A/N (June 13, 2006). This is the beginning of the "Birthday Traditions Series." For those of you reading this series as a nominated work for the 2006 Stargate Fan Awards, here is the index of IDs to the rest of the stories, in order: Birthday Traditions 2: 2240166. Birthday Traditions 3: 2257174. Birthday Traditions 4: 2262252. Birthday Traditions: Jack's Day: 2276143. Birthday Traditions 5: 2284397. Birthday Traditions 6: 2364937. Birthday Traditions 7: 2398848. Birthday Traditions 8: 2451144.

Thank you for reading!

A/N: I found this story on an old disk. I can't remember when I wrote it, butI know it was before I started posting anything anywhere. Anyway, I thought it had some decent moments in it and decided to put it up, gradually but with very fast updates. It's only five chapters long. I hope it makes a few people smile. Try not to sweat the math too much;).

Ch 1: Fighting

"All right," Colonel O'Neill thought to himself as he sat around the familiar conference table in the briefing room. "Now, I may not be the world's greatest anthropologist or sociologist or whatever, but I know people well enough to know when somebody's not happy. Particularly two people I know as well as the two people currently involved in what can only be described as a shouting match."

"THERE IS NO POINT IN GOING TO YOUR LITTLE PLANET, DANIEL, IT'S NOTHING MORE THAN A FIELD TRIP!" his 2IC, Captain Carter yelled at her teammate.

"SO IS YOURS!" Dr. Daniel Jackson yelled back.

"HARDLY! I PLAN ON BRINGING BACK SAMPLES THAT COULD CHANGE THE ENTIRE FIELD OF PHYSICS… YOU JUST WANT TO ADD TO YOUR STUPID ROCK COLLECTION!"

"COLONEL! GET CONTROL OF YOUR TEAM!" General Hammond's gruff bark broke the back and forth bickering of SG-1's two youngest members.

"Daniel!" Jack said sharply. Daniel ignored him. He was now ranting about how soil samples were just baby rock samples, or something like that. Okay, so Danny wasn't exactly familiar with the chain of command, and didn't care about his professional reputation. Carter on the other hand…

"Captain Carter!" he barked in his best CO voice. At the tone in his voice she did pause, looking at him in surprise. Her cheeks were already pink and her eyes bright from yelling, but she flushed even more as she realized how unprofessional she was appearing in front of General Hammond.

"I'm sorry sir," she said quickly. She turned to the General as well. "General, I'm sorry. I got carried away."

"I'm not the one you should be apologizing to," Hammond said, looking pointedly at Dr. Jackson.

Jack could see it on her face. She dearly wanted to object. No matter how irate, however, Sam Carter would not argue with the General.

"Yes, sir." She turned to Daniel and fixed him with an icy glare. "I'm sorry, Dr. Jackson," she said icily.

"Dr. Jackson," General Hammond prompted.

"Sorry," Daniel muttered towards the table.

General Hammond, feeling much more like he was spending the weekend with his little bickering granddaughters rather than having a meeting with his flagship team, said sharply, "Dr. Jackson, look Captain Carter in the eyes and apologize to her like you mean it," he ordered.

Daniel rolled his eyes while they were pointed at the table so that the General couldn't see, then met Sam's eyes and said, "Sorry, Sam."

Unbelievably, it was as if a switch was flicked somewhere. Jack, the General, and Teal'c, who had been watching the meeting stoically as always, all watched in a kind of horrified amazement as they both suddenly started apologizing profusely and sincerely. Carter even looked near tears.

"Okay, okay, enough," Hammond ordered finally, being almost more disturbed by this than he was by their arguing.

"We should be sticking together, not fighting…" Daniel was saying.

"I know, I know, I'm so sorry. I don't know why I let our personal…" she trailed off suddenly and they both clammed up, looking around guiltily, clearly hoping they weren't the center of attention.

While Jack gaped at them like a goldfish for several moments, Hammond was the first to recover. "Now that you're both listening, maybe you'll realize that you can BOTH go to the planets you want to visit. Captain Carter, yours isn't going to require sending another research team afterwards if all goes well, so Dr. Jackson, we'll send you to yours first. Understood?"

"Yes, sir," Carter said quickly.

"Thank you, General Hammond," Daniel said sincerely.

"You're welcome. Both of you are dismissed. Jack, Teal'c, I'd like a word," he added casually.

Carter and Daniel exchanged looks that plainly said they knew the meeting was going to continue without them, and it was going to be ABOUT them. Carter shot her CO a helpless look. He was inclined to melt at it, but he was still more than a little irritated by what she had blurted out about her and Daniel's "personal" life. She bit her lip however, and continued to look at him for help, and he growled to himself as he dismissed them, nodding at her to show he was going to try to smooth things over. Damn them both.

They left the office talking quietly, their heads very close together.

"Colonel, I'm more than a little concerned about both of them," Hammond said as soon as they left. "Have they been acting this emotional for a long time?"

"No, sir, they usually get along annoyingly well."

"Annoyingly?"

"Yeah, well, I can't speak for Teal'c here, but I find it annoying while trying to sleep off-world while they're up all night having science club meetings."

"It does not disturb me, O'Neill," Teal'c put in. "Although I too am disturbed by their current behavior."

"Any ideas on whether they're just bickering between each other, or is this just a general attitude problem?"

"I observed Daniel Jackson in a most foul mood yesterday when he had trouble procuring his tenth cup of coffee. Captain Carter was nowhere in the vicinity."

"They're probably just tired, General. We've been working pretty hard," Jack pointed out. "I'd prefer if you let me try to get to the bottom of this myself before going for… outside help."

"Very well. But another outburst like that during a meeting, I will have no choice but to interfere, and that means rounds of psych evaluations for all of you."

"Yes, sir. I'm sure it won't come to that."