Janet had only been at the SGC for an hour or so, and already she wanted to go home.
It was just her luck that on her first day back after a blissful honeymoon, two SG teams would come home severely injured after a run in with the Goa'uld. The peace and quiet of the past few days were already starting to seem like a distant dream in the midst of this chaos.
Until she saw Daniel stroll through the door. One look at that handsome face and it was like she'd never left home at all that morning.
She sent a smile in his direction and passed what she was doing to one of her nurses so she could go over and talk to him. It wasn't until she came to stand right in front of him that she noticed that he seemed troubled about something. "Leaving already?" she asked.
Daniel nodded. "In about half an hour," he said. "Listen, I need to talk to you about something real quick, if you have a minute?"
Janet glanced over her shoulder at the hustle and bustle going on across the room. "I really can't step away for more than a second," she said regretfully. "Can it wait until tonight?"
"I guess so," he said. "But just in case I get held up or something... you really need to talk to Cassie as soon as you see her."
"Why? Is something wrong?"
Daniel shifted his weight from foot to foot and shoved his hands into his pockets. "Sort of," he said. "She just... she said something to me earlier that... I think she should talk to you about."
Janet was confused by his vagueness, but since she'd already been standing there too long as it was, she didn't ask for clarification. "Okay," she said. "I'll talk to her as soon as I get home." She reached up to kiss him on the cheek. "Have a safe trip."
Daniel forced a smile and took one hand out of his pocket to squeeze her arm. "Thanks. I'll see you tonight."
"Dr. Fraiser, we need help over here!"
Janet shot Daniel an apologetic look before she hurried back to her duties. By the time she looked over at the doorway again, he was gone.
"Well, if it isn't Mr. Honeymooner."
Jack grinned when his teasing made Daniel blush violently. He was too easy.
"Not anymore," Daniel said, adjusting his gear as he joined Jack at the base of the ramp. "Honeymoon's over. Time to get back to work."
"Anxious to get away from the old lady already?" Jack asked.
Daniel's eyes opened wide in surprise. "No... no, you know that's not what I meant," he stammered.
Jack chuckled and slapped his friend on the shoulder. "Relax, Daniel. I'm just messing with your head."
"Yes, something that seems to bring you great joy," Daniel said. He sounded pissed.
Jack smirked in triumph.
Carter and Teal'c wandered into the gateroom then, so Jack motioned to the technician in the control room to dial the gate. "Everybody ready to ship out?" he asked.
"Yes, Sir."
"Indeed."
"I guess so."
"Good." Jack glanced over at Daniel as the chevrons began to lock one by one. He seemed to be sulking about something. Or just lost in thought. Jack was never sure which it was at first. "Daniel?"
Daniel shifted his eyes to look over at him. "Yeah?"
"Problem?"
"No, why do you ask?"
Jack shrugged and turned his gaze back onto the gate. "No reason."
Daniel sighed and folded his arms across his chest. "Just... family issues," he said.
Jack couldn't help but feel a pang of guilt for his light-hearted ribbing earlier. Was Daniel and Fraiser's relationship on the rocks already? They'd seemed so happy a few days ago. "I'm sorry to hear that."
Daniel shifted his weight from one foot to another and sighed again. "It's just... Cassie," he said. "It'll be fine. She'll adjust."
Jack gave a wise nod and chose to remain silent. 'Saved by the kawhoosh,' he thought as the wormhole activated. As much as he wanted to help his friend out, he knew even less about teenaged girls than Daniel did. He had no doubt that Fraiser would step in and sort things out if something was wrong, though. "Off we go," he said, leading the way up the ramp.
The rest of his team were close behind.
P5C 991 was beautiful this time of year. Nothing but waist-high grass and chest-high bushes as far as the eye could see. Paradise.
Or hell, depending on how you looked at it.
"Watch your step, folks," Jack said as he narrowly avoided planting his boot directly in some kind of animal dung. "Looks like the folks here forgot their pooper scoopers."
"There aren't any folks here, Jack."
"Then I guess that explains it," Jack said. "Okay, T, you and I'll go set up a perimeter, just in case whatever uses this particular area as its toilet decides it needs to take another dump anytime soon. Carter and Daniel, you..."
"Wow, look at the writing on this thing. I've never seen this language before."
"...check out the pedestal." He needn't have bothered saying a word, as Daniel was already crouched down before the little stone structure beside the Stargate, totally lost in his own little linguist world. The grass was so high all around it that as Jack started to walk away, Daniel and the pedestal couldn't even be seen. If it weren't for Carter standing next to it, watching what Daniel was doing, he wouldn't even have been able to tell where the thing was.
It didn't take Jack and Teal'c long to scout the area and make sure all was well, but by the time they got back to Carter and Daniel's position, Daniel was almost finished with his rubbings.
"So, what... you're not going to ask for more time to poke around at this thing?" Jack asked in wonder.
Daniel shook his head. "No, everything I need is in the writings on each side," he said. "I can work on the translations back at the base." He sent a sly look in Jack's direction and added, "Besides, what's the point? I know you'd just say no anyway."
"You never know," Jack argued. "I might surprise you."
"Right." Daniel rolled his eyes and got back to his rubbing.
Jack never understood how archaeologists had the patience to do stuff like that for hours at a time. Just watching him was tedious enough. After a minute or two he had to go off and pace around a bit just to keep from falling asleep on his feet.
Five minutes later, Daniel finally stood up, started packing up his stuff, and declared, "I'm done."
"You want to get back to her that badly, don't you?" Jack said knowingly.
Daniel tried to hide his grin, but failed miserably. "Maybe," he said as he closed his pack and stretched the kinks out of his back. "Or maybe I really do just want to get to work on these translations."
"Yeah. Sure." Jack turned to Carter then, and asked, "So, what about you, Carter? No reason for you to go all gaga over this thing?"
"No, Sir," she said. "I scanned it before I let Daniel anywhere near it, don't worry. There were no energy signatures of any kind."
"Good." It looked like this mission would go down as the easiest one of the year. "Dial us home, Teal'c."
Teal'c moved to obey, and Jack followed him over to the DHD as he began punching in Earth's address.
"Daniel?"
Carter's confused voice drew Jack's attention back over to the other two a second later.
Actually, make that the other one.
"What's the matter, Carter?" he called over to her.
"He... he was right here," she said. "Daniel?" She turned around, her eyes scanning the area for any sign of him.
Jack walked over to where he'd last seen Daniel and started doing the same. "Daniel? Where the hell'd you go?" he shouted.
"I just turned my back on him for a second to walk over to the gate," Carter said, starting to sound nervous. "When I turned around to see if he was following... he was just gone."
"Daniel!" Jack called louder.
No answer.
He sighed and took hold of his P-90. "Alright, let's fan out," he said. "Knowing Daniel, he's probably found a rabbit hole or something."
"O'Neill," Teal'c said almost before Jack had finished his sentence.
Jack turned to look in his direction and saw that Teal'c was lifting a pack up from amongst the long grass. "Is that..."
"It is Daniel Jackson's," Teal'c said, looking as anxious as Jack felt.
Jack rushed over to him and started searching the ground surrounding the spot. Nothing. No rabbit holes, hidden wells, quick sand, nothing.
He'd just vanished into thin air.