Part Two-

Jack looked over at the sleeping Daniel Jackson. Danny, he mentally corrected himself yet again. No sooner had they gotten into the truck then Danny had been lulled to sleep by the motion.

There was a part of Jack that was glad Janet let him take Danny out of the SGC and bring him home where he would not feel so confined. But then there was the part of him that worried about how the investigation into how this happened was going. He knew Carter would contact him as soon as there was anything concrete to report, but that was only a small bit of consolation.

The investigation meant that Carter and Teal'c, accompanied by two other assigned personnel, had to go back through the gate and confront the monks about what happened in the temple. None of them had any feelings that this, whatever this was, had been done maliciously. It seemed to them the monks were just as baffled by Daniel's passing out as they were.

Janet had said as far as she could tell it appeared that Daniel's memory was wiped from the point he was now, at age ten, forward. She could not explain it medically for there was no physical evidence. And although Danny was still in a full-grown man's body, he did not see the dimensions. To Daniel he was ten year old Danny Jackson.

The truck pulled up into the driveway and Jack decided to get out and walk around to the passenger side. He opened the door and paused a moment as he watched Danny sleeping with his head back against the seat and his lips parted slightly. He had sounded a bit stuffy when they chatted on their way to the truck, so Jack was glad Janet had given him Danny's prescription antihistamines.

"Hey," Jack called out as he placed a hand on Danny's shoulder. "Wake up, Danny-boy."

Danny mumbled and then began to open his eyes. Before they were opened fully he sat upright quickly and turned toward Jack.

"Easy, big guy." Jack smiled at his friend.

"Oh," Danny replied in recognition stretching his back and yawning. "I fell asleep?"

"Yep." Jack confirmed. "I think before we even got out onto the highway."

Danny looked around noticing the sun was almost gone, yet he could not really remember the day, except for the morning. He rubbed his eyes under his glasses and then settled them on Jack.

"Where are we?"

"My place." Jack said holding out a hand toward the house.

"Naw," Danny giggled. "I mean maybe upstate New York?"

"Oh, no." Jack shook his head. "Colorado."

At Danny's frown and signs that he was becoming uneasy Jack knew this had to be scary for the kid inside the man's body. He probably woke up that morning in his mind in New York. So, the gruff and sometimes surly Air Force colonel gently took his friend by the hand.

"It's okay, Danny." Jack assured the man-child. "Come on. Let's get inside. It's kinda chilly out here."

Danny slid out of the truck and let Jack lead him to the front porch. Jack let go of his hand and fiddled with his keys.

"You hungry?" Jack asked. "Or do you just want to hit the sack?"

The door opened and Danny followed Jack inside. He wondered why his tummy was not growling. He remembered he had eaten breakfast at school last, but now he was not so sure when that was.

"Do I have to go to bed if I don't want to eat?" Danny asked as he passed Jack and stepped down into the living room giving it a thorough once over.

"No, I guess not." Jack shrugged.

"Okay, then no." Danny replied as he plopped on the sofa. "I'm not hungry and I'm not sleepy. So, can I watch television?"

"Sure." Jack said. "Remote's on the coffee table. There's a hundred plus channels. Knock yourself out. I'm going to grab a sandwich and a beer."

Danny clicked on the TV and then heard Jack rustling around in the kitchen. He had caught the last word Jack had said, but decided not to dwell on it. So, the man liked a beer with his sandwich. It didn't mean that he drank like Mr. Scott. Besides, Jack was nice when he wasn't drinking. Mr. Scott was always mean.

"Find anything interesting?" Jack called out.

"You have a channel called History?" Danny practically squealed.

Jack came around and leaned up against the wall of the foyer. He took a swig from his beer and suppressed a smile so as not to dribble. "Thought that might grab you."

Danny looked over at Jack and then his eyes shifted to the beer. "Aren't you going to eat?"

Jack noted a tone of warning, or was it caution, in Danny's voice? "Yeah, sure."

Danny put the remote back down on the table and followed Jack toward the kitchen. He thought he would just make sure the colonel ate something. But as he was passing the wall he saw a picture hanging there. It was of Jack, a woman and a boy.

"Is he with his mom?" Danny asked quietly.

"What?" Jack asked from the table where he sat making his sandwich.

Danny came into the kitchen now and pulled out a chair across from Jack.

"That picture." Danny nodded his head toward the wall. "Is that your son? Is he with his mom?"

Jack froze. What would be best for him would be to pass off that question. What would be best for Danny would be the truth. And, after all, hadn't it always been about what's best for Daniel ever since he returned from Abydos? He slowly put down the knife he was holding and looked up at Danny.

"Yes, Danny." Jack said. "The picture is of my son. And no he is not with his mother. Charlie died in an accident years ago."

"So, did my parents!" Danny exclaimed with wide eyes and a mouth opened just as much.

"Yeah," Jack nodded. "Life is like that sometimes."

"Is that why you wanted me?" Danny asked innocently.

"Huh?" Jack did not see that coming.

"Maybe so you won't miss him anymore?" Danny asked.

This kid was something. Well, not a kid really, but whatever. This was so not where Jack expected nor wanted the conversation to go. There had always been a gray area in his and Daniel's friendship that both were aware but neither ever spoke of.

"Danny," Jack began. "I don't know how to explain this to you. But I…"

All right, O'Neill, Jack thought. What was he going to tell the kid? That he did not want him like this? Daniel had always seemed, for all his knowledge and scholastic achievements, to be a lost child. Jack had reconciled years ago that he had first looked upon Daniel Jackson as a substitute son. He had become overprotective of the archaeologist from the start, but it took a while for him to admit to himself the real reason why.

"Even if you don't stay with me," Jack continued. "I want you to take something neat, something really cool with you where ever you end up. Fun times, memories that make you all tingly inside."

"I like you a lot, Jack." Danny told him. "But if I don't stay with you, then it's because you don't want me anymore. That's what usually happens and then all the good stuff just hurts to remember. But it's okay if you want me around only so you don't miss Charlie. If I know that it will make leaving a little easier…"

"Ah, ah!" Jack hated how that brain of Jackson's over thought everything he said to him. Daniel, Danny it didn't matter, they were both the same. "That's not what I meant. I will not send you away. But there may be some reason we both have no control over that will take you from me."

"Death?"

There were those damn hairs bristling away making Jack rub the back of his neck. Why would any higher being allow a child of ten to be able to reason in their mind the finality of death as being the only way people are separated?

"Not exclusively." Jack replied.

"General Hammond?" Danny asked matter-of-factly.

"Possibly." It was the truth. But in all fairness to the general it would be unanimously considered the best thing for Danny. "Let me try and explain this better. I never wanted to," Jack sighed trying to find the words to explain history, their history. He knew now that why he brought Danny home from the SGC tonight was the same reason he brought Daniel home with him seven years ago after returning from the second Abydos mission. "I never want to replace Charlie. But you seemed to me to need taking care of and I, surprising to me, needed at the time to be needed. Am I making any sense to you?"

Danny's head bobbed up and down. He hoped that this man could learn to care about him like a real son someday. But even if that never happened, he would settle for just being with someone who cared at all.

"People throughout history have always needed each other. That's what Mommy always told me. And Daddy said no matter what culture they studied, they always found that was true."

"Smart folks." Jack sighed taking a swig of his beer.

"You don't want to talk about this, do you?" Danny surmised. "I shouldn't talk so much. I get into trouble a lot for that."

Jack noticed Danny had begun to pick at the lint on his sweatshirt. There was something going on inside that head of his. Well, something other than the fact that his friend who was a man when he woke up this morning was now a child.

"Don't be so hard on yourself, Danny." Jack told him as he resumed making his sandwich. "You're just curious."

"Too much for my own good." Danny recited as if they were someone else's words. "Little Mr. Know It All."

"Who told you that, Danny?" Jack eyed his friend across the table. "The Scotts?"

Danny shifted in his seat and rubbed his nose with the back of his hand. "Mr. Scott always said that before he punished me."

Now the hairs on his arms joined the hairs behind his neck in creeping him out. Jack raised the beer bottle and three big gulps painfully slid down his constricting throat.

"How long were you with them?" Jack's voice was low and controlled.

"Four months." Danny answered shyly. He was warned not to tell anyone about what went on in the Scotts' house. But since he didn't have to go back there, he decided it would be okay now. "But at least they gave me a bed, food and clothes. They didn't have to be nice to me. Some foster parents take the money and the kids get forgotten. Jimmy Crespi told me that when I was at the Bradys. Happened to him once when he was my age. He was 14 and he used to try and scare me with those stories at night. Said I could end up in a home like that 'cause I wouldn't last long there with them. I was not only a sissy, but a weirdo."

The beer in Jack's belly began to sour his stomach as realization settled on top of it. Daniel had just survived after his parents died. He never had a childhood, because he hadn't been living. He was surviving and existing in a world of temporary shelters.

"You're not looking for a replacement either." Jack was more or less thinking out loud. "But you also don't want someone to just provide food, clothes or a roof over your head, do you?"

Danny lowered his head and began to gnaw on his bottom lip. He knew he was different than other kids. His social worker told him right out after he had been sent back to the group home by the Bradys. But he didn't need her to tell him. He knew the day his grandfather Nick Ballard, his own flesh and blood, had turned his back on him and walked away leaving him in the care of total strangers.

"You don't have to love me." Danny said in a faint whisper. "Just like me a little bit."

The chair rocked backward and fell with a bang as Jack shot up from his chair and fled to the living room.

Danny glanced up at the uneaten sandwich and was well aware of the absent beer and colonel. He got up slowly and made his way to the living room.

Jack sat in his favorite chair, beer bottle in hand resting on the arm. He stared straight ahead at the sofa in front of him. He knew Danny was watching him from the bottom of the entryway stairs.

"Children should be loved simply because they are children, Danny." Jack's husky voice quivered. "And once an adult gets to know them, they love them for who they are as well."

"Some times they don't." Danny answered cautiously.

"If the kid's a brat, maybe." Jack answered, looking over at the man who was an innocent. "You're not a brat, Danny. Are you?"

Danny shook his head. "I'm different. I make people, adults and kids, nervous. Do I make you nervous, Jack?"

O'Neill let out a ragged breath and smiled. He could never explain to Danny just how nervous he made him at times. So, he settled for shaking his head no.

"Aren't you going to eat your sandwich?" Danny asked.

"Yeah." Jack rose from his chair and sauntered over to his friend and now charge. As they made their way into the kitchen, Jack asked, "Are you hungry, yet?"

"Yes." Danny confirmed.

"Grab a plate. Cupboard on the left." Jack pointed as he returned to his seat.

Danny retrieved a plate and sat down. He watched as Jack prepared another sandwich. First he applied the mustard only on one side of the bread, then salami, cheese and more salami. His breath caught in his throat as Danny was baffled by the correctness of the sandwich as it was placed in front of him.

"Something wrong?" Jack asked.

Danny looked up at Jack with wide, blue orbs that sparkled. "How'd you know that's the way I like my sandwiches?"

Jack's grin was warm as he realized just how much he really did dote on Daniel Jackson. "Just a lucky guess, Danny."

End Part Two