From
the Soul by Betty
Bokor
Sam/Daniel. Sam
needs someone to listen.
Spoilers: All
seasons, including 9 and 10.
Disclaimer: The Stargate original
characters belong to MGM/Showtime, Double Secret Productions, and
Gekko Film Corp. This was written strictly for the purpose of
entertainment. No attempt at copyright infringement has been made.
From the Soul
Chapter 4
The following days were no better. The Colonel was still in the Infirmary, recovering from his wounds, when Daniel, Teal'c, and I were sent to meet Agent Malcolm Barrett, from the N.I.D. He was expecting us in a warehouse in Los Angeles, where unspeakable experiments on human and Goa'uld hybrids had been performed. Anna, one of the subjects of that atrocity, had massacred all the personnel working in the warehouse, minus one. It did not take her long to finish her task and end her life at the same time. During her escape, in order to find the sole survivor, she knocked out Daniel and the two guards. I believe she had seen the goodness in Daniel's soul, because she spared their lives. When I ran into the room and I saw him lying immobile on the floor, I felt my blood turning into ice. As Malcolm checked on the guards I leaned over Daniel. He was breathing with difficulty, but he was alive. I sighed with relief and, right then, he seemed to stop breathing. I decided to give him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation and I prepared to start working on his chest. As I approached him, ready to start, he suddenly opened his eyes and breathed deeply. I was kneeling on the floor, still holding his head on my right hand, when he stretched out his hand and softly caressed my cheek. So I kissed him. Right there in front of everybody.
I know Malcolm was busy trying to reanimate the guards, but he could have seen us and drawn some erroneous conclusions, especially after I had told him that I was seeing someone by then. I had not meant Pete, not even Daniel. I just wanted to let Agent Barrett down gently.
The fact that I could not stop that kiss, or that I did not want to stop it, was a sign of how messed up my head was at that point. I immediately knew we had to do something to stop the madness that had come over us before we endangered something even more important than our careers. Daniel understood it too and without a word, we both agreed that it would not go beyond that ever again. Soon after that, I restarted my relationship with Pete.
You all know what happened next. The Colonel got the whole repository of Ancient knowledge downloaded into his head, again; he defeated Anubis' fleet, and he got frozen into suspended animation in a chamber we found in Antarctica. While Thor, Teal'c, and I were trying to find a way to help him and Daniel was dealing with the Goa'uld on Earth, I was kidnapped by Fifth. He tortured me for my betrayal, for leaving him behind when the Colonel ordered me. In the meantime, Thor saved the Prometheus and beamed Daniel and the Colonel into the Daniel Jackson. He connected Jack's mind into the computer of his ship and that allowed them to create a weapon against the Replicators about to attack the Asgard homeworld of Orilla. After the knowledge was erased from his mind, Jack recovered. The replicators on Orilla were destroyed, but Fifth and his ship escaped, leaving me behind. What I did not know then was that Fifth had taken a part of me with him and that it –I– would come back to destroy the Universe and hurt Daniel in the process.
Back on Earth, the Colonel became a Brigadier General and took command of the SGC. I was promoted to Colonel and I was put in charge of SG-1.
During all that time, Daniel and I respected our silent pact and nothing happened between us again. I wanted to be faithful to Pete, now that we were in a formal relationship, and Daniel would have never interfered with that. It all went well until Colonel Vaselov was taken over by Anubis who then passed into Daniel. Teal'c had to zat him and the General had to shoot him.
It is hard to explain how the injured Daniel called to me in the silence. He lay there, motionless on his Infirmary bed, unconscious due to the heavy blood loss and still sick because of what later we found out was Anubis' stay in his body. I sat by his side and I felt all the emotions that had overwhelmed me after Kelowna come back to me. "You have an effect on people, Daniel. The way you look at things, it changed me too. I see what really matters. I don't know why we wait to tell people how we really feel. I guess I hoped that you always knew." But I never told him, not when he came back, not when he asked me, not when we were making love and he deserved to know. Now I would never be able to tell him, even if he survived. I owed it to Pete to keep quiet about what I felt for Daniel, because all those feelings were inappropriate and they would only serve the purpose of ruining my career or taking Daniel out of the team. Besides, if I had lived all those years knowing that I loved him and not done anything about it, I could certainly keep on doing nothing. I just needed him to survive this, to pass the test one more time. Then I would think of the right excuse. First it had been Sha're. Then the mourning for Sha're's death. When that was not reason enough, I put all my energy into my crush for Jack O'Neill and then Daniel was dead and there was nothing left to hide. That year while he was ascended I did not even flirt with the Colonel. There was no point to it; Daniel was not there anymore. Now, Pete would be my best shield.
Daniel recovered and life went on, until he decided to stay in the Rand Protectorate to negotiate with its government, right before Soren caused the attack of the Caledonian Federation. We lost communication with Daniel immediately and we did not know of his fate for months. It brought to my mind the days I had spent desperately trying to bring back Jack when he was stranded in Edora. The difference was that there was nothing I could do now. I was not necessary to daily attempt to communicate with Daniel and there was no riddle to solve in order to save him. It was hopeless. Pete soon noticed the change in my mood. I carefully explained to him how important Daniel was for all of us and how it was hard to continue our job without really knowing what had happened to him. Pete was not very patient. I realized that he was feeling jealous of Daniel, so I concentrated my efforts in making him know that he was more important to me than Daniel, but I was lying to him.
During those months I reflected about Daniel, Jack, and myself more than I had ever done before. I questioned myself about how I was capable of having such strong feelings for three different men at the same time. Pete was the easiest to figure out. He was a normal guy, a man who could give me everything I had been yearning for in the last year: a family, a life like everybody else's. There were no complications to loving him. Of course he had a dangerous job by normal standards, but compared to ours, it was nothing. He probably would be the one staying up at night wondering if his spouse had fallen under enemy fire. Besides, he did not expect anything special from me. He was already taken by the whole idea of the intergalactic warrior and he considered himself lucky that I was with him.
Jack was a different matter. I could not explain, even to myself, why I had this crush on him, the kind of crush that lasts years. He was –he is–a great leader and an exceptional soldier. He is also handsome, in a rough kind of way, but I finally concluded that what really appealed to me was that look that he gives people sometimes. Not the "Uh?" look. That one bothers me, especially when he uses it in the middle of one of my explanations. The "This world is crap, but now I only care about you" look. He really makes you feel that way. After the end of a hard mission, after another tragedy, after one more painful day, he looks at you and you feel like there's nobody else in the universe for him but you. Well, I feel that way when he looks at me. The problem is that there is nothing behind the look. There is no follow-up, no continuity. After you melt, he goes back to the sarcasm and the evasion techniques.
Daniel was the complicated one. First, he has something that I will call irresistibility. I mean, how can anyone not love him? He provokes some sort of maternal instinct in everybody –ask Jack, Teal'c, or General Hammond, if you think I am exaggerating– like a deep need to make sure that he is all right, because he carries so much pain... Sometimes I look in his eyes and I see it so clearly, that I feel afraid that one of these days the pain will crush him under its weight. You should have seen what those eyes expressed the day we left his grandfather behind with the giants' race of the crystal skull. They had just found each other, truly for the first time in their lives, and, once again, Nick had left him in favor of his dream.
You should have seen what those eyes said when I had to witness him helplessly relive, over and over again, the awful death of his parents, thanks to the Gamekeeper. Or after he helped deliver Sha're's child, who was not his son, as he rightfully deserved, but Apophis'. Or when he had to let that same child go, though he loved him as if he were his, first with Oma and then after his nightmare of absolute power. Or when, dizzy and in pain, he kept trying to focus on the dying figure of Sha're.
So, is it pity? Do I go back to him time and again because I feel sorry for him? No. The truth is I do not pity him. I admire him. I trust him. I wish I could ever be like him, because even if we all feel the need to protect him, he does not let us. He gets up on his own every time. He picks himself up from the wreckage and keeps walking without one complaint. Metaphorically and in the strict sense of the word, because I have seen him myself stand up after he has been shot, zatted, struck, or injured with the ribbon device, and gather enough energy to put himself through the gate, keeping his dignity, holding his ground.
I do see his defects, too. He keeps pointing them out to anyone who cares to listen. He blames himself for every mistake he has ever made and also for ours. He is not perfect and he knows it. He is just more human than all of us.
Then, if I love him that much, why do I keep resisting it and I refuse to let him know? Because loving him is wrong. It was wrong when I first fell for him, in the Cartouche room on Abydos, while his wife, unknown to us, was being taken. It was wrong when I wished Daniel had lost any hope of finding her and proposed to me to adopt Cassie together. It was wrong when I secretly felt relieved as Ke'ra –Linea– stepped into the gate without the memory of her feelings for him. It is wrong because he is my best friend and that is all he expects from me. I do not have the right to ask for anything else and, if I have given him more than that, it has been as part of what I owe him for being there every time I have needed him. They are part of the benefits of being as close as we are. I understand now what Cassie meant once when she talked about a couple of friends who were "friends with benefits" and not just friends. I understand it, but those benefits became part of the past when I got involved with Pete.
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