd heard the previous day while waiting for Julia to approach in the old meeting hall. It had been Oma's voice, he was sure of it now.
The glow drifted down the hall toward them trailing tendrils of golden light. Slowly the light began to dim and separated into two distinct entities taking shape before them. Oma de Salla stepped out of the golden light, followed by Sha'uri's harsesis child, Shifu. Oma's smile was warm and comforting, the radiant glow she gave off acting as a natural soother to all around her.
"Oma, what are you doing here?" Daniel asked, unconsciously rocking the child curled up in a frightened ball against his chest. Expecting one of her usual cryptic answers, he was surprised by her straightforward reply.
"I was called to this place by the light of the Ancients," she said looking wonderingly at the child cradled in Daniel's arms. "I could not see from afar who of our kind who possesses that power had chosen to use it. It is a great and mighty gift wielded by only a very few."
"You must be mistaken. Maybe you were called by the light being cast by Aurora healing the shapeshifters. There aren't any Ancients here . . . ," Daniel's voice trailed off as he looked at the child in his arms and remembered Aurora telling him he was of the Ancients, and so was his son. Then he remembered the glow of light that had appeared when the boy had touched Larinda and called her back from the darkness. Shifting the child in his arms he looked in confusion at what looked like a burn mark on his sleeve where the child had bit him earlier in order to get away. Not really wanting to look, Daniel couldn't stop himself from pushing the sleeve up to check out the extent of the damage. Instead of the teeth marks he'd expected to find, the skin was red, sore and burned, as if it had been brushed by fire.
"This cannot be," Oma said moving closer and passing her hand lightly over the back of the now sleeping child. "He is of the Ancients, but he is also of humans, shapeshifters and the goa'uld. This should not be possible."
"What does it mean," Daniel asked.
"He possesses great power," she said brushing her hand reverently over the child's head. "And great knowledge. Like Shifu, he possesses some genetic memory from all of his ancestors. That must be how he learned of the light of the Ancients. But wielding such power wisely is a skill that requires much diligence and training. And it is the type of power that can easily corrupt those who use it unwisely."
"Is there any way we can make him forget how to use it, like you were able to blank my memory when you sent me back to Earth?"
She shook her head sadly, "No. Such a thing is not possible. Your memory could be altered because you were being returned to a fully human state. He is not fully human even now, so our methods would be ineffective."
"Then you must tell me what I need to do to teach him not to use this power," Daniel said.
"Daniel . . . ," she began softly, her voice sorrowful.
"No," he said firmly, as he backed away from her, his voice trembling with emotion, "You're not taking him from me. I won't let you."
"Daniel, you do not understand the seriousness of what has happened here. There has never been anything like this before in the history of our peoples. The power this child possesses could destroy all of us if it is turned in the wrong direction. The child needs constant attention and guidance. It is imperative that he learn self-control and be guided along the proper path."
"I can do that myself, Oma," Daniel said firmly, but with a slight quaver in the words. "I can teach him."
"You cannot do it alone, Daniel," she said sadly. "It is impossible for you to monitor him every instant of the day. It will soon become apparent to those on your planet that he is not fully human. Once they discover what he is, they will try to use him as a weapon. You know this is true. And if the goa'uld ever find out about him, they will want to possess him for the same reason. You do not have the ability to protect him."
O'Neill stepped beside Daniel and said firmly, "He won't be alone. He'll have plenty of help."
"That's right," Carter added stepping up on Daniel's other side. "We'll help him."
"As will I," said Teal'c, walking over to join them.
"You do not understand what you are facing or what you are exposing your world to," Oma said, "or you would not be so precipitous."
Daniel felt the child suddenly jerk to wakefulness in his arms. Sleepily, he looked up into Daniel's eyes and smiled. Daniel smiled back at him tenderly and moved to shift his weight slightly. He'd forgotten the knife wound on his arm so the movement caused him to wince with pain. The child registered the pain and looked down at his father's arm with concern.
"'apa 'urt?" he asked.
"It's okay, it's just a little cut. I'll be fine."
The boy looked at him with concern, then placed his small hand over the still bleeding wound. Light sprang from the hand and Daniel felt a warmth move through the wound on the arm and felt the skin almost seem to ripple. When the light faded out a few seconds later, the wound had disappeared with it.
"Wow," Carter said. "That was pretty amazing."
"Yeah," O'Neill responded. "That's a pretty handy skill to have."
"Indeed," Teal'c added.
Daniel looked at his son with concern, worried that the things Oma had said could be true and knowing in his heart that all the governments of Earth would be very interested in the abilities his son had demonstrated today.
The boy twisted in his grip and said, "'ut me 'own, 'apa."
"Not right now, Daniel. You need to stay with me."
"No! 'own now!" the boy kicked and twisted defiantly, causing Daniel to shift position to be able to keep hold of him. That casual shift put Larinda's body in full view of the boy and he screamed, "'ama!!! 'ama!!!" fighting even more violently to get down.
"Daniel," Oma's calm voice said, "put him down. You must see to understand."
Daniel hesitated, and the boy pressed his hand against the arm he had just healed. Daniel screamed with agony as it felt like molten fire had been poured over the arm. The boy dropped from his arms and he immediately ran over to his mother's body crying, "'ama! 'ama!"
Little Daniel leaned over and began shaking Larinda, but she remained still and unresponsive.
Daniel moved to go to the boy, still cradling his injured arm, but Oma stepped in front of him, "Wait and you will understand."
When there was no response to his shaking, the boy sat crying for a few minutes. Then he put both hands on Larinda's chest and they began to glow with a radiant light. Within minutes the gaping wound in her chest disappeared. Daniel heard a gasping breath and was astounded to see Larinda's eyes open.
"What happened?" she asked groggily.
"'ama," the boy said happily, laying his head on her now fully healed chest as he hugged her.
Carter had pulled out her med kit and was rummaging through it to find some burn cream to put on Daniel's arm. She cast a worried glance at the child and shifted her gaze to O'Neill. His face was unreadable, except for the lines of worry around his eyes and mouth.
"So he can heal people, but he can also hurt them too," O'Neill said to Oma. "Is he able to kill with that power."
"All things are possible," Oma said gravely.
Daniel felt panic settling in his stomach, "We can teach him not to use it to hurt people, Jack. He only did that to me because he was scared for his mother."
"I know that, Daniel," O'Neill said heavily, "but there may be many more situations to come when he'll be scared. He can't going around doing that to people who don't let him have his own way."
"Jack, please. Don't," Daniel pleaded.
Torn between his duty to protect the people of Earth and his longstanding friendship with Daniel, O'Neill wasn't sure what to say or do. The child could obviously be a serious threat, but they were used to containing threats. And he was Daniel's son. How could he possibly ask Daniel to leave him behind. Before his own son's death, if anyone had ever tried to take Charlie from him, he would have died before letting it happen.
Their attention was drawn to Larinda again when she suddenly let out a scream. Black hair began to cascade from her head. Carter, who was closest to mother and son, instinctively reached over and pulled the boy off his mother's chest. He screamed and swiped at her with a glowing hand. She let out her own scream as the hand brushed her wrist and she dropped the boy. Daniel was already there and grabbed him before he could run back to his mother. "Sam, are you all right?" he asked anxiously.
"I'll be fine," Carter said with a wince. "It's just a minor burn. It'll be gone in a few days."
Daniel grabbed the boy by the shoulders and forced him to look into his eyes. "Daniel, you mustn't do that. You mustn't ever touch people and hurt them. It's wrong. Sam was only trying to help you and look what you did to her," he said, indicating the burn on Carter's arm.
"I'm sorry, 'apa," the boy said remorsefully. "I make better?" he asked reaching his hand out toward Carter again.
"No, thanks," she said, pulling the arm away. "I'll be fine."
"Now you are beginning to understand," Oma said calmly.
"Understand what?" Daniel asked.
"Why you must send the boy with Shifu and me," she said. "His power is well beyond your ability to contain."
"You don't know that for sure," Daniel said stubbornly, clutching the boy to him. "You said this has never happened before so how can you know?"
"The truth is in your heart, Daniel," Oma said. "You see it clearly. Do not betray what is in your heart for false pride. You must do what is best for the boy, as his mother tried to do."
"What is best for him is to be with me," Daniel insisted, becoming distraught. "How can you ask this of me, Oma. Haven't I lost enough already. Sha're, Sha're's son, all the people of Abydos, now you want my son too? How do I know you will care for him? How do I know he will be protected? I know that since I was cast down from the ascended, you'll never take me back, and I'll never see him again. How can you expect me to do this?"
"Daniel, you are of the Ancients. You will always be one of us. When the time comes, you will return to us and be with your son, but there is much more that you have to do here on this plane before that time comes. In the meantime, his mother will be there to care for him," Oma said gently and opened her hand. A tiny particle of glowing dust drifted from it and landed on Larinda. It disappeared into her skin and a few minutes later her thrashing stopped. Like the people on the surface who had been transformed, her skin glowed and rippled for a few minutes, then her eyes opened clear and bright.
As she drew herself to her feet, Larinda's skin rippled again and briefly turned liquid before settling back into its natural shape. "I am cured," she said with awe. "I am whole again!" Then she gasped and slid to ground. A silvery light appeared around her and she transformed into an ascended being that immediately went to Oma. Oma smiled and touched the creature of light and it melted back into the form of Larinda and stood beside her.
Shifu stepped up to Daniel and said solemnly, "The path is not always straight. And though we sometimes take different paths, still we will eventually arrive at the same destination. Although some may travel with unfamiliar companions, all will become as one in the end."
The boy's wise eyes bored into Daniel and he knew instinctively he had to let the child go, that it was the right thing to do, and the best thing for him, but still he didn't want to do it. Instead, he clutched the boy tighter to him, afraid if he loosened his grip, the child would disappear forever.
Not knowing how to help, Sam moved closer to Daniel to offer moral support, gently laying a hand on his arm. O'Neill matched the movement on Daniel's other side, while Teal'c placed a comforting hand on Daniel's shoulder. A lone tear slid down Daniel's face as he struggled with the difficult decision, the boy pressed against his chest looking up at him with eyes full of concern.
O'Neill broke the tense silence by saying, "Daniel, it's okay. We're not going to let them take your son away from you. Let's head for the transport station and we can figure everything else out once we get back to the SGC."
Another tear slid down Jackson's face. "No, Jack. She's right. He has to go with them. We won't be able to protect him. If it were just the goa'uld, we might be able to, but once the governments of Earth find out about him, they'll all be after him to try use him as a guinea pig to experiment on or, worse yet, try to make a weapon out of him. I have to do what's best for him, not what's best for me."
"Are you sure," O'Neill asked feeling his own heart constrict at the thought of giving the boy up.
"Yes."
"If it would make it easier for you, Daniel," Oma said in her quiet voice, "I can make it so you forget about the boy's existence."
"No!" Daniel said with conviction, hugging the boy close to him. "I never want to forget this. I never want to forget about my son."
The boy wriggled uncomfortably in his tight embrace and finally Daniel loosened his grip. "'own, 'apa," the boy said.
Wiping another tear from his eye, Daniel said, "you want to get down, sport. Okay." Putting the boy down, he held his small arms for a moment and looked directly into the boy's eyes. "You need to go with Mama and Oma now, Daniel, okay. They're going to take very good care of you. Papa has to go somewhere else for awhile, but I'll see you again sometime soon, okay."
The boy frowned, "'apa come with 'ama and 'anyel."
"No, son. I can't do that, not right now anyway. But I will always be here for you and I will always, always love you. Don't you ever forget that, okay. Now go to your mother."
"luv 'oo too, 'apa," the boy said reaching up to give him a quick hug and a peck on the cheek before turning away.
Daniel watched miserably as the boy raced over to his mother and lifted his arms to her. She picked him up and hugged him, covering his small face with kisses as he giggled in her arms. Looking over at Daniel, she said to him, "I promise to take good care of him, Daniel. I promise."
The boy turned and waved at Daniel and the other members of SG-1, then one by one Oma, Shifu, Larinda and the boy transformed into ascended beings and floated away, leaving the humans behind watching them.
A week later, Daniel sat under a tree outside the Cheyenne Mountain complex, staring at the sky, grieving for his lost son. He'd finally managed to convince Jack, Sam and Teal'c to leave him alone and return to the planet to work out the peace accord with the shapeshifters. Their hatred of the goa'uld ran deep and they were already proving to be dedicated and formidable allies just as Aurora had promised.
He couldn't help remembering that two years before he had sat under this same tree wishing only to get his memory back, but now he almost wished he had let Oma take it away again because the memories he held inside were almost too painful to bear. He missed little Daniel so much that everything inside of him ached with that loss. I'm so sorry now that I gave you up. Please come back to me, he thought miserably.
The air in front of him seemed to shimmer, then two balls of light coalesced in front of him. The light faded, leaving Shifu and Daniel standing in front of him, the older boy carefully holding the younger one's hand. Daniel was so shocked he almost missed the third ball of light that coalesced a short distance away depositing Larinda by a tree several feet away, where she stood in the background watching the boys.
"Hi, 'apa," the younger boy said. "'ou clalled me?"
Daniel smiled and held out his arms for the boy, who came over and hugged him. He showered the small face with kisses and held him close, not wanting to let him go away again. Finally, he said, "I didn't call you, I was just thinking about how much I miss you. But I'm very glad you're here."
The boy caressed the side of Daniel's face and looked directly into his eyes, saying "'ou called me and I come. When 'ou call, I 'ill come. I 'ill ne'er leave 'ou, 'apa."
Daniel's eyes filled with tears and he looked over at Shifu, who only nodded. He hugged his son again, then released him, watching as the youngster went over to take the older boy's hand. The two of them smiled and waved and Daniel returned the smiles and waves, until the silvery light engulfed them again and they drifted away.
THE END