Part Four: Demons.

"Stargate trips are never fun, they're just varying degrees of scrambling," Daniel muttered to no-one in particular, supporting Matt down the ramp. The leg wound from a glancing staff blast a few days ago hadn't fully healed, leaving him pretty unsteady. And gate trips were dizzying at the best of times. He felt Matt pull away slightly in embarrassment, and he walked down the ramp unaided. Daniel sighed internally and followed. It bothered him slightly that Matt was still isolating himself from the others, as if he didn't quite trust them.

"Are you okay?" he asked, catching up with Matt on the way to the debrief.

Matt didn't meet his eye. "I'm fine."

After Janet had finished the usual once-over – "Apparently, I'm still too skinny," was Matt's only reaction – they headed for Sam's lab, looking for some of the artefacts that might now be translatable. She glanced up at them and smiled briefly as they walked in.

"Looking for something, or is this just a social visit?"

"Have you seen those tablets we sent back?" Daniel asked.

"Those ones you couldn't really decipher? They might still be here… I'll have a look. They might already be in the archives," Sam added, her voice tailing off as she rummaged through the various plastic crates on the floor. "Nope. Nada. Sorry. They must have already gone."

Daniel shrugged. "Oh well. They'll keep. Thanks anyway."

"Do you guys even know what half this stuff is?" Matt asked. He was wandering around the lab, looking at some of the alien technology Sam was working on. Sam just laughed.

"Are you kidding me? Half the time we don't have a clue. I mean, that" – she pointed at the metal cube with a black gemstone on top that Matt was currently examining – "could be a communicator, some kind of signalling device. It might be a way of talking to the Go'auld."

"What – speak into the stone, and heed its wisdom?" he replied wryly, running his fingertips over the side and up to the gemstone on top.

"Not exactly…"

There was a fierce flash of white light. When Matt opened his eyes again, blinking, he realised he'd been thrown across the room. He cautiously sat up from his slump, rubbing the side of his arm that had hit the wall, as Sam and Daniel stared down at him.

"Ow."

"Matthew?" Daniel said nervously.

"What?" he asked, gingerly testing his weight on his feet. Not too wobbly – that's a good sign, nothing serious.

"Oh my God," Sam murmured. "Matt, you might want to look in a mirror."

Matt stood up, slightly shaken, both from the impact and the way Sam and Daniel were acting. Suddenly his clothes seemed way too big. He caught sight of his reflection in a monitor and looked properly.

"Oh, no."

Instead of the usual lanky twenty-six year old looking back, he was staring into the frightened eyes of a sixteen year old boy.

He let them lead him down to the Infirmary, oblivious to the confused stares of the soldiers on base. He was barely aware of Janet moving around him, conducting every test she could think of to try and work out what had happened. He noticed the results she gave, though. He was massively underweight, and there was evidence of recent, severe physical trauma. As soon as he was released, he headed for Daniel's office – his usual bolthole – and shut the door behind him. Daniel didn't ask what Janet had said, or if she knew what had happened. He just pulled Matt into his arms and held him, without hesitating. The familiarity was calming.

When Matt's heart rate had slowed to normal, he asked quietly, "What did Janet say?"

"I'm dangerously underweight, and there's evidence to suggest I was recently physically attacked." Matt shrugged. "I saw the look on Janet's face when she examined me. Whatever it was, it was bad." He paused and looked up at Daniel. "This must be really weird for you."

Daniel smiled faintly. "I'm fine. Don't worry about me. Are you alright? That's what's important."

"It's not right," Matt said quietly. "I'm still me, I still have all my memories, I still feel the same" – he ducked his head and looked away – "I'm still in love with you. I'm just stuck in the wrong age. Why this? Why sixteen? Why the worst time of my life?"

He was shaking. Daniel didn't answer. He just held on.

Three weeks passed, with no solution presenting itself. Matt had been stuck in the mountain for all of them, getting tested and examined and quietly going insane. He'd read two or three books per day, learned four new songs on guitar, drank enough coffee to sink a battleship, eaten little, slept less, and only sustained conversations with Daniel. He'd also developed a theory as to what the device was actually for.

"I think it's a way of making you face your fears," he explained. Daniel frowned, puzzled.

"How?"

"I have a gap in my memory," Matt said quietly. "I'm missing about a year, from when I was fifteen to just after my sixteenth birthday. It's completely blank, I can't remember anything. Whatever happened, it must have scared me enough that I've just blocked it out, and I am terrified of what it might be. And every time I fall asleep, I dream that I'm in a dark room with light in the doorway."

"And whatever is in that light is what you're afraid to remember?" Daniel asked, sipping coffee. Matt nodded.

"So," he continued, "You must be meant to walk into the light, and face what you're afraid of, to get back to normal. Right?" He paused. "So why…"

"Because I'm not strong enough," Matt said, looking at the floor. "I can't. I'm too scared."

Daniel stood up, setting his mug down on the desk. "Matt, come here."

The boy obediently got up and stood in front of Daniel. He looked ashamed, and didn't meet the older man's gaze.

"Matt," Daniel said calmly, resting his hands on his shoulders, "You are strong enough. I know you. You've been through hell and come out the other side. You can do this. I'll be right there beside you." Something clicked in his mind. "Maybe that's a part of it. You're not meant to try and deal with this alone."

"If we fell asleep at the same time, in the same place…" Matt tailed off.

"It's worth a try."

They explained the theory to Janet between them, sat in her office.

"Well, it would explain why we can't find a way to reverse the process," she said, nodding thoughtfully. "I suppose, if you're right, then what we're seeing is an illusion – a physical manifestation of what's going on in your mind. We can't reverse it because there's nothing to reverse." She measured out two doses of sedative and handed them each a hypodermic with a clean needle. "These should knock you out for about seven hours. I'll get someone to check on you then," she said briskly.

Back in the guest room, Daniel settled on the bed and Matt curled up next to him. Daniel carefully wrapped an arm around the younger man, the same way he always did.

"Ready?" he asked.

Matt nodded. "On three."

They both pushed down the plungers, feeling the sleepiness kick in. The needles just about made it to the bedside table before they sank into unconsciousness.

Matt's eyes flickered, then snapped open. He was back in the same damp, cold, darkened room. Harsh white light shone in the doorway. Daniel was kneeling in front of him, waiting for him.

"Daniel?" Matt whispered.

"I'm right here," he said quietly. "I'm not going anywhere."

Matt stood up slowly, leaning on Daniel for balance. He looked normal, like he always did in these dreams.

"Are you okay?"

"Not really," Matt replied, trying to stay calm. "Let's just get this over with."

They stepped through the light and emerged, blinking, into what looked like the living room of a fairly well-off household. Something was off, though, and the details started to make themselves felt. The furnishings, while clearly expensive, were tatty and threadbare. The wallpaper and ceiling were speckled with damp. Daylight was bleeding through the closed curtains.

As they watched, a teenage boy – the young Matt – stepped hesitantly into the room. The boy was clearly seeing the room for the first time, and was drawing much the same conclusions Daniel and Matt had – that something wasn't quite right. He was closely followed by an older man with greying blond hair, a walking stick and a slight limp.

"That's Major Steward," Matt muttered to Daniel. "Ex-military big shot. I guess he must have been my carer when it happened."

"What was he like?" Daniel asked, watching the man watch the boy.

"He took all the 'troubled' kids, the ones nobody else would touch. They always said he tried so hard to help them…"

Matt tailed off as the Major attacked the teenager with his stick. The blow came from behind, to the back of his head; he was out before he hit the floor.

What happened next started to tell Matt why he couldn't remember.

Steward knelt beside the boy and roughly stripped off the shirt and trousers, throwing them carelessly to one side. He examined him briefly, then stood up and let fly with the stick, leaving huge welts and drawing blood in several places. Matt and Daniel were frozen, utterly horrified.

When the boy started to come round, Steward was smiling.

"They have to be awake the first time," he muttered to himself. "It's better that way. They learn who's master…"

Daniel tried to step forward, to yell, to do something, but Matt held him back.

"There's nothing you can do," he said. His voice was dull and emotionless. "It's just a memory."

They watched, still and silent, for what felt like hours, as the teenage Matthew became thinner and weaker and sicker. Matt wondered if Daniel knew what would happen next. He knew perfectly well this was only going to end one way.

The Major was drunk, passed out in the armchair, the drink long since soaked into the carpet. His head was tipped back, and he was snoring like an engine. The boy was half awake on the floor, lying in a small puddle of blood and tears, clutching a faded blanket. He stood up, shaky and unsteady on his feet, and walked to the kitchen. When he returned, there was a knife in his hand. The handle and the blade were already clotted with blood.

The old man never even knew he was dead.

This time, they followed the boy – or rather, the scene shifted around them.

So they could see him running a bath of cold water to be stained a sick dark red.

So they could see the neighbour come in a few hours later to find the old man dead in the armchair and the boy in the bath doing his damnedest to catch up.

So they could see the boy survive as an empty shell until a young man with dyed black hair and hazel eyes turned up and the image faded to the same damp, cold, darkened room with the harsh white light in the doorway.

The sharp pain of a punch to the jaw sent Matt staggering across the room, dazed. He looked frantically for Daniel, completely lost, unable to understand what was happening. Another hit, a body blow this time, made him double over and cry out.

"You're a monster!" someone hissed furiously, as the attacks continued to rain down. "Worse, you're a liar. You told me I was the first, that I was special. Lying bastard. You're a murderer. You sick freak, I trusted you. I trusted you and you killed him!"

Matt couldn't fight back. Why should I? he thought. It's all true. And it's Daniel saying it. What can I say to make him stop? Nothing. Nothing. It's true. I'm sorry – Daniel, I'm sorry –

He took the blows in silence until he blacked out from the pain.

When he woke up, he was back in the guest room of the mountain. He was lying on the bed, in Daniel's arms. His shirt was damp with tears. He shivered, sickened by himself, and tried to move away. "Daniel, I'm sorry."

Daniel held onto him. "For what?" he asked gently.

"For lying to you. For letting you believe I was normal. For making you believe I was someone important and someone worth caring about. For not being able to give you what you want." Matt shivered again, trying not to just lose control.

"Matthew," Daniel said calmly, tilting the younger man's jaw to bring them eye to eye. "It was not your fault. It was self-defence. And what you saw was not real. That was not me. It was your own fears. I could see it, but I couldn't stop it. I couldn't help you." He pressed his lips against Matt's briefly, then went on. "It was not your fault. You are not a monster. You are one of the strongest people I've ever met. You are important. You are worth caring about." Another brief kiss. "I love you. I don't care what happened. I still love you."

"You have no idea how much I want to believe you," Matt said quietly.

"Believe me," Daniel replied. "I love you, and I'm not going to leave you. And I don't want to force you into something you're not ready for. I would completely understand if you never wanted to go to bed with me." No matter how much it would hurt me that you didn't feel safe.

"No!" The force of the reply makes them both jump. Matt ducks his head. "I – I want to. I trust you." He looks up. "I love you."

When the orderly knocks on the door half an hour later, they don't open it. Yes, everything is fine. No, nobody's injured. No, they don't want Janet. Yes, they want to be alone. Go away.

"I thought he'd never leave," Matt laughs. Daniel smiles – he laughed, he's happy – and kisses him. These things take time. We'll be okay.