AN: I'm warning you again this fic isn't for the kiddies. The plot bunnies that made me write this ate the fluffy ones… all of them.

Let me know what you think.

Disclaimer: I don't own them; I'm just lumping on the emotional baggage for my own personal amusement.

***

Vala paced round her room like a caged animal, the anger at her self and the anger at Daniel feeding off each other. Every time she thought of the look of disgust on Daniels face her anger went up another notch, in response to that her anger at herself went up because she shouldn't let him under her skin like this. Each step she took produced a new word to describe Daniel in a new language.

She had gotten up to pompous ass in Raxacoricofallapatorian when there was a knock at the door.

"WHAT?" she yelled at the door.

Daniel appeared in the door way, using his own key card to open it, his face still sporting her hand print.

"What the hell happened back there?" Daniel was both bewildered and angry. He had no idea what had ticked Vala off so much. Since Vala had regained her Time Lord memories things had been going good between them, Daniel thought they had gotten past most of the issues that had coloured their relationship.

"Excuse me?" the indignation on her face was priceless "What happened was you and you're attitude towards everyone in the galaxy that doesn't comply with your little human morality code." She huffed out a breath "If the great Dr Daniel Jackson doesn't approve then it must be wrong."

"You can't honestly be sticking up for those people? Vala, they where thieves, mercenaries and…" He couldn't even bring himself to say the word that was on the tip of his tongue.

"Whores?" she supplied for him.

The look on his face told her exactly how he felt about that profession.

She scoffed "Did you never stop and think why Daniel? Why these people do what they do? That maybe there's nothing else they can do?"

"There's plenty of people out there who get by just fine with out resorting to those depths" Daniel couldn't believe she was defending this way of life; he knew how much it had taken from her.

"And there are those who don't; those who have had everything else taken from them but refuse to give in. Get real Daniel! Where do you think the Lucian Alliance gets the land they grow Kassa on? What do you think happens to the people on the planets you 'liberated' from the Goa'uld? Do you really think that the Alliance got those lands on fair deals? That the people you set 'free' all go on and live happy lives? That's not how the real world works." She stared hard into his eyes, a fire ignited in them that Daniel couldn't remember seeing before.

"You can't excuse what those people are Vala! It doesn't matter why they do it. They simply take things from others, there no better than the Alliance or the Goa'uld! Thieves stealing ships, mercenaries taking lives, women selling themselves and for what? The Money? The reputation? The fun?" He spat the words at her, his own anger rising.

"To survive Daniel, to be free." Her voice had lost some of the anger, she now simply sounded tired like she was trying to explain something to a particularly slow child. "They may be stealing, or killing or even selling themselves but there doing what they want. The Alliance came and took there lands, they said "Work for us." And they simply said no. You would be surprised how many of them have family some where, someone to send money back to. The Alliance and the Goa'uld and the Ori, they can take everything from them but they can't take that one last freedom." By the end of her speech something else had seeped into her voice that Daniel couldn't recognize.

"And what about the women, is this their choice too?" He was still too angry to listen to Vala's words properly, to see the emotion behind them, to hear what she was admitting.

"Some times there is no choice Daniel, when all you have is the clothes on your back… when it's a choice between starvation and that it's an easier decision than you would think."

The tone of her voice finally registered with Daniel. When she had been angry with him it was easy to think she was simply defending the people they had seen today but now that the anger was gone he could tell she was admitting something to him through this argument. Something she would never be able to come straight out and say.

"You made that choice?" he asked, hoping he had misunderstood.

"Yes…" her voice only just above a whisper.

The look of pity that crossed Daniels face was enough to spark her earlier anger up to new heights.

"Don't look at me like that Daniel, one of the first things I ever told General Landry was that I did what I had to do to survive. I don't want your pity, I wont let you make me feel ashamed for surviving."

"You… you… I can't believe you would let someone use your body like that! Even you! With your flirty, sexy, use-my-body-to-get-anything-I-want attitude…"

She interrupted him "You think I liked it Daniel? You think after all those years of knowing what Qetesh did with my body I wanted to do it of my own free will?"

She crossed the gap between them in three steps, stopping right in front of him. He could feel her hot breath on his face, see her silver eyes dilated in anger and the way she trembled all over ever so slightly.

"I. Did. What. I. Had. To. Do." She hissed the words at him between clenched teeth. "Traded for money what some had stolen for free and I hated it but not once… not once did I ever feel ashamed of it"

He recognised the tone in her voice now that he hadn't been able to before. It was pride. In some twisted way Vala was proud, not of what she had done, but that she had done it.

"I had nothing Daniel, no home, no family, and no safe place to go back to when everything got too much. Believe me when you haven't eaten in 4 days and you can't sleep because you've no place to go and it isn't safe to sleep where you are… well I bet you would be willing to rethink your opinion."

Vala turned from him then, she was afraid of what she would see if she looked into his eyes. It was the first time she had noticed that Daniel had left the door open during their argument, and that the rest of SG1 where standing in the hall outside.

Suddenly the confines of the base seemed too much. She had to get out of there, so she ran. Not even stopping to wait in a lift she climbed up one of the emergency shafts, ignoring the calls of her team coming from down below her.

Her team except from Daniel.