The Present
It's been raining all day. Not the heavy kind of downpour that soaks a man in seconds and makes his 2IC's clothes stick so attractively to certain parts of her anatomy (bad Jack, bad!), but the sort of fine mist that at first makes no difference, yet as the hours pass, seeps in and is bone-chilling.
It makes his knee ache. As they prepare the camp, he sees that she is actually shivering, her lips just touched with the blue of cold. He moves to her, starting to leave T and Space Monkey to finish lighting the fire.
He cannot resist though. He knows that they both have the skills needed to have a warming fire lit by now. As he passes the two, he leans in towards Daniel.
"How long did you spend on Abydos, Dannyboy?"
Daniel flicks his head up, directing a distinctly unamused glare towards him.
"How often do you think it rained on Abydos, Jack?"
It is a fair comment. Still, this Air Force Colonel isn't too sure that Doctor Daniel Jackson could ever have evolved from a caveman. He moves away and pretends not to hear the further grumblings of a certain archaeologist as he fails, again, to light the kindling.
He knows that she is struggling when he stops at her shoulder and she doesn't even notice that he is there. He watches for a moment as her shaking hands fumble awkwardly with the assembly of a tent, before stepping forward and wrapping her fingers in his.
She flinches in surprise, but he barely registers this as he realises she is ice cold.
She looks up at him, eyes wide at the unexpected physical contact. "Sir?"
He just gives her a lopsided smile. "You're cold, Major."
For a moment, she looks as if she may start to object to his proximity, but as he starts to rub her hands, as a miniscule amount of his warmth starts to leech into her, she sighs.
"Yes I am, Sir."
He gently pries her fingers away from the canvas of the tent and folds them fully into his hands, cocking his head as he starts to pull her away. And he speaks with humor. "I know, Major. I already said so! C'mon, let's get you over to the," he rolls his eyes a little as he sees Daniel,still crouched over the kindling, "fire."
She smiles wanly, her teeth chattering, allowing herself to be guided along.
He settles her into a front row seat next to the fledgling fire, and then chooses to light it properly himself.
-----
The evening meal is more companionable and warm than he could have imagined it would be.
He, after all, makes very good fires.
And he has three very good friends here.
-----
As Daniel falls into his tent (apparently, being an archaeologist is very tiring) and as Teal'c steals away into the darkness to check the perimeter, he looks at her.
She is clearly much warmer now. But still, there are a couple of damp locks of her hair, plastered to her forehead.
He wants to cheer her up, wants to make her warm. He can't do that the way he truly wants to, so he decides to simply make her smile.
He reaches behind himself and hauls his backpack forward. Digging into a side pocket, he pulls out a white plastic pot and a spoon. He passes them over to her and watches as she curiously opens the little package.
As she raises her eyes to his, he look away, almost bashfully.
"It's a stupid present," he says, self -depreciatingly.
She looks seriously at the spoonful of extremely wobbly blue jello she holds up in the firelight before addressing him, her eyes shining.
"No, it's not. Thank you."
He shrugs ruefully.
"It would have been better if there had been good weather tonight but, well, you know, you can't have everything."
She smiles, as does he, at the totally intentional reference to something other than blue jello, or the weather.
Her head dips, a little shyly, as she answers.
"No, you can't, Sir. But thank you."
There are so many things they are forbidden to do.
This isn't one of them.
OK, so it isn't a lot.
But for today, he figures it's enough.