A/N: Here's a big one for you oh-so-kind ladies and gents.

Ch 16

Sam walked through the park to the playground that had always been Cassie's favorite. She quickly spotted the rest of her team. As it was a beautiful Saturday, the park was fairly crowded with families of all sizes and configurations. Small groups of women with strollers, mothers and fathers chasing after their children, people with their dogs, and constant chatter and laughter filled the playground, but Jack and Teal'c stuck out quite obviously.

They were sitting on a bench, Danny's tricycle and a heavily laden stroller beside them. Teal'c was wearing a cowboy hat and a paisley shirt. Getting control of her laughter before she was within earshot of them, she returned their waves. They must have told Danny that she was here because he suddenly climbed out of the sandbox and started running towards her.

Sam laughed when she saw that Jack had dressed him in his tiny SG-1 "uniform" - he was the only kid in the park dressed in green cargo pants, a black tee-shirt, and a little green boonie hat, which slipped off his head and hung down his back by its strings when he hugged Sam round the legs and tilted his head up to look at her. "Hi, Danny, are you having fun?"

"Yup. Come to pway in da sand?"

She brushed sand off his shirt and pants as she picked him up, put his hat back on his head, and carried him back over towards Jack and Teal'c. "Well, I think I'm a little big for the sandbox, it looks pretty crowded. Why don't I sit with Jack and Teal'c and watch you instead?"

"Kay," he said happily, squirming to be put back down.

She set him on his feet and looked after him as he climbed back into the sandbox and resumed whatever he was constructing. "Hey Carter."

"Greetings, Major Carter."

"Hey guys. How's it going?"

"It goes well. Daniel Jackson is easily entertained."

"Yeah." Looking around at the stuffed diaper bag that was sitting in the stroller, the helmet hanging off one of its arms, and the tricycle next to it, Sam turned to her CO and asked, "Where's the kitchen sink?"

"Very funny. I forgot lugging a kid around meant lugging all this crap around too. I looked like a freaking nomad with all this stuff."

"And the rest is in my car," Sam added lightly.

"Great," he responded dryly as she sat down on the bench next to him and turned her attention to Daniel, who was calling, "Sam, Dack, Tea, wook at me!"

They all waved to him, and Jack turned to Teal'c. "So, what's it gonna be, big guy?"

"Your offer is most generous, O'Neill, and I would be happy to render as much assistance as possible, if Major Carter has no objections."

"To what?" Sam asked, pulling off her sunglasses and frowning at the smudges Danny had left.

Since Jack's shirt was already untucked, he took the glasses from her to clean them off while Teal'c explained, "O'Neill has asked me to accompany you to his home for the remainder of the weekend."

"Oh, that's a great idea!" Sam said immediately, realizing it would really help the potential awkwardness of being alone with her CO and a toddler all weekend.

"Then I will be happy to join you," Teal'c said, nodding to both of them.

"Great," Jack said, clapping Teal'c on the shoulder and then leaning back into the bench more comfortably, stretching his arms out along the back of it. Sam thought idly that the movement might have been construed as a subtle effort to get an arm around her - but he'd done the same thing on his other side, to Teal'c, as well, so clearly he was just making himself comfortable. Probably.

"Tea, come pway in da sand wiff me!" Danny called, in a very bossy tone that grown-up Daniel Jackson probably wouldn't use with anybody, let alone Teal'c.

"As you wish, young Daniel," Teal'c responded, getting up and answering his summons.

Sam had to laugh as she watched the large man perch himself on the edge of the sandbox next to Danny and obediently take the plastic shovel the little boy passed him. Several of the parents who were monitoring their own children in the sandbox looked slightly alarmed at Teal'c's huge presence, but they quickly relaxed when they saw how gentle he was with Daniel, and how patient he was with the toddler.

"Cassie and Janet are probably going to meet us in a little bit," Sam offered, after she and Jack had lapsed into comfortable silence for several moments as they watched their two teammates - one over a hundred years old, one currently little more than a hundred weeks.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah, apparently Cassie really wants to see the tiny version of Daniel. And I think Janet wants to make sure I didn't damage him too badly. She wasn't very impressed when I told her what happened last night."

"Oh, come on, I'm sure she didn't say that," Jack said mildly, squeezing her shoulder and letting his hand fall back to the back of the bench again.

"Well, no," Sam admitted. "It was… implied."

"Or inferred? Only by you?"

"Just wait. The first thing she'll do when she gets here is take his temperature."

"She does that to everybody who'll let her," Jack said mildly.

Two little girls, one about his age, one a bit older, had joined Danny in the sandbox and were helping dig and build in the sand. Teal'c watched these newcomers suspiciously for several moments, determined them not to be a threat to Danny's safety, and left him to his new playmates, taking the opportunity to stand to his full height, brush the sand off himself, and return to the bench with his teammates.

"Daniel Jackson has made several new acquaintances. He informed me that they are constructing a castle."

"Yup, Danny-boy is always popular with the ladies," Jack commented.

"Speaking of which," Sam added, waving to Janet and Cassie, who were approaching. Cassie was on her rollerblades, zipping around, circling her mother, who was carrying a handbag almost as big as she was. Cassie called out to them and skated over to them expertly, stopping next to Teal'c, who stood to greet her.

"Hey, guys!" She hugged Teal'c, then rolled over to hug Jack and Sam at the same time from where they were seated. They had all exchanged greetings by the time Janet joined them.

"Hey, guys," she repeated, unknowingly echoing her daughter's greeting. "Where's Danny?"

"Sandbox, getting numbers from all the little girls," Jack said, gesturing to the sandbox.

Janet went over to him to say hi, lifting the hat off his head and feeling his forehead in the process. Sam nudged Jack discreetly when she saw her friend giving Danny a quick checkup, but he didn't get time to respond because Cassie was going on and on about how weird it must be for all of them, and asking all kinds of questions about Danny and what they had all been doing, and how long he was going to be young.

Cassie sat down on the pavement in front of them to take off her rollerblades, put on some sandals, and hurried over to the sandbox. Janet smiled up at her daughter from where she was seated on the edge of the sandbox. "Danny? Here's somebody new for you to play with."

Danny looked up at the teenaged girl carefully. Cassie squealed when she saw him. "He's so cute! Look at that little outfit!"

"I'm not wittle," Danny said stubbornly.

Cassie laughed. "Sorry. Nice to meet you, Danny. Mom, can we bring him home with us?" she asked immediately.

Janet laughed. "I think he's pretty comfortable with Jack and Sam, sweetie."

"Yeah, speaking of which… they're looking awfully cozy on that bench over there."

"Hush, leave them alone," Janet scolded, glancing back at the rest of SG-1 to see if they had overheard her. From the look Teal'c gave her, she guessed that he had, but Sam and Jack were talking about something else and not paying the rest of them much attention. "But you're right," Janet added quietly.

"Doc, name," Daniel interrupted, patting Janet and pointing at Cassie.

"Sorry, Danny. This is my daughter Cassie. Can you say 'Cassie?'"

He looked thoughtful for a moment and said, "Cashy."

"Close enough," Cassie said, laughing. "Can I play with you, Danny?"

"Yeah, pway. Here, take tis." He offered her a shovel and scooted over, patting the sand next to him.

Cassie joined him. "See, mom, I'd be an excellent babysitter," she said pointedly as Janet got to her feet and brushed herself off.

"We'll see," Janet said. "I'm going to go see if they can make room on that bench for me."

"I'm sure they'll manage, even if it means Jack and Sam just have to sit even closer than they already are… although I'm not sure that's possible in a public place…"

Janet swatted her daughter's arm playfully as she left the two of them to play together, although she privately agreed.

"They look like they're getting along," Jack commented when Janet approached.

"Oh yeah. Cassie is determined to prove that she should get to start babysitting, although I'm not sure Danny's the best test subject. He's a pretty good little guy, isn't he?"

"Sam, care to enlighten the good doctor on how many hours he kept you up last night?" Jack asked as everyone scooted to the left to make room for Janet next to Sam.

It left the two in the middle, Jack and Sam, of course, pressed side by side. Teal'c shot Janet a look of approval that caught the doctor off balance for a moment, but she recovered quickly and turned her attention back to Sam with a smile.

"That wasn't his fault," Sam insisted. "He didn't feel good. Actually it was my own fault in the first place for not…"

"Oh, stop it, Sam, it wasn't anybody's fault. We all know Daniel has allergies. I should have thought of the possible problem sooner, but he was doing okay on the base so I sort of forgot about it. Now, drop it."

"All right, fine," Sam agreed.

Jack's jaw dropped. "I said the exact same thing to you several times last night and it had absolutely no effect! And I'm your CO!"

"I wouldn't say it had no effect," Sam defended half-heartedly, turning her attention back to Danny and Cassie, who were heading farther across the playground.

"Shall I accompany them?" Teal'c asked.

"Nah, they're okay," Jack said as they got in line for one of the slides, Cassie holding onto Danny's hand carefully.

The adults chatted as they watched Cassie supervising Danny. She went down the slide with him several times, helped him on the seesaw and other pieces of playground equipment, and was running after him towards the swings when Danny tripped on the uneven ground and fell.

All the full-sized members of SG-1 jumped to their feet as Danny fell off of his. They couldn't tell if he was hurt badly, but Cassie seemed calm enough as she crouched over him and picked him up, so everyone else relaxed partially, although they could hear him crying.

Sam and Jack both hurried across the playground to meet Cassie halfway and take him from her. Janet started to follow but Teal'c put a hand on her shoulder. "I believe they have control of the situation, Dr. Fraiser."

"Looks like it," Janet agreed as Sam took Danny from Cassie and they all clumped together to make sure he was okay before continuing back towards them. Jack had his arm loosely around Cassie, who was looking at the little boy with a very worried look on her face.

Several other people in the park were giving them all sympathetic looks because Danny was still crying, although his sobs were now muffled by the fact that his face was pressed into Sam's shirt, but they all saw that Danny had several adults to take care of him and left them alone.

"He's okay," Jack assured Teal'c and Janet immediately. "Just a scraped chin."

"I'm sorry, I was too far away to grab him before he fell…" Cassie said.

"Kids trip all the time, Cass. He fell off his tricycle yesterday surrounded by adults and got a much worse scrape on his knee."

"Really?"

"Yeah. Kids his age always have a few scrapes, right Doc?"

"Yes, Cassie, this is definitely not your fault and I'm sure Danny will be fine. Sam, can you sit down so I can take a look at him?"

"Nooooo!" Danny wailed. "No doc! No pokes! No fermer!"

"No what?"

"Thermometer," Sam translated. "I may have overdone it last night with the thermometer." She sat down on the bench and took Danny's hat off, absently passing it to Teal'c.

Jack was kneeling in front of the stroller, rummaging through the diaper bag. "Where's that damn sippy cup?" he muttered. "Crap it's probably in the truck, he wanted it on the way here…"

"I've got a first aid kit in my car," Janet said. "I can go get it, but I want to get a look at him first."

"Danny, come on, lift up your head so the doc can see that you're not mortally wounded," Jack said, shifting to the bench and rubbing the boy's little back. Danny lifted his head obediently but shrank into Sam even more heavily as Janet peered at him carefully, checking his eyes and inspecting the scrape on his chin.

"Did you bite your tongue?" she asked. Still sniffling and crying quietly, but no longer wailing, Danny shook his head. "Let me see." Danny opened his mouth and stuck out his tongue obediently, but when Janet tried to touch him to feel his head he squirmed away from her, swatting at her hands.

"I guess he still hasn't forgiven you for that first day of testing," Sam said apologetically.

"I guess not," Janet said with a frown as Sam carefully felt around his hairline and Jack felt his arms and legs.

"He's okay," Sam insisted. "Just not very happy."

"I still need to clean out that scrape. It's probably full of germs."

"I can go get the kit on my skates," Cassie offered, reaching for them.

"No way, the last thing we need is you falling on those things because you're distracted and going too fast. You'll end up breaking something."

"Moooom…"

"I shall retrieve the kit," Teal'c said.

"You don't know where I parked," Janet said. "It's pretty far away."

"We should have a kit in this bag, we've got everything else in there," Jack muttered, feeling guilty for not having one on hand.

"Don't worry, Colonel, I'll be back fast," Janet said, getting to her feet with her bag.

"I will accompany you, Dr. Fraiser," Teal'c insisted.

They left together, and Cassie sat down on the other side of Sam and looked at Danny carefully. "Are you okay?"

He nodded, but his lip was still quivering. Jack wiped his face clean, apart from his chin, with a cloth from the diaper bag. "He's a tough little guy, aren't you, buddy?" Danny nodded proudly, his breathing almost completely back to normal. He still looked rather unhappy with the world in general but he was now quiet, content sitting sideways in Sam's lap, and glad that all the commotion was over.

He suddenly pulled up one of his trouser legs and pointed at his scraped knee proudly. "See Cass? Old boo-boo on my knee."

"Wow," Cassie said appreciatively. "That must have hurt really bad."

"Yeah," Danny agreed. "But I am tough, wight Dack?"

"Right," Jack agreed, ruffling his hair. "And apparently you've always been a little on the accident prone side."

"Sam where my hat?"

"Er…" Sam looked around. "I think Teal'c must still have it, sweetie. He'll be back soon."

"Tea haff his own BIG hat!"

Everyone laughed at that, which cheered Danny considerably, so that he started trying to climb out of Sam's lap. "Whoa, wait a minute," Sam said, holding onto him.

"I okay now, weady to pway again."

"Well, we have to take care of your new boo-boo," Sam explained. "Just wait a little bit." Danny managed to get to his feet on the bench between Sam and Cassie, but Sam kept her arms around his body firmly to keep him from jumping down.

"You try that and you'll just hurt yourself again," Jack said. Then, deciding to use Daniel's inherently sympathetic nature against him for the moment, he said, "You scared all of us when you fell, Danny. Especially Sam, right?"

When Danny turned his concerned blue eyes on her, looking at her carefully, she caught on and said, "Oh yeah, you scared the hell…o… hello, you scared me, Danny."

Cassie laughed quietly at the way Sam tried to censor herself. "So maybe you should stay here with Sam for a little bit and cuddle with her," Jack suggested.

"Kay Dack," Danny agreed, hugging Sam around the neck.

He gave her a big drooly kiss on the cheek, which made Jack say, "Ohforcryingoutloud, Danny. You've gotta stop slobbering all over women when you kiss them. Come on now, I'm gonna do you a favor here."

Sam was trapped between the two of them on the bench, and didn't have time to say anything before Jack was crowding her more than ever, reaching around with the wash cloth from earlier to wipe off the cheek Danny had just drooled all over.

"Now, try to keep your mouth closed and keep the drooling to a minimum," Jack instructed, squishing Danny's cheeks together till he puckered his lips properly, making a little fish face. "There ya go, close enough. You know, if this is a problem you never figured out, it could explain a lot about your social life," Jack commented as Danny pressed another still rather wet kiss to Sam and looked at Jack.

"Nope, still not right. Look, this isn't that complicated, just do this." He kissed Sam on the cheek without thinking about it… well, without thinking about it beforehand, at any rate. Which pretty much went for this whole impromptu lesson, now that he thought about it as he sat there on a public bench in broad daylight kissing his 2IC.

Sure, it was innocent enough… although Cassie, he realized as he pulled away from his suddenly red 2IC and caught a glimpse of the shocked and thrilled look on the teenager's face, was never going to let either of them forget any of this. Even G-rated kisses were headline news in the world of Jack and Sam, after all.

Danny, always eager to learn, pressed a careful imitation kiss to Sam's other cheek, and asked hopefully, "Wike dat?"

"Yeah, that's better. Don't say I never did nothing for ya." He ruffled Danny's hair again and leaned into the back of the bench again, adopting a deliberately relaxed body posture that kept him out of the direct line of sight of his 2IC. He wasn't sure what she'd have to say about being an object lesson for young Daniel Jackson… but he had a feeling he may have just crossed a big line and embarrassed her thoroughly in the process… in front of Cassie on top of that.

Sam, once she recovered from the initial surprise, decided to go along with her CO's decision to act as though there was nothing unusual whatsoever about what had just happened. She forced herself to look relaxed, and figured the lingering pinkness in her cheeks could easily be attributed to the warm day. She pulled Danny all the way back in her lap and turned to Cassie, trying to come up with something to wipe the smug grin off the teenager's face. "How's school?"

"Good," Cassie answered automatically.

Danny continued trying to squirm out of Sam's lap. "Pway, pway!"

"Oh, come here." Jack slid Danny over onto his knee and started bouncing him around to keep him entertained, pretending like he was going to drop him every few bounces.

Danny was laughing hysterically, which of course drew Cassie's attention. "He's so adorable, how do you stand it?"

"Oh yeah, it's pretty unbearable," Jack commented dryly.

Cassie rolled her eyes. "Yeah, you seem to be having an absolutely terrible time, Jack."

Teal'c and Janet joined them again, Teal'c carrying a small first aid kit. Danny eyed it warily, particularly when Janet knelt down in front of them and opened it up. "No," he said firmly, crossing his arms and sticking his lip out in a defiant pout.

"Danny, I have to clean out your chin, so you don't get really sick," Janet explained.

"No. Stay way fwom me Doc."

Chuckling, Jack said, "Trust me, buddy, that doesn't work."

Janet pulled out a cotton swab and doused it with disinfectant. "This shouldn't even sting," she promised.

Danny tried to kick her. "Hey!" Jack objected, holding his legs still.

"Once again, this is why I'm not a pediatrician."

"Hey, I've been tempted to give you a swift kick a time or two myself," Jack commented.

"I'm sure you have," Janet said dryly, quickly cleaning the scratch on Danny's chin.

He screamed bloody murder, even though Janet knew it didn't really sting. She rubbed some Neosporin on the scratch and was packing everything away, although Danny still hadn't stopped screaming over the latest injustice he had been made to suffer.

"She's done," Jack assured him. Janet put the first aid kit in the diaper bag so they'd have it handy in the future.

"The inverse relationship of Daniel Jackson's size and corresponding volume is most interesting," Teal'c commented among all the screaming.

"People are going to think we're killing him," Cassie agreed.

"No they won't," Jack argued as Danny leaned out of his lap to Sam's and she took him back.

"Poor little guy," she comforted, rubbing his back. He stuck his thumb in his mouth and gradually began calming down.

"He's had a tough couple of days," Jack agreed. He looked around and spotted a concession stand quite a walk away. "Hey, Danny, you want some ice cream?"

Danny's eyes lit up, but he refused to cheer up completely, because then he might not get the ice cream after all. He nodded with a big, brave sounding sniffle.

"Vanilla, chocolate, strawberry?"

"Chock-wat."

"Colonel, you do realize it's almost lunch time," Janet said pointedly.

"You torture the kid, then you're going to tell him he can't have ice cream?" Jack asked incredulously.

"Give her the puppy eyes," Sam encouraged Danny.

He shifted his face towards Janet and gave her a truly pitiful expression that she couldn't refuse. "Whatever, ruin his appetite, health, and teeth…" Janet muttered.

"Mine too," Cassie contributed.

"Cassandra Fraiser…"

"Come on, Mom, once in a while…"

"Yeah, come on, Mom," Jack said, getting to his feet. "Ice cream all around."

"Dack, noooooo!"

"What? I thought you wanted ice cream."

"I do."

"Well…"

"Don't weave." He put his tiny hand on Jack's arm and glanced nervously at Janet, who rolled her eyes and got to her feet.

"Fine. I'll go get your ice cream, for all of you, even though it goes against everything I believe in as a doctor."

"Thank you," Jack and Cassie both chorused.

"I'll help you carry it, Mom," Cassie offered.

"As will I," Teal'c agreed.

Jack handed Teal'c his wallet and said, "Make sure you get a bunch of napkins."

As everybody headed off towards the concession stand, Jack watched them go for a few moments and realized Cassie was going to tell Teal'c and her mom about the whole cheek kissing demonstration from earlier. He sighed and stretched out his legs, his knee twinging from bouncing Danny around on it. "You know, Danny boy, you've got the good doctor wrapped around your little finger pretty nicely. We've got to start taking advantage of that more often."

Danny held out his hand with his fingers splayed and studied them carefully, trying to figure out what Jack meant about his little fingers. Sam laughed and said, "She does have a point about lunch though, sir… Jack, I mean. It's almost noon."

"We ate breakfast late though," Jack commented, unconcerned.

So, with Janet Fraiser casting disapproving looks at the lot of them, SG-1 and Cassandra proceeded to completely ruin their appetites with ice cream. "Oh come on, Doc, relax, will ya? It's not like we're not all going to be hungry again in a little while."

"Yeah doc," Danny agreed, trying to move from Sam's lap to Jack's. His giant ice cream cone threw him off-balance and he crashed into Jack's chest, smooshing the chocolate ice cream between them both. He looked down at the ruined treat and apparently the injustice was just too much to handle after falling earlier. He was two seconds from starting to cry again when Jack started laughing.

Everyone had been holding their breath to see what would happen, and they were all surprised at the sudden, deep laughter coming from Colonel O'Neill. "Carter, please peel the child off of me," Jack finally requested.

She took him by the armpits and pulled him back into her lap. The ice cream cone remained stuck to her CO's shirt. "Oops," Danny finally offered. That set everyone off laughing again, and Sam and Janet started trying to wipe as much ice cream off Danny's bare arms, shirt, and face as they could.

Teal'c pulled out his own napkin supply and said, "Allow me to assist you O'Neill." Cassie burst out laughing again as Teal'c began trying to clean up Jack with the same quick fastidiousness Janet and Sam were cleaning up Daniel.

Jack tolerated the help for only a few moments before grumbling, "I can do it myself, Teal'c, thank you" and swatting the other man's hand away.

Teal'c nodded and said, "Come, Cassandra, we will get more napkins."

While Sam finished cleaning up Danny, she handed him her own neatly nibbled cone. "Here, Danny, try to get this one in your tummy, okay?"

"Kay, Sam," he said, nodding seriously and diving right back into the ice cream happily, now oblivious to the women still fussing over his clean-up.

Jack frowned at him for a moment. "You are not doing good things to my wardrobe, you know." Danny looked around for a moment and offered him his ice cream cone as a truce. "Ah, no thanks, it's not really my flavor. I tend to prefer a little less drool in my ice cream."

"Wha?"

"Nothing. You eat it."

"Kay Dack."

Jack plucked his cold, wet, stained shirt away from his skin with two fingers and sighed down at the stain - that was just never going to come out. Although he'd got the spaghetti sauce off of Carter's shirt okay… maybe there was hope. As he studied the stain, Janet couldn't help but add innocently, "If you hadn't insisted on giving him ice cream nothing would have happened."