Huge apologies for the slow update - just been busy, busy, busy here at Naquadah Mansions. Very sorry.
Chapter 3
Later on, during the afternoon, Vala took a chance and slipped away out of the cave again. She was smothered in sun protection cream, Daniel's bandana wrapped loosely around her mouth and nose. She carefully and quietly climbed the cliff and peered over the top. There were still about a dozen or so guards around the Stargate, all armed. Vala looked closer – noticing now that all of the men standing out in the open wore long, loose scarves, similar to her own. It appeared that they had some sort of breathing apparatus on beneath their bandanas - she couldn't see clearly, and wished that she'd brought Daniels' binoculars with her.
Not that it matters much, Vala thought, beginning to wheeze from the effects of the strange, heated climate. Gazing up at the sky, she wondered about the bizarre weather on this strange planet. They hadn't suffered any problems with the atmosphere on SG-1's previous visits, but now that she thought about it, it had been cloudy on both occasions. It had even rained on their second visit.
It must be something to do with direct sunlight, Vala mused, wriggling back down the cliff and taking care not to scuff her knees again. By the time that she hit the gulley bottom she could barely draw breath. She reluctantly took several swigs from the bottle of sandy water, which made her cough. After a minute or so of resting in the shadows she managed to recover enough to be able to slip quietly along in the shade of the cliff and head back to the little cave.
"Vala!" Daniel spoke with real concern in his voice as Vala crawled back into the cave, trying to drag some slightly cleaner air into her lungs, skin pale and clammy.
Without thinking Daniel upended his own bottle of water, creating a healthy sized puddle in his palm, before dribbling the water over her dusty face. He held the flask up to her lips – after a few moments she took a few sips, coughing hard afterwards.
"Oh darling, this is the most vile of all horrid planets!" Vala flopped against him, forehead and arms red and sore from the heavy, leaden sunshine. "I hate it here, and when we get home, well, I shall have to tell Cameron in no uncertain terms, that I'm never coming back here again! He can fire me if he wants!"
"Well - you won't hear any complaints from me." Daniel shook his bottle, which now was only about a quarter full. "He'll have to fire both of us." He stroked her damp hair away from her face. "No going outside again in daylight, okay?"
Vala nodded. "You don't have to tell me twice, darling. Well, sometimes you do have to tell me things twice, but you won't ever have to say that again. I mean, you had to tell me twice not to touch those things in Glastonbury, I recall. And Samantha definitely once said, don't go into.."
"Okay, and that's where we need to finish this conversation." Daniel softened his remark by a swift stroke of his thumb along her jaw line. "Off." He tilted his shoulder to make her sit forward. "Are there any painkillers left anywhere?"
Vala pulled out the last sheet of tablets. There were eight left. She popped two free of their foil wrap and handed them to him.
Hesitantly, Daniel took a swig of their precious and ever decreasing water supply. "Do you think that it'll rain again tonight?" he asked.
Vala shrugged, then grimaced herself. Shrugging with sore shoulders was painful.
"Want a couple of these?" Daniel held out the painkillers.
Vala shook her head. "You need them more than me, darling. How is the leg, by the way?"
"Better, I think," he replied, pulling the makeshift poultice away from his ankle. It did indeed look slightly less swollen and red.
"Well then," rubbing her hands, Vala grinned winsomely at Daniel. "How would you like to take me to dinner, darling? I'd like an energy bar and some sandy water please!"
Daniel chuckled - he couldn't help himself – and pulled his friend in for a hug. Even stuck in the middle of a godawful planet like this one, she still tried to keep cheerful.
Vala took the unforeseen opportunity to wrap her own arms around his shoulders and wriggle up close. That teasing, playful look was in her eyes and she raised her eyebrows hopefully.
"Stop it," Daniel told her.
The ex-space pirate pouted before huffing noisily and pushing away from him.
Daniel frowned - for a moment he thought that he'd seen a genuine flicker of disappointment in her eyes. "Hey," he caught her arm. "I'm still up for that date, though."
"A date? A real date? Even in a cave?" Vala grabbed one of their remaining precious energy bars and broke it in half. "Can we tell the others that it was a real date?"
"Okay." Daniel sighed briefly, giving up. "Okay, you can tell them that it's a date!"
- o - o - o - o - o -
Night had drawn in quickly again, except this time there were no flashes of lightening to illuminate their little hideout.
Vala had used one of their precious torches to sort through the backpacks and find out how many supplies they actually had left. There were four MRE's, three energy bars, one bar of chocolate and two rolls of mints. Daniel had just under a quarter of a bottle full of water. Vala had the same ammount in her's, but a large part of that was sand. She gave a tiny sigh. Her head was aching and her arms sore from the sun earlier. Surely Mitchell and the others would come and rescue them tomorrow? She'd tried not to drink too much during the day, encouraging Daniel to have more than his share, as she felt that he needed it more. After all, the SGC didn't really need a space pirate, should the worse happen, but they did require their archaeologist.
Vala repacked all of their provisions and came back to sit next to Daniel. Neither of them spoke, she just laid her head on his shoulder, as he put his arm around her. The air was practically pulsing with an almost visible miasma of unrelenting heat, the atmosphere was becoming more and more uncomfortable in their little cave.
"Let's lie down," Daniel tugged his backpack back over towards himself and lay back against it, grimacing slightly as he moved his injured ankle.
Vala over hauled her own kit and did the same, propping it up next to his. She lay back against it, smiled gently and closed her eyes.
Daniel flicked off the little torch. After a few minutes he heard Vala turn onto her side – moments later she tentatively lay her arm on top of his own. He moved his hand to catch her's, briefly squeezing it before holding it gently against his chest.
"They'll come tomorrow," Vala whispered, into the velvet blackness around them. "Mitchell won't let us down, darling. They'll come tomorrow."
"Yeah." Daniel pinched the bridge of his nose. He certainly hoped so.
- o - o - o - o - o -
Daniel awoke suddenly in the middle of the night, unsure of why. Vala was gone from beside him, reaching out to where she had been lying he could feel no trace of her. Panicking suddenly he sat forward, about to call for her.
"Sssh." Her voice came very, very quietly from over near the cave entrance. Almost straightaway he heard another noise – the unmistakable sound of someone slipping on the stony, sandy ground outside.
He and Vala had no weapons – the Alliance had relieved SG-1 of their firearms before they'd marched them away from the village. Daniel felt around in the darkness for anything that could be used as a weapon – all he came up with was his shoe. As his eyes adjusted to the night he thought that he could see Vala's shape against the night sky outside. Only a few seconds later, and he was sure of it. Mainly because someone unknown was coming closer and closer, and undoubtedly carrying a light.
Vala pulled back suddenly, as far as she could against the wall, just as a man appeared at the entrance to the cave, holding a Zat out in front of himself. He wore some kind of light source clipped to his shoulder. As he leaned in Vala whipped out a large rock from down by her side and smashed it down on his head. He grunted and staggered – she went for his Zat, wrenching it from his grip and hitting him with a blast to the side of his chest. However as she went to stand she received the same treatment from another man who had obviously been following the first.
Vala fell, tumbling over the first guy who lay in front of her. The Zat dropped almost at Daniel's feet – without thinking he picked it up and fired it at their other adversary, who was still watching Vala. The man crumpled into a heap.
Waiting, hardly daring to breathe, the archaeologist listened for any more of the enemy coming, but the two men must have been alone. He looked sadly at them as they lay incapacitated on the floor of the cave. Gently grasping Vala's upper arms, he manhandled her across the cave towards himself, so that no part of her was touching either of the two Alliance members. Then, regretfully, he fired the Zat a second time at them both, while they were still unconscious. Then he fired again. The men disappeared, as if they had never been there in the first place.
Killing is never easy, Daniel mused, even if it's your enemy. He felt Vala move against him – groaning, she attempted to sit up.
"My head is killing me," she leaned forward, covering her face with her hands. "Did you Zat me?"
"No I did not!" replied her team mate, indignantly.
"Well, you can't deny darling, you have done it before." Vala groaned again and leaned into his side, heavily, hands still over her eyes. "Where did they go, by the way?"
"I had to Zat them." Daniel's voice was sober.
She understood. "Three times?".
He nodded.
Vala laid one of her hands over his. "We've all had to make that decision sometime, darling."
Head pulsating and muscles aching, she crawled back over to the cave entrance. "I'll go on first watch. But I really need just a little bit of water to drink." Taking one of their flasks, she took the tiniest swig that she could get away with and handed it back.
Daniel took a longer draught. He was wondering how many times, before the alien had come to the SGC, she had needed to make the decision to Zat someone three times.
"I should go on first watch," he told her.
Vala shook her head. "No, Daniel. The SGC needs it's archaeologist more than it needs a retired space pirate. You go to sleep. I'll wake you if I hear anything."
Reluctantly, he laid back on the rucksack again. "If you don't wake me in two hours, I swear, I'll report you to Landry. For disobeying orders!"
Chuckling, Vala took another tiny swig of water. "Darling, I don't know if you'd noticed, but hardly anyone obeys your orders anyway."
"Especially you!"
"Especially me," she continued, with some satisfaction. "That's because most of your orders are ridiculous. 'Don't touch that, don't say that, don't go over there, stop talking, stop fiddling, stop eating – need I go on?"
"You make me sound like I'm some kind of nagging old school master." Daniel mused.
"You are darling," Vala replied, crossing her legs and making herself comfortable. "But I still love you."
She threw the comment out at him flippantly, but for the first time Daniel realised that her careless bandying around of endearments and sexual remarks actually hid something far deeper. Before he could change his mind, and probably only because it was so dark that she couldn't see him blush, he pulled himself awkwardly across the cave.
"What are you…?" Vala began, but was stopped by the feel of lips, brushing so very gently over her own. Her heart leaped and her breathing juddered – she opened her mouth slightly and Daniel deepened the kiss, tenderly.
He put his hand up to cup her face and softly stroked his thumb across her cheek, wiping away a single tear that had slipped hesitantly down her cheek.
Vala was lost. She brought her own hands up to Daniel's face, teasing his tongue very carefully with her own. Oh my – holy Hannah, holy crap, for cryin' out loud! She was melting, dissolving into a massive puddle of hormones and heat – then before she could speak he'd pulled away.
Daniel was panting – how had that just happened? He tried to steady his breath. Something strange had happened there, between them – some opening up of hearts, joining of souls. He knew now, without a doubt, that all of Vala's suggestive innuendo's towards him hid much deeper, truer feelings. The archaeologist was beginning to think that he might like to find out more.
Vala was grinning dazedly in the darkness.
"I'm on first watch," she managed to stammer out, again.
"Okay." Daniel moved back, and lay down, but it took him a long time to fall asleep, and he watched her shadowy figure for the entire time, until he could fight it no longer and his eyelids slid closed.
TBC...
