FIC: Daddy Dearest (5/?)

Jack threw down the prophecy, unable to focus on the lyrical phrasing before him, his mind consumed with thoughts of the raw hate in his newly-discovered daughter's eyes. God, what sort of man was he? He'd wanted to hold her in his arms, comfort her somehow. Fear of her boyfriend hadn't stopped him, the boy looked tough but over thirty years of Special Forces' experience gave him the confidence that he could handle the younger man. But fear of his daughter had, not of her powers, but of her final, crushing, rejection. "So what does all this mean?" he asked hoarsely. "The cliff notes, not the long-winded, god, I wish I was being tortured by Anubis version."

Daniel blinked at his tone before beginning. "According to Thor, the blood-god, Enkil, took himself and his favoured childe, Akasha, through the Stargate to P2X-400 at the start of the war between the humans and the demons. However they tried to use it to travel to P3X-774-."

"The Nox homeland?" Jack queried.

"Yes," Daniel nodded. "However the Nox destroyed the Stargate. Now, thousands of years later, the entire planet is over-run by vampires. According to Thor, the planet is largely nocturnal, with night lasting 16 out of their twenty hour days, and as a result, the planet is mostly vampires, what humans there are, are simply cattle for entertainment and feeding."

Jack blinked. "The people stranded there, it's bad for them, but it's confined right?"

"No," Daniel shook his head. "Eight decades ago another Stargate was found on the planet. Enkil and Akasha were both killed years ago, so they were left with trial and error to find out how it works."

"And now they have," Jack's fingers drummed on the desk. "How many vampires are we talking about?"

"It's only a small planet," Daniel swallowed. "Maybe a hundred thousand."

Jack couldn't manage the energy for a shout. "A hundred thousand?" he groaned. "Look who does this prophecy need, how do we kill a vampire?" He got a sinking feeling when Sam and Daniel exchanged worried looks. "What is it?"

"Well," it was Sam who broke the uneasy silence. "Our experts are sort of in one of our cells."

"Great, just great," Jack began to stand. "Clear me a bay in the medical ward. I'll be in there in just a few minutes."

"Stand down Colonel," he glanced at General Hammond's sympathetic but stern face. "It appears that your meetings with Faith Doolan haven't gone as well as one might hope," Jack blinked, that was one way of putting. "So I decided to give Daniel a chance." Jack looked towards the archaeologist. That explained Daniel's slightly wide-eyed look, he'd be freaking terrified too. "To see if he could have better luck."

Jack snorted. "Yeah, good luck, you'll need it."

"I will accompany Daniel Jackson," Teal'c informed them. "It will be a great honour to talk to your daughter."

Jack stared at his alien friend. "Here's some advice Teal'c, mentioning my name will not get a friendly response."

"Before they go," Carter put in, "what exactly do we want to know?"

"Anything Giles?"

"No," Giles hung up the phone before shaking his head. He'd spent the last hour on the phone to France, talking to the concierge at the hotel Xander and Faith had been staying at. The hotel employee hadn't been able to tell him a lot, aside from the fact that the first five nights there'd been a number of complaints about the noise coming from the room, Giles coloured that was rather more information than he'd needed, and then for the next three nights there'd been nothing. Finally hotel staff had ignored the 'Do Not Disturb' sign to investigate, concerned there'd been some sort of accident. They'd found the lovers gone but their belongings remaining, including a number of toys that Giles could only hope were Faith's rather than Xander's, and, more worryingly, their weapons. "And you?"

Willow smiled, but there was no warmth in the expression. "Contrary to popular belief, I'm not infallible. If I knew the area they were in, or even the country I'd be able to track them.."

"Does not knowing where they were last not help?" he queried.

"If they'd moved by mundane means it might but," Willow grimaced. "I can't help but suspect magic, there's no trace."

Giles nodded. He left unspoken the thought that someone with Willow's power would probably be able to sense the strand. He suspected the Wicca already knew that, she was smart enough. "What about contacting Buffy?"

"I doubt she'd be interested, especially after the chewing out Faith gave her for turning her back on us."

"True." Giles winced at the reminder. It had been the first anniversary ball of 'The Calling', as the fall of Sunnydale had been known. Xander and Faith had flown in specially, as had Buffy, Dawn, and the Immortal. As soon as Faith had seen the Immortal, sparks had flown. Within seconds, the sultry Bostonian had got in Buffy's face about bringing something like him to the meal. When Buffy had defended herself by claiming the Immortal as her boyfriend, his muttered but audible comment of 'oh no not again' probably hadn't helped matters, Faith had gone off the deep end about Buffy deserting them.

The situation had only escalated when the Immortal had attempted to defend Buffy's honour receiving a broken nose from Xander for his troubles. Seconds later a pull-apart involving Faith, Buffy, and ten Slayers in formal wear that had erupted, only ending when Willow had teleported Faith and Buffy into the outside fountain, something Faith had taken in considerable better humour than Buffy. In the five months since there'd have been no contact from Buffy although Dawn now worked as a trainee Watcher. Giles sighed at the loss. He had hoped that with the burden of Slayerdom now shared, some of the distance between them and Buffy would have closed. Instead the gap had grown, Buffy becoming more and more imperious, resulting in the new Slayers demanding two months after the mass Calling that he be installed as the Council Head and not her. After that….

Forcing his mind back to the present and the children he still had, he stared at Willow. "In that case any suggestions?"

"I'll keep researching this Hammond, there's got to be a connection, there just had to be!"

He placed a calming hand on the red-head's shoulder. "We'll find them. They'll be fine Willow," he soothed. And if they weren't, whoever hurt them would pay most horribly.

"Hello, can we come in?"

Faith looked at Xander. "I don't wanna see him," she declared.

"You don't have to," Xander soothed, although how he was supposed to stop them he had no idea. He turned his attention back to the door. "Who exactly is we?"

"Dr. Jackson and Murray."

Xander glanced at his girl-friend. After a second she nodded. He leaned into his Slayer and kissed her on the neck. "Remember I'm here," he whispered before turning back to the door and shouting. "Come in!" A few seconds later and the bespectacled man and the black muscle man walked in. "What do you want?"

"Your father is a mighty war-."

"That's a real deep voice you've got there Shaft," Faith interrupted the black man, her eyes hard. "You wanna keep it that way shut your hole about that bastard right now, otherwise you'll get my foot right in your balls." Her warning given, the brunette glared at Daniel. "What do you two assholes want?"

The bespectacled man pushed his glasses up his nose, a curiously Giles-like gesture that under other circumstances would have him laughing. "Um, I, that is to say us, would like some information."

He exchanged glances with Faith. After a second the east coast native nodded. "Quid pro quo," he said. "You answer one of our questions we'll answer one of yours."

"Um, you're not cleared -."

"Get out," Faith interrupted. In an instance his girl-friend was stood in front of the two men. "Unless," she rolled her neck around, a sure sign that his Slayer was ready to open a can of whup-ass. "You can think you can force us to talk?"

"We'll talk," Daniel caved in.

Faith nodded before turning and swaying her way back to the bed and sliding back into his arms. "K, first question – where are we?"

"You're in a NORAD site in Cheyenne Mountain." Daniel replied. "How long have you been a Slayer?"

Xander blinked at the man's answer. Before Faith could reply he spoke. "Don't answer. They're lying."

Faith glanced at him. "Why you say that Xan?"

Xander continued to stare at the nervously fidgeting doctor and his impassive, stone had more expression than the black man, bodyguard. "Remember how we got here. And you sensed he wasn't human."

"Yeah," Faith turned her eyes towards to the two intruders and cracked her knuckles. "'Fess up. Or leave."

Daniel sighed. "Okay. I wasn't lying, not really. Officially this is a NORAD site in Cheyenne Mountain. Unofficially," the scientist groaned. "General Hammond is going to kill me. Unofficially, this is one of two sites in the world housing Stargates, a mode of alien transport that allows for wormhole travel between planets in a matter of seconds. We've been travelling to alien planets for over seven years."

"SHIT!" Faith's eyes widened. "Thor wasn't a fucking higher demon was he? He was a fucking alien!"

"Indeed," Teal'c inclined his head slightly. "A member of-."

"Their turn to answer," Daniel interrupted.

Faith nudged his shoulder. "What ya say X?" After a second he nodded, the story was fantastic, but then so were vampires, demons, mages and the like, and there was the way they'd got here. "K, I was called in May '98 when the babe before me was killed by a vampire by the name of Drusilla. What is Thor? And him?" his girl-friend nodded towards Teal'c.

"That's two questions," Daniel pointed out.

"Then we'll answer two," Xander agreed.

"Okay. How are Slayers called? And what happened to Lady Haversham?"

Feeling his girl-friend tense beside him, he squeezed her shoulders and answered for her. "Truth is we don't know how. Slayers are always young girls and usually for a Slayer to be called her predecessor has to die. We believe they're 'Chosen' by some mystical power. Lady Haversham died when her and Faith were kidnapped by this 1,000 year old Master vampire called Kaktosis. Your turn."

"I am a Jaffa, formerly First Prime of Apophis, but now aiding the Tau'ri in their fight for freedom in the hope they might one day free my people," Teal'c stated.

"Oh you're one of them," Xander nodded sagely before turning to Daniel. "And in English?"

"What we remember as the Egyptian gods," Xander groaned at Daniel's lecturing tone. Junior-Giles much? "Were in fact the Goa'uld, a parasitical species, who take host bodies and seek galactic domination. The primary objective of this whole installation is to battle them. The Jaffa on the other hand were enslaved by the Goa'uld as warriors and incubators for their young. We first met when Teal'c helped us escape from Apophis' prison and he's worked with us ever since."

"Uh, uh," Xander raised an eyebrow, that was unusual. "And Thor?"

"Thor is the Supreme Commander of the Asgard fleet, once part of a great alliance of four ancient races. They appeared to humans as the Norse gods until SG-1 solved a riddle on the planet Cimmeria, proving that we worthy of seeing them in their true form-."

"Bug eyed and ugly?" Faith guessed.

Daniel sighed long-sufferingly, he knew the feeling. "They're effectively immortal, having learnt how to transfer their consciousness into younger versions of themselves as their bodies wear out. They're our most powerful ally."

"And you nearly strangled him," Xander muttered in Faith's ear, "good going even for you Miss. Dynamite."

"Watch it smart ass," Faith elbowed him in the ribs before turning to the two interlopers. "Next question?"

The two men exchanged worried looks, Xander's heart sank. He just knew what was coming. His thoughts were confirmed by Daniel's next words. "You were convicted of murder?"

Faith paled. "You wanna field this one X?"

"Sure," he squeezed his girl-friend's hand comfortingly before beginning. "Faith and the other Slayer-."

"I thought you said there could be only one Slayer at one time?" Daniel broke in.

"No," he corrected. "I said the Slayer died for another Slayer to be Called. B-," deciding naming his friends might put them in danger, Xander changed what he'd been about to say, "the other Slayer was drowned by a Master Vampire just a few months after I met her, I gave her CPR that brought her back, but the act of her dying meant another Slayer was Called."

"Most ingenious Alexander Harris," Teal'c praised.

"Um, yeah thanks," Xander reddened at the compliment. "Anyhow, Faith and the other Slayer were jumped by a bunch of a bunch of vampires. In the midst of the fight, this civilian blunders in, the other Slayer grabs him and throws him to Faith to stake. At the last second Faith's fellow Slayer realised and shouted out a warning but it's too late."

"That's not murder!" Daniel exploded. "At worst that's friendly fire."

"Try explaining I was staking a vamp to a judge," Faith's tone was dry, but her voice was hoarse with pain. "Anyhow I went a little nuts, X and Fang tried to help, but I wasn't much with the trust those days. And when the Watcher's Council, the guys who train us, sent a hit-team after me I went whack for a while, killed a few people." Faith smiled viciously. "You might wanna tell Pops that bit in case he's thinking of getting cuddly."

"Faith," he whispered in his girl-friend's ear. "Nothing's these two guys' fault. Cool it okay?" After a second Faith nodded.

By the time they left the meeting an hour later, Daniel's head was swimming. "That was amazing, the things they've experienced and seen."

"Will this require greater research Daniel Jackson?"

Daniel glanced at the massively-built alien. "Are you making fun of me Teal'c?" he shook his head. "Sometimes I think Jack could be a bad influence on the pope!"

"Jack's daughter is a mighty warrior."

"I'd really stop calling her that if I was you Teal'c, unless you want to have your head removed." Daniel sighed. "This report is not going to be fun."