Ch 32

"So, this is the hard-to-find office of Colonel O'Neill," Jacob called from the doorway. Jack looked up from his computer and waved him inside.

"Jacob. What's up?"

"I was looking for Sam."

"She's not in the VIP room?"

"No. I thought maybe Danny woke up and she brought him here."

"Huh. Maybe she took him to see Janet or something. I'll call the infirmary." Jack quickly dialed the infirmary and confirmed that Janet hadn't seen either Sam or Danny since lunch. "Nope," he reported. "And you were in her lab the whole time, right?"

"I went up to the floor where all the linguists are for a while, but Teal'c was in Sam's lab the whole time."

"Hmm." Where else would she possibly go to work without being bothered? "Oh," Jack realized. "I bet she's in Daniel's lab."

"Well go get her, we have to report to Hammond in an hour, I need to know what she's got."

"Yes, sir," Jack muttered as Jacob left as quickly as he'd come. Still, searching for his 2IC would provide a nice break from all the boring reports he was plowing through.

As he neared Daniel's lab, Jack thought he'd guessed wrong. The lights were off, for one. When he reached the open door, however, he changed his mind. He had been right all along. A couple of lamps were on, plus there was enough light from Daniel's computer and her laptop for him to locate both missing members of SG-1.

Jack had found them secretly working in Daniel's lab many times, and even found one or both of them asleep in there a time or two, but it was the first (and only, he hoped) time he'd ever found Daniel asleep in Sam's lap as she continued to work.

His legs dangled over either side of the chair and his face was hidden in her shirt. She had one arm around him to keep him from falling, as she was sitting in his rolling chair. With only one hand free to work, moving from the computer mouse to thumb through Daniel's notebooks, the work was a little bit slowed, but not all that hindered.

Jack could tell, based on how she was sitting and how fast she was working, plus that slightly-crazed glint in her eyes, that she was onto something. Plus, she hadn't noticed him yet. As he stood there filling the doorway, she rolled from the desk to the work bench in the chair without having to get up and disturb Danny. She picked up another notebook and rolled back to the desk with it, speaking quietly to Danny. "As soon as you're back to your normal, fully-grown self, you and I are writing a translation program. I don't care what you say - it'll at least be a help when you're not around, even if we don't get the exact meanings right."

"Good idea," Jack commented.

She looked over at them in surprise. "Colonel! I didn't see you there."

"What are you doing up here? Apart from the seriously impressive multi-tasking you've got going on."

"Oh, I um, needed some of the things in here. And Danny kept waking up and every time I tried to put him back down I'd wake him up again so I finally just gave up trying. Why were you looking for me anyway?"

"Dad enlisted my services as a bloodhound."

"What?"

"He sent me to track you down."

"Oh. Why?"

"He wants to know what you're going to have for your report to Hammond. In an hour."

"An hour?" she asked, glancing at the clock with desperation. "No, that's not enough time, I think I might be getting somewhere but there's no way I can do this in an hour…"

"Hey, easy." He leaned against the work bench and said, "What's the problem?"

She gave a tired smile, recognizing the offer to use him as a sounding board. The method had ended up causing major breakthroughs in whatever she was working on that had frequently saved the day on several occasions. "The problem? The problem is that I'm not him." She nodded down at Danny.

"That's not a problem from where I'm standing."

She smiled and looked down at Danny again, marveling, not for the first time, at his uncanny ability to get people - her especially - instantly relaxed. "It's just… I can't help but wish I'd been the one this happened to. Daniel would have had all this figured out days ago."

"Well… as interesting as it might be to see what you were like as a toddler, I don't think that would have been a better situation for anybody. I mean, it was weird enough giving Daniel a bath…"

"Sir."

It was really impressive, Jack thought - and not for the first time - that she could manage to turn a word that was inherently submissive into an order in and of itself. "All right, I'll stop. Look. Maybe you're doing this all wrong."

"Well, if you'd care to take over, be my guest," she said, waving a hand at the books spread out in front of her.

"That's not what I meant. Instead of trying to do what Daniel would do, why don't you just do what you do?"

"It's not technology, I've scanned it with everything I could think of. There's no place to start!" She shot a glare at the device and said, "It's not like anything we've seen before…"

"That usually doesn't stop you," Jack said with a shrug. "Start over. Pretend you just found the thing and you're explaining what it does to me."

"Okay. As far as we can tell, it doesn't open. It doesn't emit any detectable energy or radiation."

"What does it do?"

"It turned Daniel into a two and a half year old child. But how am I supposed to know if that's what it's supposed to do or if it's broken?"

"Like the time loop machine?" Jack asked.

"Yeah…" her eyes lit up suddenly. "Exactly like that, actually! We know the ancients have done research with ascension and time manipulation, and the Asgard, their former allies, are all clones."

"Yeah… what's the connection?"

"Immortality. Different forms of it, sure… ascension, transferred consciousness, reliving the same day over and over… plus we know the sarcophagus was derived from ancient technology. Speaking of the sarcophagus, remember the canopic jar Daniel found on vacation?"

"The one with a dead snake in it?"

"Yeah. Well, it was only dead because there was a crack in it, but that's not really the point… from the outside, it looked like a regular old canopic jar. We couldn't detect the technological part inside… and that was essentially a stasis chamber, yet another form of preserving life. Obviously there are differences, but if this trunk is related to the Furlings, and the Furlings had an alliance with the Asgard, the Nox - who also live abnormally long - and the Ancients, then it's reasonable to assume that they might be conducting similar if not interrelated studies and experiments."

She was getting so caught up in her thoughts that she didn't realize she was speaking loud enough to wake Danny. He squirmed and tried to cuddle closer to her to avoid waking up. "Carter?" Jack interrupted. She stopped talking and gave him a confused look - he'd been the one who'd started her off on that line of thinking, he knew better than to stop her halfway through. He pointed to Danny, who let out a gurgly, snory sound.

"Oops?" she offered with an apologetic smile. She rubbed Danny's back until he settled again, but it didn't work. He woke up and looked around for several moments, blinking drowsily at both of them.

"Hey, little buddy. Nice nap?" Jack asked.

Danny nodded, his thumb still in his mouth, and looked around. "Where we are, Sam?"

"Where are we? Well, this is… a lab on the base. This is where we found you, remember?"

He looked around, still sleepy, so he was happy to remain in her lap. He caught sight of the masks on the wall and screamed, hiding his face in her shirt.

Jack laughed, he couldn't help it. Daniel himself had, of course, put them there in the first place. "You think he's scared of them because they're scary, or because he's appalled at his grown-up self's decorative style?" Jack asked, petting his head while Sam rubbed his back and tried to comfort him.

She gave a small, appreciative laugh and said, "They're just masks, Danny. They look scary but they're just decorations."

"Ooh, he's not gonna like that when he's big," Jack remarked. "To Daniel nothing is just a decoration."

Danny calmed down and eventually shifted so he could see again, but he avoided looking at the wall with the masks. Sam let him down when he wanted and they watched as he inspected his own lab. It was really impossible to tell if he was remembering it or just checking out 'new' surroundings with his usual curiosity. Although Sam would have liked to believe the former, she had to admit there was no way to really tell.

"Why we all are in here?" Danny finally asked.

"Just talking while you slept," Jack said. "I guess you should check in with Hammond and your dad before you take Danny and go."

"Yeah, probably."

They both watched as Danny neared the trunk. He regarded it for a few moments before deciding it would be something good to climb on. "Danny, be careful," Sam said, going over to him as he scrambled to his feet on top of it.

"Wook I'm a big boy Sam!"

"Yes, you are," she agreed, catching him when he jumped off the trunk at her. "Damn, I hoped he recognized it," she muttered, turning back to Jack. "I guess he just wanted to play on it."

"Yeah. Well, we know standing on it and declaring you're a 'big boy' doesn't reverse the process," he joked.

"True," Sam said thoughtfully. "But you know… so far nearly everything we've translated is part of a warning."

"And?"

"Well, it's a long warning. They were obviously concerned about the device being used improperly. So it's reasonable to assume that there's some way built in to reverse the effects."

"Assuming this is the intended effect," Jack added, gesturing to Danny, who was climbing back up into the chair Sam had been sitting in.

"Dack, pin me!"

"Pin you? Gladly. To what? The wall? Or the chair?"

"Pin me!" he grabbed the arm rests of the chair and kicked his legs.

"Oh, spin you." Jack started spinning him absently, not too fast.

Above Danny's giggling, Sam said, "It doesn't appear damaged. It's likely if it was damaged it wouldn't open."

"Open?"

"I think it must open. Daniel must have opened it somehow, and was checking out the technology inside, when it… you know."

"You think he got inside the thing?"

"Considering its dimensions… I mean it's kind of small, sure, but maybe the Furlings are closer in size to the Asgard than to us… I don't know. But what if, somehow, when Daniel activated it or whatever, he got it coded somehow? To himself. Maybe that's why nobody's been able to do anything with it. Maybe it's only… unlocked, I guess… for him?"

"But he touched it a minute ago and nothing happened," Jack reminded her.

"Maybe he has to touch the right words or symbols… or maybe the symbols tell him exactly what to do… oh God. Jack, stop spinning him," Sam said suddenly as she saw the look on Danny's face. "NOW!"

Jack stopped the chair abruptly and bent down in front of him. "Okay… he's gonna blow." He picked him up by the armpits, holding him face out, and said, "Sorry, little guy…"

"Tummy," Danny managed. Sam grabbed the nearest receptacle and held it in front of him just in time, as he threw up what she would have guessed was a lot more than his little body was capable of holding at one time.

He sniffled as soon as he finished and wiped his face with his arm, smearing both with the vomit. Then he started to cry. "Poor little guy, it's okay." Jack turned him to face him instinctively, forgetting about the vomit, and rubbed his back in a soothing circle as Sam managed to fight down her own nausea the sight and smell caused.

She set the puke-filled container down on the table and managed, "Gross."

"Where's the diaper bag?" Jack asked. "We need baby wipes over here, stat."

Sam groaned. "I left it in the VIP room, I didn't have enough hands to bring it. He's got to have some tissues around here…" She quickly found Daniel's tissue supply and started wiping off the little boy's face and arms as best she could, trying to breathe shallowly through her nose as she did.

Jack held him and tried to comfort him, resisting the natural urge to bounce in the process, just in case. "I guess that was a little too much spinning," he finally commented.

"Ya think?" Sam quipped.

She threw away the tissues in her hand and pulled out a fresh bunch, wiping Danny's hand, trying to get between all his little fingers. There was vomit on Jack's shirt as well, from Danny's face, hands, and shirt. She dabbed at that as well and couldn't help but laugh.

"This isn't funny, Carter. Just get it off."

"I'm sorry, sir, it's just… after he threw up on me, I told him next time he should try to get you instead."

"Ha ha. At least I don't need to be hosed off."

"I'm not so sure about that, these tissues aren't helping much," she said, scrubbing at the spot on his chest a little harder.

"Well, we've found them," a voice called from the door - General Hammond.

"Indeed."

Sam and Jack glanced at each other before turning to the open doorway, where once again, the three bald men were standing.

"Now the question is… what the hell is that smell?" Hammond asked.

"And what the hell are you doing?" Jacob added.

Jack and Sam both looked down to her hand and she pulled it off of him quickly, throwing away the tissue. "It's puke," Jack offered. "To answer both your questions."

"I frowed up," Danny said, resting his cheek on Jack's shoulder and looking rather pitiful.

Sam scratched his little back lightly and said, "He was spinning in the chair… a little too fast. Sir, I've actually got several new things to report about the trunk but I think we should get Danny cleaned up first."

"Agreed, Major."

"I'll take him," Jack offered. "I've got to get cleaned up too. Go tell them your idea, we'll be in the VIP room."

Sam nodded.

"Good. And I'll send someone down here to clean up this room," Hammond said, making a sickened face as he tried hard not to breathe in the smell too much. "Oh, and Major Carter?"

"Yes, sir?"

"I'd like to be there to see the look on his face when you tell Dr. Jackson what happened to his Egyptian urn."

Sam's eyes widened as she looked down at the thing she'd grabbed to catch the vomit - it was one of Daniel's favorite artifacts. Then again, whenever anything happened to one of them he usually claimed it was his "favorite"… although she did specifically remember him throwing what could only be called a tantrum when Jack had decided it made a much better basketball hoop than relic once. And he hadn't even had the excuse of going through the Terrible Twos at the time, so she was guessing using it as a vomit-catcher was a no-no too.

"Crap. He's going to kill me."

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