Chapter 11

Four United

Standing in an otherwise empty hallway, it occurred to Sam that she hadn't thought this through very well. The constant high pitched beeping that informed them they were in the right place was not helping their intention of sneaking around until they found Jack and Daniel. They had gotten frowns and disapproving glances ever since they walked through the doors and at least three people stopped them to ask if they needed help and to suggest that such toys do not belong in a place where people are sick. Sam obligingly turned her gun off every time only to turn it back on again the moment the well-meaning nurse or doctor was out of ear shot.

Teal'c wasn't helping things either, looming as he was and giving off the impression that an attempt to approach him would make that person glad they were already in a hospital with readily available treatment. Mark, if anything, was worse as he demanded, loud enough to make even Teal'c cringe, why they couldn't just ask what room Daniel was in and why would an alien detecting gun detect humans. He still wasn't quite convinced that anything they told him was real. Finally, though, after a few false turns on the wrong level, Sam was fairly certain they had arrived at the right door. Receiving yet another glare from a passing nurse, Sam finally turned her gun off again as they stood before the door. If this wasn't the right room, she decided they would just have to ask for directions. It wasn't as if they could be any more conspicuous than they already were anyway.

She looked up at Teal'c who nodded his head, his calm demeanor never betraying his own nerves. Then Mark grew impatient and, rolling his eyes, threw the door open and walked through. Teal'c and Sam followed.

Mark didn't go far into the room, perhaps startled by the fact that there really was a little boy in the hospital bed and some teenager sitting near him. Sam rushed past him to the bed crying "Daniel!" partly in the shock of really seeing him as a little boy, and partly in horror of his condition. Her first thought was that he was so small. Lying in bed with an awful, yellowish bruise on his face, plaster on his legs, and some sort of splint on his arm, he didn't look like he could possibly be older than five, let alone be almost nine. Shock was quickly replaced by a surge of anger, anger that Daniel was hurt, anger that a little kid was hurt, that anyone could look at the child that Daniel had been and purposefully cause him pain…

"Daniel Jackson, Colonel O'Neill," Teal'c said, and Sam finally looked up from assessing Daniel's condition so that she could really see her friends. Jack was another shock, seeing him so young. From the way he and Daniel were staring at her, she suspected they were just as shocked to see her at ten.

"Sam?" Daniel finally asked, his voice sounding so young and timid that Sam wanted to grab him in her arms right then.

"Black hair?" Jack asked, raising an eyebrow in a way that was distinctly Jack, no matter his age, and Sam remembered belatedly her attempt at a disguise. She scowled slightly, having no doubt of what was going through Jack's mind.

"It's usually blond, I dyed it," she said and then, when he continued to smirk at her, she said, "I dyed it black. From blond. Mark dyed his hair too." At the mention of his name, her brother suddenly became unfrozen.

"You're real!" he blurted out, blinking rapidly.

"Shouldn't we be?" Jack asked, glancing questioningly over his head towards Sam and Teal'c. While Sam launched into an elaborate explanation as to why Mark was there, why their hair was black, and, most importantly, how cool her alien detector gun was, Daniel looked back and forth between the new arrivals, finally latching onto Teal'c. It was comforting to find a single person who remained unchanged, despite recent events. Teal'c was just as large and solid and familiar as he remembered. Luckily, without his glasses he wasn't able to make out Teal'c's expression. Most people call it disapproving. Daniel, who knew all of Teal'c expressions quite well, would have called it alternating between murderous rage and the sort of soft tenderness most often reserved for his son.

Jack, who didn't need glasses, sent Teal'c a look of understanding which didn't match his youthful features. Daniel the adult had already pushed every paternal instinct they had, despite knowing that he was normally quite capable of looking after himself. Daniel the child would probably never survive their combined mothering and protective instincts.

"Teal'c," Daniel said in greeting with just a hint of a smile. Any hint of murderous rage was immediately replaced with a warmth that belied his tough Jaffa reputation.

"Daniel Jackson," Teal'c said, "It is good to see you."

"Hey, what about me, isn't anyone glad to see me?" Jack demanded. Unfortunately, this statement was made in the middle of one of Sam's long run-on sentences and she finally latched onto the fact that Jack wasn't listening.

"And that's why Apophis was wearing the pink tutu," she finished sharply in the short silence that followed, and was rewarded by four heads swiveling towards her. Mark looked completely baffled, Jack not much less so, and Daniel got that look he sometimes had when trying to work out a particularly puzzling translation. Teal'c merely raised an eyebrow.

"I suppose that makes sense," Daniel said at last, "But where did he get the glitter?" Then both kids were giggling and it was definitely Sam and Daniel, no matter what their ages now were. Jack and Teal'c looked at each other, an understanding passing between them. Later, when they were alone, Jack would fill in the gaps concerning the bastards who hurt Daniel; later they could rant and, firmly out of earshot, they could go all fatherly about how cute Daniel and Sam looked as kids and Jack could lambaste anyone who dared to suggest that he, at eighteen, was cute. For now, they would pretend that everything was normal, that Sam hadn't just squealed because her brother pinched her, that Daniel wasn't lying in a hospital bed covered in plaster. For now, they would be SG-1, on another mission where three of them just happened to be momentarily youthened. The mood considerably lightened, they finally began to talk.