Hi guys! Long time no see. I'm gonna be (hopefully) writing more often. If you want that, please review! If you don't, please review! If you don't care... Please review! Thank you... Emilie :)

PS. If anyone likes "Law and Order: SVU," my sister (who is picky about names on the internet but goes by the username BedduinAshes) has written a story for it. I'm trying to get her to write some Stargate, but so far I haven't succeeded...

Disclaimer: Jack and Sam and Teal'c and Daniel and Hammond and the SGC (etc) don't belong to me. They belong to all those cool Stargate people up in Vancouver, which is where I want to live as soon as I get out of school.

JACK

Regular day, regular mission. Maybe a little hot. Of course, they all start out like that—pleasant or mildly inconvenient. I just wish they could all end up that way. Don't get me wrong: I like the excitement. But any danger to me, my team or the base is a danger I could do without.

I am, as usual, with Daniel in an old building. Teal'c is outside, making sure Sam stays okay. Us 'warrior' types, me and Teal'c, usually look after our 'scientists.' I know perfectly well that Sam Carter can take care of herself in a combative situation. But give her a computer she hasn't taken apart before and watch out! If put under pressure, I'll even admit Daniel is quite capable of defending himself—maybe not against me, or Teal'c, but I could never beat my teachers either, and….Well, Teal'c is Teal'c. However, Daniel gets so absorbed in what he's doing that he may as well be on another planet altogether—one with no goa'ulds, jaffa, or other creepy slimy aliens except in historical books and murals, and moldering buildings.

Anyway. Daniel and the building.

Daniel and I are in a big old cellar-thing, although Daniel says it was really a house. He thinks they lived underground to hide from the goa'uld. I think they lived underground to hide from the heat. Seriously—it's about ten degrees cooler in here, and I'm still boiling. But Daniel says that was just a perk.

I'm inclined to believe him.

Despite the fact that he's a geek, Daniel's actually a pretty cool geek. The only way he ever makes you feel stupid is by assuming you're smart enough to keep up with him. Some guys just assume you could never understand half the vocabulary they use in non-anthropology speech. (Or chemistry, or math, or whatever branch of geekdom they belong to.) They never take into account that you have to be pretty smart to get to colonel, even if you don't use all the smarts stuffed in that brain. Daniel, on the other hand, thinks anyone can get anything as long as you explain it with enough long words. One of the few things he's wrong about.

"Jack, come here," Daniel calls. He's in another room, I realize. I've been fiddling with a glazed pot for the last few minutes, thinking. I put it down carefully and join him in the next room.

Uh-oh. There's a glowy thing in the middle of the room. Daniel's crouching by it. "Daniel, don't touch it!" I say, knowing very well that he probably already has. "I'm gonna go get Carter, okay?"

"Jaa---ack…" I can hear the smile in his voice. I hate that! "I think it's just phosphorescent."

"Which is why I'm getting Carter. If it's more than three syllables long…" I trail off. Never mind; dumb comment. Just like all my others. Well, most of my others. Well, some—

Just go get Carter, Jack, I tell myself.

Sam's walking around the ruins with Teal'c in tow, presumably looking for us. She's maybe ten yards away, but facing the opposite direction. Teal'c hears me, and looks behind him, poking Carter when he sees it's me.

When she sees us, her face kinda lights up, and she waves. "Hi, sir!" she says, jogging over. "What's going on?"

"Uh…Daniel's found some...rock thing," I say. "He says it's phorent—phosphesphor—uh…" I pause, then say, "It glows."

Sam smiles at my clumsy tongue, and says, "phosphorescent?"

"Yes!" I cry, triumphant at having gotten my point across. "I told him not to touch it, but I doubt he listened…"

Sam smiles, getting out her all-purpose stuff-detector. "I'll check it out, sir."

I lead the way down the cellar steps.

DANIEL

I don't know much about geology, but this was pretty cool.

A big rock sort of stuck in the ground, glowing. I've seen these in natural history museums, but never in the middle of nowhere on another planet. But finding strange things on other planets is my—and the rest of my team's—forte, so I didn't really marvel at my luck.

I'm just gazing at it, wondering if it's safe to touch it—despite Jack's insistence that I touch everything, I am reasonable sometimes—when Jack comes in, leading Sam and Teal'c.

"Cool," Sam says, reflecting my earlier thought. She takes a few steps forward.

"Is it safe to touch?" I ask, looking up at her.

"Just hold on," she said. "It could be emitting radiation."

I stand and back up quickly.

Sam comes slowly forward with that little machine that looks like a mathematician's dream graphing calculator, moving closer and closer—closer than me, even. If it is emitting radiation, I think she's gonna die pretty quick. But it's not, because otherwise she wouldn't be that close. Would she?

She makes a few adjustments to her instrument thing, and stares at the screen for a few seconds. "It's emitting alpha radiation, sir," she says, looking to Jack. I frown, and back away a little more. But Jack nods, and says, "Go ahead, Daniel."

I look at Sam. She nods, too. "Alpha radiation is non-penetrating, Daniel. It can't even get through the dead layer of skin that's on all of us. Plus, it can only go a few centimeters until it breaks apart. As long as you don't swallow any of that rock, you should be perfectly safe."

Swallow?

Oh, well: if Sam says it's safe…

SAM

This rock is really pretty cool. It's not phosphorescent, or at least not in any way I've ever heard of. But it is giving off light, completely without a light source to start with. It could be spontaneously producing energy, which could be really helpful to know about, if you think about it.

With that in mind, I approach the colonel, intending to propose we bring it back with us.

But he's already way ahead of me. "First off, Carter," he says when I face him, without me having said a word, "Are you sure that alpha radiation is the only thing this does? I mean, could it be dangerous in another way?"

I ponder the subject. "Well," I say slowly, "It's hard to say that for sure when I don't know what it's for. Daniel might be able to help us there."

"Probably just decorative," Daniel calls over his shoulder. He's now crawling on the floor, looking at the stuff written there. Funny; I hadn't even noticed that until now. "It says here," Daniel continues, "that this is some sort of meditating room to honor their gods. They'd sit and pray in here. Kind of like a chapel on Earth."

"Right," says the colonel. "That sounds pretty safe to me. Teal'c? Daniel?" At their nods, he moves forward. "Okay," he says. "Daniel, help me with this thing? We gotta go soon." Daniel promptly drops what he's doing and sticks his fingertips under one end of the rock. Colonel O'Neill has the other side, and they pick it up easily. So much for being embedded in the earth, I think. I can tell it's not too heavy, despite its bulk, by the way they're carrying it. It would be awkward to carry it without help, but not by any means impossible.

Daniel offers to carry it alone to the gate. The colonel must think he can handle it, too, because he gives in without a fight. "Okay," he says. "I'm on point, Carter has our six. Teal'c, make sure Daniel doesn't trip over his feet with that thing blocking his view."

We have about 40 minutes until we have to be back, and about a ½ hour walk back to the gate, so we get going pretty quickly.

TEAL'C

By the time we are in sight of the stargate, Daniel Jackson's arms are getting tired. He would not say so, but I can tell by the way he must often hoist the rock higher, as one would a small child. I offer to carry it for him.

"No," he says, smiling, "I'm okay."

"I am sure you are, Daniel Jackson," I reply, "however, that rock appears to be a heavy object for any one person to carry for such a long time." O'Neill gives me a sideways grin which says, "I know what you're up to."

Daniel shakes his head. "We're almost there, Teal'c," he said, "It's not worth it to stop now. I'm fine carrying it, really."

I realize I must use a different tactic, and begin to speak again. "Your progress is slowed by the rock you are carrying because you cannot see over it. I believe I can carry it in a different way which will make our progress overall much better, and when we get to the SGC you and Major Carter can study this rock."

Daniel squints suspiciously, but cannot find any flaws in my logic. He hands over the rock, and we are soon walking again, and at a faster rate.

"So," Daniel says as we walk briskly in the direction of the gate. "I was watching TV land the other day."

"Oh yeah?" O'Neill says, inviting a continuation of Daniel Jackson's story while not taking his eyes off the path ahead.

"Yeah," Daniel says. "There was this show called 'Macgyver'."

O'Neill freezes in his tracks for a brief moment, which is noticed by all. He then continues walking as if nothing had happened. "Never heard of it," he says dismissively.

"Really?" Major Carter asks. "I have. It was pretty popular in the 80's and early 90's, sir."

"I, too, have watched many episodes of 'Macgyver'," I say, unable to hide a very large grin from spreading across my face. O'Neill, who is three paces ahead of us now, does not see it. Major Carter, however, does, and stifles a giggle.

"That TV land stuff is crap," O'Neill says, glancing suspiciously back at Carter. I quickly wipe my face free of expression. "You guys shouldn't watch that. Really bad stuff."

"I, in fact, found the main character, Macgyver, quite similar to you, O'Neill," I say, refusing to allow myself to start smiling again.

"No way," he says vehemently. "I will not be compared to that...crap."

"Indeed," I say. Daniel Jackson is biting his lip to keep from laughing. "Macgyver looks much like a younger version of you, O'Neill," I say. Before he can interrupt, I add, "He also comes from Minnesota, and likes hockey and fishing." O'Neill gives me a dirty look, and I return a placid smile.

Our conversation has brought us to the stargate. Daniel Jackson is already dialing, and Major Carter takes her GDO out of her bag and starts to punch in SG-1's code.

"However," I say, "the character is not exactly like you, because he does not like guns or beer, and considers tofu to be fine cuisine."

"Bleaach," O'Neill says, making a horrible face. "Tofu." He runs up the three steps and into the stargate's shimmering pool, as if to get away from the very idea of tofu.

Thank you! Pleeeeeeease review. Please? Please? I'll give you a cookie...