"Daniel Jackson, did SG3 inform you of a red flag?"
Daniel furrowed his brow and looked up at Teal'c from his position in the dirt beside a busy Sam.
"Huh?"
Teal'c glanced at Jack.
"There's a little red flag in the dirt about oh...one mile that way." Jack waved his hand in the direction of the misty river. Sam stood up and brushed herself down.
"That'd be where SG3 found your artifact Daniel. Why don't you go take a look? I've collected enough soil to start up a few basic experiments."
Daniel sprung to his feet, "Jack?"
Jack knew exactly what that meant, "Ah, no. Teal'c's so fascinated with that little red flag that I'm sure he'd love to take you back over there."
Daniel couldn't care less who accompanied him, as long as he got to go. With a smile thrown in Teal'c's direction he grabbed his pack and scampered off, leaving Teal'c to follow steadily behind him.
Jack glanced over his shoulder at Sam, who was setting up what he would call a 'lab'.
"Are you sure you need all of that stuff?" Jack walked over and picked up a test tube filled with soil and held it up to let the light shine through.
"I'm not sure if I'll need all of it Sir, but there's no harm in setting it all up anyway. We've got three days here." Sam watched Jack tap the side of the test tube he was holding.
"Hey, did you realise that this...dirt is sparkly?" Jack tapped the tube again. Sam smiled in amusement.
"It's the sparkly stuff that we're after Sir. I have to separate it from the dirt."
"You mean the dirt dirt?"
"Sir?"
Jack handed the test tube back to his 2IC, "Well sparkly or not Carter, it's all dirt to me."
Sam shook her head and placed the glass object back into it's holder.
"Well Major, I'll leave you to it. I have some M & M's in my bag that just can't wait to get out." With that, he walked off calmly to find a tree to lean against.
A few slow, comfortable hours later, Jack was disturbed by a loud crashing in the forest behind him. Leaping to his feet, he drew his weapon and aimed it into the trees. From behind him, Sam was doing the same thing. Crash after crash, thump after thump then finally they could make something out, but not before they heard it.
"Guys guys guys!!"
Jack lowered his weapon, oh-so-slightly annoyed as Daniel blundered his way towards him waving something about his head. Teal'c wasn't far behind; the expression on his face was slightly puzzled.
"Daniel, what the hell do you think you're doing? Are you trying to give me a heart attack?!"
Daniel ignored Jack and stuffed an object under the angry Colonel's nose.
"Look!"
Jack snatched the thing from his friend, "My nose does not function in that manner Daniel. Whatever you've found, it had better be worth waking me up for."
Sam walked over and peered at the brown blob in Jack's hands.
"What is it?" Jack handed it to Sam, who hadn't the foggiest.
"It's the other half to the artifact that SG3 brought back! I found it about 20 feet from Teal'c's little red flag! I thought there must have been some form of inscription on it, and here it is! It must have snapped off."
"You don't say." Jack bent down to pick up the plastic mess he'd left earlier.
"No no no, you see, now I can translate it and find out if there's any living culture here! Sam can I have that now?" Daniel took the broken artifact from Sam and skipped over to his bag to fetch the other half. Jack shook his head and looked at Teal'c.
"Well, we might as well set up the tents Jaffa buddy. It looks like Danny and Carter have scientific things to go on with."
For the rest of the day, Daniel remained absent. He was sitting cross legged under a tree with his back bent over his work. Sam was doing the same, only now and then she grew bored and stopped to talk to Jack and Teal'c who were setting up camp.
"Sir, have you noticed that it's almost 1800 hours and the light hasn't faded?"
Jack put down the saucepan he was wielding and looked up at the sky.
"Yeah I did notice that. You think it'll get dark at all?"
"I don't know. SG3 weren't here long enough to work that out. It's possible that this planet's time runs differently. For starters it's much bigger than Earth, and we're not sure what stage of the day it was up to here when we stepped through the gate at 0800 hours. We'll have to give it more time I guess."
Jack shrugged, "Well personally I won't mind if it doesn't get dark, it's kinda nice right now."
Sam smiled, "I agree. But I'm not a good sleeper during the day."
"Oh we're not going to get any sleep if Daniel translates that rock you know! For my sake I hope he figures it out back home." Jack scratched his head and watched Daniel as he attempted to hold all his paper down with the toe of one foot while he chewed the end of his pencil and flicked through the pages of his well-used journal.