Glad you're all enjoying this - here's a little more fun, until it becomes something far more sinister...

Thank you all for your wonderful comments - love to know what you think of this story.

Have A Nice Day, Jack!

by Lingren.

Previously:-

"After picking myself up out of the mud, having been flattened by said, 'heavy' archaeologist..."

Chapter 3 – Jack 0 – Daniel 4?

The phone rang for some time before the receiver was eventually picked up.

"Colonel Saunders."

"Mac. here Sir. I have some news. They have played straight into our hands sir. The result of today's mission couldn't have turned out any better."

"You're sure this idea will work?"

"Perfectly Sir. I shall be able to kill two birds with one stone, as the saying goes. I can get rid of O'Neill which is good, and do it by using the good Dr. Jackson. That will put him away for a very long time too, and that would mean both of them will be out of the way. They're not exactly on friendly terms just at the moment."

"Good...that's good news. The more the merrier. Go to it Mac."

"Yes Sir!"

OoOoOoOoO

"...The planet appeared to be deserted Sir. Just trees and mud; lots of trees and lots of mud. Did I mention there was lots of mud? Lot of sharp stones there too. There weren't any buildings that remained in tact. None that we could see of, in fact there was nothing there which I considered remotely useful General. Not that we had that much chance to see a great deal of the planet. Carter did her soil samples. Daniel was just a tiny bit peeved because he wanted to scrabble around in the dirt to look at some rocks. I said we could come back later if we had time. To which he groused a little, saying something about never having time, and that he was going to stay right there while we went and scouted around the area, including the nearby forest. So, I went over to him to try and 'persuade' him to come with us, when he grabbed a fist sized rock and shoved it into my face to show me that there was something written on it. Um...that's when I got the first black eye. Hurt like crazy too."

"Are you telling me that Dr. Jackson did that to you on purpose Colonel?" Hammond gasped unable to imagine the mild mannered young man doing harm to anyone, let alone Jack.

"No Sir. To be Honest I guess he thought I was actually further away than I was, but as I wasn't, and well, the rock smacked right into my eye."

Carter snickered but when Jack glared icily at her, she managed to turn it into a cough. His dark-er eyes narrowed as best they could under the circumstances.

"You never mentioned that you had a cold Carter." Jack asked suspiciously.

"Oh...I haven't Sir, it's nothing, just a tickle Colonel." She helped herself to a glass of water to try to prove her point.

Jack ignored her blatant stretching of the truth and carried on with his report.

"After refusing to allow Daniel time to study the rocks, and Carter checking over my black eye, we finally moved on into the wooded area of the planet. It was pretty dense in there too, lots of undergrowth, lots of trees. I made Carter take point, then Daniel whom I followed, and I had Teal'c cover our sixes. It was stupid really, but I thought by placing Daniel in front of myself, I would have been safe from any further mishaps. It was just not gonna happen, Sir. Daniel just wasn't concentrating on the job at hand, and he let go of a particularly 'springy branch' just as I was about to take it from him." Jack paused, taking a sip of water from the glass in front of him as he recalled the pain so clearly. "Needless to say General, unfortunately the branch managed to find my nose quicker than I could react. The result was injury number three... Oh, he was apologetic enough, but I was getting a little tired by now of playing his stooge."

"I really was sorry about that Jack." Daniel had spoken from the doorway, not wanting to enter, but too curious to hear what was being said he couldn't stay away from the briefing.

As he spoke the room fell silent as everyone swivelled round to look at him.

"Dr. Jackson just what in God's name were you thinking of out there today. You have single-handedly managed to disable my best team. There's no-way I can send the Colonel out on any mission like this."

"General, I really didn't mean for any of this to happen. I guess I wasn't really at my best today. There's no-way I can say sorry any better than that. I'm sorry Jack, really." Daniel paused, wrapping his arms around himself in his classic 'I'm hurting' pose. "You know, maybe I should just quit this whole thing now before I do any real damage." He turned round, dashed out of the door and hurried quickly down the corridor, still hugging his chest with his arms.

"Oh fer crying out loud! General, let me go after him, and try to talk some sense into him before he goes and does anything...silly."

"Go ahead Colonel. Major Carter can fill me in on the rest of the report."

OoOoOoOoO

Jack believed he knew where Daniel would be hiding away from everyone, so he made his way quickly there. The Lab appeared to be empty at first glance, but he thought he heard a small noise, so he took a closer look, peering into the dark corners. That's when he found Daniel. He was sitting on the floor in one of the corners of the room with his arms hugging his knees tightly and his head almost buried in his arms. He was rocking backwards and forwards.

Jack's frustration with his young friend evaporated, as he watched his friend suffering, and with great difficulty, he squatted down in front of him placing a hand on Daniel's arm.

"Danny, come on, it's not that bad. So, you've just had an off day. We all have them...sometimes. I know I sounded off at you, but hey, you know me. Bad case of foot in mouth..." he grimaced when his knee protested strongly at the position he was in. "Ah! Look, can we get off the floor now, my knee's killing me. So, we going to get us some coffee or what? Huh?" Jack stood up and rubbed his sore knee, he then stretched out his hand to take his friend's.

Daniel hesitated for a moment, looking up at Jack, then reached out and grabbed the offered hand to haul himself to his feet. It made him feel a little better that Jack was still considering him a friend, but it hadn't eased away his guilt.

"Just don't turn this crazy day into a habit will ya!" Jack smirked, slapping his team-mate on the back.

Daniel couldn't bring himself to look Jack in the face yet, it reminded him too much of what he'd done to the older man.

Once again the klaxons sounded and Jack and Daniel forgot the idea of coffee and hurried as fast as Jack could run down the hallways to get to the control room. They ran up to the briefing room window first and looked down over the gate-room. The iris was open ready to receive its travellers, then SG-7 stepped through. The team had come home safely, and in one piece.

Jack quickly made his way over to the metal stairway ready to descend to the control room where he knew the General and the other members of his team would be.

Daniel followed close on his heels, but somehow, he caught his foot on something and went crashing into the back of Jack who promptly fell headlong down the stairs, ending up in a crumpled, moaning heap at the bottom. Daniel just stood transfixed at the top of the stairs watching, horrified at what had just occurred.

Jack was now sat awkwardly on the floor glaring up at him utterly exasperated with his friend. He was now clutching his elbow to ease the pain he felt there after pounding it on the way down, and blood trickled from several scrapes to his hands and forehead.

General Hammond, Sam, Teal'c and the crew of the control room turned at the cacophony of alternate yelps of pain, cursing and bumping as the Colonel made his ungainly way down to the bottom of the steps. Sam and Teal'c rushed over to help him, while the General gaped in disbelief at the unbelievable scene in front of his eyes.

Surely, Dr. Jackson couldn't have done anything else to Jack?

Sam looked up at Daniel with sadness on her face, she couldn't understand it at all. The first few times something like this had happened to the Colonel could be considered funny, but this, this was far beyond belief, and definitely not amusing.

Jack just sat there for a few moments absolutely bewildered by his sheer misfortune, he couldn't believe his luck was this bad on any given day. Did someone forget to tell him it was Friday the thirteenth? Did he walk under a ladder or something? This was going too far.

Guiltily, Daniel clenched his fists and banged them in frustration on the handrail, and when the rest of his team looked up at him accusingly he turned away and escaped before they started voicing their disappointed opinions of him.

Jack was duly helped back up to his feet by Sam and Teal'c. He stretched his long legs gingerly and flexed his upper body to assess any damage. Nothing wrong there, at least nothing except a few new bruises, and just his right elbow which by the feel of it was probably busted. There was a sore spot on his back too, probably from where he had caught the edge of the bottom step when he'd finally landed.

Another thing Jack was really having trouble with, was controlling his temper. If Daniel did anything else to him today, he was going to lose it and snap.

Once again in the space of an hour or so, he found himself in the infirmary being checked over by Dr. Fraiser. This time he'd managed to avoid any breakages, getting away with severe bruising to his elbow and several grazes and scrapes from his contact with the unyielding hard metal of the stairs.

Janet patched him up once more and sent him away to rest after he refused to stay there any longer. He'd seen enough of her infirmary today to last him a life time, thank you.

OoOoOoOoO

"Colonel Saunders here! That you Mac?"

"Yes Sir! Just filling you in on the latest Colonel. The tactics are working well and going according to plan Sir."

"Good! Let me know how it ends."

"Roger that Sir!"

TBC