Author's Note: Thank you so much to those who reviewed! Also, kudos to Mara Jade Jedi for betaing this chapter for me (twice actually).
Chapter Two: How do you say 'Hello'?
Jack knocked lightly on an open laboratory door. The owner of which (one Samantha Carter), glanced up from her computer screen and smiled in greeting.
"Sir?"
"Wanna walk with me to the infirmary?" he asked. Jack continued, trying to answer her confused look, "Daniel's proving a point for me." This 'clarification' succeeded in making the Major more puzzled.
"What point?"
"The one about touching alien goo…" The Colonel called over his shoulder, already heading out the door. A bewildered and slightly concerned Sam was right on his heels, following her commanding officer to the infirmary.
Similarly, Janet Fraiser was also having a confusing morning. Teal'c, Jack, and Sam were gathered around the doctor and patient as Janet tried to explain that Daniel was in the best health of his life. Ever. To which all the typical redundant comments were made:
"I am?"
"He is?"
"That's weird."
"Indeed."
"And I can't even begin to explain why Daniel's eyesight has improved spontaneously."
Jack tried: "So Daniel, fall into any sarcophaguses recently?" Daniel shot Jack a look that told him that his smart-ass behaviour was not appreciated (as usual).
"And you've experienced no other symptoms?" Janet asked.
Daniel wondered if a strange new addiction for health food was a symptom ---
Bonjour. Guten Tag. Tal'matte. Ciao. Hola.
Unexpectedly, Daniel heard the word "Hello" in a thousand different languages.
"Did you hear that?"
His friends' confused expressions were answer enough. Janet ventured to ask the obvious question, "Hear what?"
Within… not external. Daniel heard this message, like the greeting, in a dozen languages including Russian, German, Goa'uld, even Ancient?
"External?" muttered Daniel, his brow creased in thought, trying to sort through the bombardment of languages. He didn't even realize he was being ushered to an infirmary bed, until he felt pressure on his shoulder to sit down and felt the familiar stiff mattress beneath him.
Daniel could barely make out Jack asking, "Who the hell are you talking to?" He wouldn't mind knowing himself.
Language… complex… learn. We within you, Dr. Daniel Jackson.
Daniel was both fascinated and frightened. Someone, something, was trying to communicate with him.
"Who are you?" Daniel mumbled out loud. His friends were very concerned for him at his point. Jack snapped his fingers in front of Daniel's dazed face, while Janet started hooking him up to various medical devices.
There was no answer from the mysterious voices, but that didn't stop Daniel from speculation…
"Wait a second. You're saying that the compound you touched on P3X 489 is intelligent?" asked Sam.
"Yes. They were talking to me… learning language." His shuttered English then began to sound like gibberish: "confundo quia ego cognitio multus linguae."
"He said something about the goo being confused because he speaks so many languages… Very badly actually. Awful grammar," Jack off-handedly translated. Teal'c wasn't surprised; however, Sam and Janet looked at the Colonel as if he'd grown a second head.
"Latin, guys." Although it was three years after the "Time Loop Hell" incident, Jack still spoke fluent Latin. It was an intellectual feat that caught the two women off-guard. Not for the first time, Sam wondered how hard the Colonel worked to maintain his simple minded reputation.
With this new development in Daniel's condition, Janet announced, "I want to do another MRI of Daniel right now." Without another word, she set off to find the right equipment.
While Janet was gone, the remaining members of SG-1 struggled to communicate with Daniel. However, other then the odd word in Goa'uld, Latin, or English, Daniel was incomprehensible. It was "Jack going Ancient" all over again.
"So the real question is: do we have anybody on base who can speak…" Colonel O'Neill made a 180 degree turn and addressed Daniel, "How many languages do you speak?"
"Vingt sept."
That wasn't Latin --Jack looked around the room, eyes asking if anyone could understand what the heck Daniel was saying.
"That's French, sir. He said twenty seven," offered a nurse who was restocking the shelves with medical supplies a few feet away.
"So all we need is someone who can speak twenty seven languages… most of them probably dead or extraterrestrial," Jack concluded. There was a reason that Daniel was irreplaceable.
"Perhaps if we asked for Major Stevens' assistance?" Teal'c suggested.
"That red-headed geek from SG-9? He's bilingual?"
"I believe the term is multilingual, O'Neill. He speaks seventeen languages."
"Not too bad. So all we have to hope is that Daniel doesn't spout off the meaning of life in one of the ten other languages…"
At that point in time, Janet arrived with her doohickeys. Threatened with needles if they didn't leave the premises immediately, the remaining three members left to update Hammond on the situation.
"…Twenty-seven languages," Jack finished describing to his commanding officer the current language barrier.
The three remaining members of SG-1 were debriefing Hammond about Daniel's current state, including the theory that it was linked to the slimy incident from three days ago, and discussing the possibility of sealing off the base as a precaution.
"I just had a thought, sir," Sam announced.
"That's what I was counting on!" Jack proclaimed.
"What about that device we picked up on PX5 763? The one that we thought might be a translator of some kind."
"I'll have Area 51 send it to us immediately. Do you think you can make it work, Major?" Hammond asked.
Sam shrugged, "It's worth a shot, sir."
Janet interrupted the meeting with a flourish, holding the results from her scans.
"I just finished printing up the new functional MRI of Daniel's brain and I compared it with the one I took when Daniel came to me two hours ago." All eyes at the table were on her. They were a captivated audience, ready to hear her findings.
"And…?" hedged Jack impatiently.
"Activity in the left side of his brain has spiked, which is what I originally suspected. The left side of the brain is where language functions are primarily found. His symptoms are almost like he's suffering from a highly selective form of aphasia."
"Aphasia?" asked Sam.
"A disorder where a patient loses the ability to communicate in some way –be it reading, writing or speaking. It's usually due to brain damage."
"Daniel's suffering from brain damage!" Jack's panicked voice filled the briefing room, and it spoke for all its occupants.
"I said that aphasia is usually caused by brain damage. I don't think that's what we're dealing with." How Janet managed to sound frustrated and reassuring at the same time had to be a superpower of some sort.
"Then what are we dealing with?" asked Jack. All he wanted was a straight answer.
"I don't know, but I'm going to find out." It wasn't the answer that Jack had been looking for, but Janet Fraiser was determined… and slightly scary.
"Doctor Fraiser, what do you need?" inquired the General.
"Assuming that this is related to SG-1's last mission, I'm going to need a larger bulk sample of the compound Daniel came in contact with, sir."
"I'll do that, sir," volunteered the Colonel.
"And I shall accompany you, O'Neill," added Teal'c.
The General agreed to the plan with a slight nod of his head. "You can head out as soon as you're ready. Dismissed." His last word initiated an outbreak of movement. Hammond was the only one who stayed in his seat, watching silently as his best people hurried out of the room.
The base wouldn't be sealed for now, he decided. So far Dr. Jackson was the only one who had been inflicted with delusions (an unsettling pattern). No one could question Daniel's sanity. Not this time.
TBC
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