A'N: See? I'm trying to do a lot better on the updating. Don't worry, people who were saying they wanted to see Janet have a turn with the kids. Her time will come! It's just Teal'c's turn for a little while first. Thank you so much for the reviews and the good wishes about our move. It's kind of weird being in the south for the first time. Not weird in a bad way, just different. We went to this town Christmas light thing where everyone was so excited because there was a snow machine... because it DOESN'T snow here much. that's just crazy to me, lol! I'll get used to it... anyway, on with the show. I get out of school next week so I will have some time to write faster then, I hope.

Ch 15

"Don't forget about your phone, Colonel," Janet reminded him as they walked her to the door on her way out. "General Hammond was pretty upset when he couldn't reach you."

"Oh, I'll find it," Jack said, casting the kids a knowing look. "I have a feeling I know just where to look."

They exchanged guilty looks and took off, yelling, "Bye, Doctor Janet!" as they retreated back into the house.

She laughed, watching them go. "They're so cute like this."

"Yeah," he agreed. "Makes it a lot harder to yell at them for pissing me off."

"Uh-huh," she said, smiling knowingly. For all the gruff appearances he liked to maintain, she doubted she'd ever met a man who was better with children. When it came to handling them emotionally and keeping them entertained, that is. The other stuff…

"That reminds, me, Colonel," she said, turning back to face him with a no-nonsense look on her face.

"What?" he asked, defensive. It was his automatic response to that look on her face.

"Those kids are getting more than a little ripe! Have you given them a bath at all?"

"Uh… no. I helped you with Sam's hair that time…"

She rolled her eyes. "They've clearly been playing outdoors a lot. Sam's hair looks like a rat's nest and Daniel's isn't too far behind."

"They wash their hands before we eat," Jack defended. most of the time, he added silently to himself.

"Colonel, come on. I know you're hesitant because it's Sam and Daniel, but if you want to keep them here with you you've got to keep them clean."

"All right, fine," he grumbled. "I'll make them take baths before bed tonight. How's that, doc?"

"Good," she said, glancing at her watch. "Oh dear. Now I really have to go. I'll be in touch - and let me know if you need someone to watch them for a spell. If I'm not available and Cassie is, I know she would love to babysit."

"Yeah, okay. Bye, Doc."

He shut the door after her and turned, sighing heavily and trudging back inside. "Sam! Daniel!"

They were in their room, drawing pictures. They both gave him sweet, innocent smiles, and he was immediately presented with several hastily drawn pictures of himself with the kids doing various things. All clearly meant to butter him up. He tried hard not to fall for it. "Great. We'll hang them up later. Right now I need you to tell me what you've done with my phone."

They exchanged looks again and Sam bit her lip.

"We wanted to talk to Uncle Teal'c," Daniel admitted finally.

Sam nudged him. "We didn't break it!" she said quickly.

"We're pretty sure it's not broken," Daniel agreed.

Jack groaned. "Pretty sure?"

Sam went over to their bed and pulled the phone out from its hiding spot under her pillow. "We called some people by accident I think. But we couldn't call Uncle Teal'c."

"Then we hit some buttons…" Daniel continued.

"And all the letters went all funny," Sam concluded, handing the phone over to him.

Jack groaned as he quickly looked at the display and tried to pull up the menu screen. They'd switched the language on his phone to another language… and he wasn't even sure which language!

"Great," he mumbled, mentally wondering how long it would take to find someone on base who spoke whatever language it was now in and switch it back for him. The irony was that in all probability, it was a language Daniel himself knew… or would know… or had known… whatever. Jack felt the beginnings of a headache coming on.

"What are we gonna do on the base?" Sam asked for the thousandth time from the backseat.

Jack had slightly altered the plans, feeling the kids (and Teal'c) were less likely to get in trouble if they played with their "Uncle Jaffa" on the base. He wasn't sure they were ready to send Teal'c to the park with them alone. Anyway, the kids were happy enough to be going back to the base, and had insisted on changing into their little makeshift SG-1 uniforms again. In an effort to appease Fraiser, and Hammond, should they run into him this afternoon, Jack had scrubbed down their faces and arms and mostly managed to untangle their hair.

Daniel's had ended up plastered to his head with water in the process, and was now drying a bit crazy, but there wasn't much he could do about that. The ponytail he'd tried to put in Sam's hair had been rejected three times before he'd given up and told her she'd just have to wear it down. She'd responded by putting his sunglasses back on stubbornly.

He'd had them pack a little backpack of things to play with, but really figured they'd be more likely to go play in the gym again with Teal'c. he'd heard them talking a lot about how much fun it was to play with Teal'c because he was "the biggest, strongest person ever in the whole wide world."

"Colonel?" the little voice piped up again from the backseat, punctuated by a kick to the back of his seat. "I asked what we're going to do?"

"Sorry. Just thinking. You're going to do whatever Teal'c tells you to, that's what you're going to do. While I go to a meeting and then try to get a little work done."

"Why couldn't I bring my bike?" Daniel whined. Again.

Jack bit back a groan. The kids had come down from their sugar high hard. They were both very cranky, but he hadn't had time to get them a nap before they had to go to the base. He'd fed them as much of a carb-and-protein heavy lunch as he could, hoping it would somehow help balance things out in their little bodies, and hoped Teal'c didn't hate him too much for dropping off overtired, over-sugared kids with him. At least, he hoped Teal'c wouldn't remember the event next time the two of them were boxing…

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Teal'c was finishing an afternoon snack in the commissary when the rest of his team entered - or rather, when the children who were now Samantha Carter and Daniel Jackson burst through the commissary doors at full speed, yelling his name and running towards him as fast as their little legs would carry them. They both threw themselves at him in enthusiastic hugs, then immediately began talking very rapidly, apparently trying to tell them every single thing they had done since the last time they had seen him.

After several moments of this, Teal'c held up both hands for silence. They stopped, waiting eagerly to hear what he was going to say, grinning up at him adoringly. Before he had too much time to wonder what exactly he had done to inspire such loyalty from these children, since they had no memory of him as adults, after all, O'Neill had tossed a back pack onto the table Teal'c had been eating at and called hastily, "Here are the little angels, Teal'c, I'm sure you'll have a wonderful time with them, see you all later!" and was retreating out of the commissary.

Several members of base personnel who were in the room began laughing quietly to themselves then. A sharp look from Teal'c silenced them, and he looked back at the children and gave them the smile O'Neill had made him practice for several hours when Cassandra Fraiser had first come to Earth.

"Children, you may tell me of your exploits at a slower pace. We have time for lengthy tales. Now, come, we will go to the gym, unless you would prefer to do something else."

"Gym!" they both yelled happily.

"Very well."

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Jack tried to pay attention in the briefing. He really did. He knew it was important. It was about the damn egg, after all. But it seemed to him the geeks were just doing a lot of waffling. Either they hadn't learned squat and were trying to hide it, or they were just really, really, really going for the slow dramatic build up here. Jack was pretty sure it was just the former. He missed Carter and Daniel. Not the kids - well, he kind of missed them too - but he missed his adult teammates. Even though he acted like they bugged him too sometimes, the truth was they were actually the best at giving Jack the information he needed in a way he could tolerate receiving it. The rest of these geeks… not so much. Jack resisted the urge to drop his head on the table in front of him as one scientist said something about how awesome the robot arms were they were using to study the thing.

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"Wow, what are they doing?" Sam asked, mouth hanging open as she watched the rather intense sparring match taking place in the gym. SG-3 and SG-12 were having one of their semi-regular, very competitive sparring sessions. The team members not currently fighting were cheering their respective teammates on and hassling the other guy.

"They are training," Teal'c said, placing a hand on each child's shoulder. "Come. We will go elsewhere."

"Awww, can't we stay and watch?" Sam asked.

Teal'c looked at the little girl in confusion. All he knew of little girls was from Cassandra Fraiser - who would not have enjoyed watching such a thing, unless perhaps it was himself and Colonel O'Neill fighting. "This would amuse you?" he asked.

Her nose wrinkled. "It would be fun," she said, sort of guessing at his meaning.

"Daniel Jackson?" Teal'c asked.

Daniel's eyes widened as he saw someone - Major Pierce - go down hard on the mat. "Uh, yeah. Let's watch."

Teal'c shrugged slightly. "Very well."

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"Wait, what?" Jack interrupted, snapping up straight in his chair as his brain absently alerted him to something Geek Guy 2 was droning on about. "Back it up, Zippy, did you just say you found instructions on the outside of the damn thing?"

"Well, maybe, sir." Swallowing hard and blinking owlishly behind large glasses, the scientist continued. "We, we, we think so. It's definitely writing, of some sort. Miniscule. But it stands to reason that it would be instructions… although I don't think the translators have had much luck translating any of it yet…"

"Oh," Jack said, settling back down and trying not to feel too disappointed.

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"GO UNCLE TEAL'C! GO UNCLE TEAL'C!" Daniel shouted at the top of his lungs, waving his fist in the air.

"GET HIM! GET HIM!" Sam yelled, jumping up and down in place. It hadn't taken long for someone to challenge Teal'c to a match, and the kids had been eager to see him in action. He sure wasn't disappointing them either! They watched him beat person after person, applying just enough force so they'd feel it tomorrow but not enough to seriously injure them. It was more about technique. And his technique was impressive, even to four year olds. Perhaps ESPECIALLY to four year olds.

"WHOA, I think he's going down," Daniel called to Sam above the din of all the cheering.

"Huh?" she yelled back, just as the guy Teal'c was fighting hit the ground hard. He'd been sweating profusely, refusing to back down in the fight even though Teal'c clearly had him beat… repeatedly. Everyone crowded around the guy who was down, and even Teal'c's attention was on his fallen opponent. He wanted to make sure he had not injured the man. If the man had insisted on pushing himself beyond his own limits, that was his own fault, not Teal'c's. still, he was willing and ready to assist the man to the infirmary, were it needed.

"Uncle Teal'c's not watching us," Sam said quickly, nudging Daniel pointedly and pulling her ID badge out of her pants pocket.

Daniel looked worried. "I dunno, Sam. We're going to get in trouble…"

"Let's just go explore for a little bit. We'll come right back. That guy will probably be knocked out for a while, I mean, look how strong Uncle Teal'c is!"

"Okay," Daniel agreed, pulling out his own badge and grinning, despite himself.

The kids snuck away, headed straight for the elevator.

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"Colonel, while you're here on base, why don't you make some headway on all those reports you owe me," Hammond suggested after the meeting ended and everyone else had left.

"Oh, nothing would please me more, sir," Jack said dryly.

"And bring my little goddaughter by to see me sometime before you head out, if you don't mind. I'd forgotten how entertaining that little button is."

"Oh yeah, she's a peach," Jack said, sliding his phone across the table. "Check out her latest *adorable* little game."

Hammond looked at the phone in confusion, but quickly chuckled. "Is that Hungarian?"

"Beats me. With your permission, sir, I'd like to find someone who can fix it before I get started on all that wonderful paperwork."

"Granted," Hammond said, chuckling. "Dismissed, Jack."

Jack got up to leave, pocketing the phone after Hammond slid it back to him.

"Oh, Jack?" Hammond called after him, causing O'Neill to pause in the doorway and turn back around. "I did warn you about her."

"Oh, I know you did, sir," Jack said. "But frankly, I don't think you knew the half of what that little child is capable of… or maybe she's just doubled her efforts with Daniel's assistance or something. Remind me to tell you how my living room ended up covered in rice and my kitchen covered in beer and flour some day, sir."

Hammond chuckled and waved Jack on again.

Jack had made it about three steps down the hallway before Walter came on the PA system. "Colonel O'Neill and General Hammond to the Control Room. Colonel O'Neill and General Hammond to the Control Room. We have a… situation."

Jack groaned. Sam and Daniel. He just knew it.

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"It's hide and seek!" Sam giggled. "It's fun!"

"But we didn't ask if they wanted to play," Daniel answered.

"They're playing now," Sam whispered, as several pairs of combat boots ran past their hiding place, all clearly looking for them.

"I still think we're going to be in trouble," Daniel grumbled.

TBC.