Chapter Seventeen: Consequences

Jack held fast to the squirming child in his arms as he walked out to the lobby, wondering what he'd seen to cause such a reaction and headed to the elevator, making sure he had his key card handy as they road up together even as Johnny whined and grunted his disapproval.

"What is it buddy?" he asked, not expecting an answer.

Johnny continued to fight him all the way to their room but Jack retained his hold despite the energy it took to do so. He groaned when Johnny got in a good kick just before he closed them in the room and locked the upper lock so Johnny couldn't escape. He rushed across the room quickly since Johnny was kicking and grunting, throwing himself at the door.

He fumbled for the equipment that helped to release the visions from his son's mind and turned to see something he'd never thought he would see from Johnny who never had any of the other powers his older siblings possessed, he used telekinesis to unlock the bolt and by the time Jack was running, he was gone.

"For crying out loud!" Jack responded angrily and raced after the child who seemed to move like lightning. He rounded the corner to just watch the elevator close behind Johnny who looked determined but sad. Jack cursed and took the stairs at a run. His knees didn't like the exercise but Johnny never reacted well to his visions and none of their guests could know what he were capable of. Jack had to protect his son, try to do for Johnny what he couldn't do for Charlie. He slammed into the lobby to find Johnny running towards the banquet hall and took off after him, waving off anyone who tried to grab him, not knowing what Johnny would do if a stranger touched him in the midst of whatever this was.

Johnny was capable of sending psychic pain to anyone who touched him, having done it to Daniel and Jack on more than one occasion when the visions got to be too painful.

When Jack rounded the hall and stopped inside the banquet room, he found Johnny panting and holding his hand to Zale's cheek before both of his sons took off towards a door at the back of the banquet hall. Jack took off after them just as Zale, gawddammit, used his powers to slam open the door and Jack cursed again as the guests gasped in amazement. Jack reached out to grab Johnny back when he saw Daniel pressed up against the wall, bloody and battered with his pants hanging loosely around his knees. Jack shoved the kids back so they wouldn't see their Daddy like this more than they needed to, clearly this was what Johnny had seen and tried so desperately to stay with Daniel.

"Danny?" Jack cried out as he pulled his husband close and wavered and wondered which one of his wounds he should attend to first. He pulled up Daniel's pants and notice the blood around Daniel's hole and cried out. "No Danny, baby what happened?" He held Daniel's pants up and pulled him close just as Ben and Hammond came to the door.

"Oh Daniel," Ben said, holding a hand over his mouth in shock.

"Janet!" George called out and then turned to Ben, "You should get the children out of here they shouldn't see Daniel like this."

Ben nodded, leaned close to press a kiss to Jack's forehead before he moved to do what General Hammond asked of him. Janet appeared at their sides with Sam and Teal'c in tow but Jack tightened his arms around Daniel. He couldn't let him go, couldn't see Daniel leave his sight.

"Jack, I need to see Daniel to a hospital," Janet whispered, touching Jack's face gently before he could even look at her.

"Only you Janet, only you can see him. Promise me!" Jack hissed at her, still running gently hands through the patch of hair that wasn't plastered down with blood. Daniel shivered in his arms, assuring him that his lover was still alive.

"I promise, Hammond can call ahead and make assurances," she promised even before they looked up to the General who was already on his cell phone. He nodded and Janet kept her hand on Jack, another on Daniel's shoulder in comfort. Jack didn't think he could let go, not even to the loving hands of Janet Frasier.

"You are his spouse Jack, no one will make you leave his side," Janet reminded Jack gently and Jack nodded. He sat with Daniel huddled into his lap, pressed against the wall behind them where blood had trickled down and dried against the rough exterior.

The ambulance arrived seemingly in seconds and equally hours later and Jack released his hold so the paramedics could place Daniel gently on the gurney where Jack reclaimed his spot next to Daniel who whimpered at the absence of his lover. The paramedics looked at the Class A's on Jack and the uniforms on Janet and Hammond, "He military?" one asked.

"He is to be cared for as if he was the savior of the fucking world!" Jack snapped. The paramedics moved to remove Jack from Daniel's hand and the injured man whimpered deep in his throat, tightening his grip as best he could with battered knuckles and fingers. It seemed everywhere he looked on his partner; there was blood or bruises.

"Brigadier General Jack O'Neill will be staying with his husband at all times," Hammond demanded and the paramedics responded with quick nods and they all were loaded into the back of the ambulance, Janet as well since she would arrive with them instead of hoping to catch up with her car.

"What happened?" one paramedic asked as he pulled out the scissors to start stripping Daniel of his clothes and Jack stopped him, while Daniel's glazed eyes tightened in fear.

"General O'Neill, we need to be allowed to do our job," the paramedic responded.

Jack pulled the guy close, "Don't you see what happened to him, he's been abused by a man and possibly raped and yet you think another man stripping him without his consent is the best thing to do right now for him?" the words were hissed with a barely contained level of rage especially having to say the word 'rape' again.

The paramedic nodded and turned to Janet, "Attending physician?" he questioned.

"The only one who's going to touch him during this, he trusts me."

With another nod the paramedics did what they had to keep Daniel comfortable and calm while Janet looked down at him and started cleaning at the scraps on his face and wiping the blood from a nasty bite on his shoulder. Daniel had yet to respond to anything or anyone, as if he was in a state of catatonia. Janet never stopped talking to Daniel during the trip and when they arrived at the hospital Daniel was whisked away to a private room for Janet to check him out while a nurse, briefed on the situation led Jack to get scrubbed and cleaned, finding himself stripped of his bloody Class A's, and washing the blood from his chest, arms and hands. He cleaned between his fingers, slipping his ring around and tried to hold down the desperate need to fall apart but he didn't have time. Daniel was alone and who knows what that would do to his psyche right now.

As soon as Jack was dressed in clean green scrubs and sterilized he was led into the room where Daniel was struggling against the male nurses in the room before the patient caught sight of Jack and reached for him desperately. Jack rushed forward and wondered where Janet was but figured she must have been changing as well so she could treat Daniel cleanly.

Jack took Daniel's hands in his and looked into those dull blue eyes, "Danny, Janet is going to be here in a minute and we need to check you out. Can we get you out of some of these bloody clothes?"

Daniel looked over his shoulder at the nurses and Jack turned, "Leave!"

"Sir, we can't leave a patient alone with someone who isn't medical staff," one of the nurses stated.

"Hospitals leave patients alone all the time, I am his husband and you can't be here right now!"

Both of them crossed their arms and stood their ground, Jack prepared to go to war and Janet walked in. She was wearing scrubs and a facemask around her chin and gloves on her hands and she took one look at shivering Daniel and pissed off Jack and turned to the nurses, "Leave."

And they did, no one was dumb enough to take on Doc Frasier.

Jack returned his focus on Daniel, wishing his skin could come into contact with Daniel's but understood the necessity with all of Daniel's open injuries. "Okay Danny, are you ready for the doc to check you out?"

Daniel shook his head but didn't fight as Jack gently slipped the bloody suit jacket off of Daniel's shoulders and Janet was there to place it in a bag for evidence. The shirt came next, cut from his shoulders to his hands, down his side to show the mottled bruises along his shoulder blades and also across the upper chest. Daniel tried to cover himself now, clearly ashamed of the picture he made on the bed. Jack noticed again with a still burning rage that Daniel was favoring one of his sides, as if he couldn't sit still, like after one of their marathons. Jack was going to find who did this and he was going to kill them!

For now though, he tugged Daniel's grasping hands away from his chest, "You are as you always are; beautiful."

Daniel kept eye contact with Jack and stopped fidgeting then Janet took scissors to his pant legs and Daniel's eyes got wide and wider the closer she came to his thighs and buttocks. He gripped at Jack's hands taking the option to leave out of Jack's hands and honestly Jack didn't know if he could leave him right now.

"It's going to be okay Daniel," Janet whispered as she removed his pants and underwear next leaving him nude and uncomfortable with the fact.

Jack cataloguing the smears of blood across his head, neck and the bruises around his throat as well as the abrasions at the front of Daniel's thighs where he must have been rammed against the wall. He watched carefully as Janet started giving him a bed bath, using a bowl with Jack's help to wash his hair and stitch a few cuts at the back of his head before Daniel's head was wrapped in gauze. Next came cleaning his face and throat, Jack found Daniel's left temple was bruised, giving him a black eye under the blood and that was the same side where he had what appeared to be road rash, possibly from the concrete wall. Each bruise and cut inflamed Jack to a frenzy that was only slightly cooled by the look in Daniel's eyes. There was a deep sadness and empathy that Jack wouldn't have expected at the moment though he also didn't know what Daniel felt empathy about.

"Daniel, I need to administer the rape kit, it's going to be uncomfortable but it has to be done. I want to make sure you aren't badly injured."

Again that sadness reflected towards Jack as he nodded. Jack pressed a gloved hand around Daniel's uninjured cheek as Janet settled him into a supine position and started the procedure; all the while Jack held Daniel's hand and rubbed his cheek gently.

"I'm so sorry Danny, I should have let you come with me. I know better than to separate him from you when he is flustered and he was so desperate to get back to you, I thought it was for comfort and not to warn us."

Daniel shook his head.

"What?"

Daniel shook his head again but didn't speak.

"Come back to me love, I need you to speak to me, to tell me who did this to you so I can see them dead."

Janet scoffed from her position, "Please don't plot death around me otherwise I will be morally obligated to report it. Do it somewhere else so when the guy does end up dead I won't have to send you to jail."

Jack snorted a little and stayed where he was, "Danny, I am never going to leave you alone again. I can't stand that you got hurt because I couldn't be bothered to check with Zale before I took Johnny out of the room."

Daniel shook his head again.

Jack frowned, "I love you?" he asked, wondering if Daniel was going to discount that too but Daniel nodded and leaned forward a little and Jack did as well, placing his forehead against Daniel's, "Just checking. Are you telling me it's not my fault?"

Daniel nodded gently against Jack's head.

"Bad things happen sometimes?" Jack asked.

Daniel nodded once more then his eyes started slipping down a little at a time. Jack pulled away from Daniel's head to find Janet with a large empty needle, "Did you dose him?"

Janet nodded, "He needs some rest after such a traumatic event and we need to talk."

Jack nodded, understanding the need but fighting against the need to stay with Daniel. He watched as Janet slipped a clean warm blanket over Daniel's body for now until he woke and had enough wherewithal to get dressed in a gown at the very least.

"Just outside the door Jack," Janet told him and Jack finally nodded and followed her out and closed the door gently. Janet took Jack's shaking hands into his gently, "ook I don't think there is any internal damage and because Daniel is in a relationship with you, I can't tell for sure if he was raped or not. The skin around his anus is enflamed and red so we will wait for the tests to come back to see if there is foreign DNA, other than that he's just going to need time to heal. If his symptoms persist we may have to get him an X-ray to make sure the concussion isn't worse but for now he needs to sleep."

Jack sighed, looking back through the window. His heart seized painfully in his chest when Janet said she couldn't be sure if Daniel had been raped or not. Jack didn't know how to see Daniel through this; last time when it had been Hathor, Daniel didn't really have to worry about a romantic relationship being harmed by it but this time, Jack didn't know how their love life would be resurrected in the wake of Daniel being raped by a man.

"Then we wait," Jack finally said but Janet wasn't done.

"Most of Daniel's injuries were self-defense wounds so I think he fought and fought until the very end, he's not going to be broken by this Jack."

"I wish that was good enough for me Janet but it shouldn't have happened."

"Daniel didn't tell you, did he?" Janet asked.

Jack frowned and turned to look at her, "Tell me what?"

"Before you guys left the Springs, when Daniel came back to work and kept hanging up on you, I came to talk to him about something that I had heard. He didn't seem to worried about it at the time though."

"Janet, just tell me," Jack demanded.

"There were rumors flying around, about you and Daniel and some of the soldiers were really pissed about Daniel taking you from the program. They figured it was Daniel's fault you were leaving, and that you were gay now. I don't know if that is connected to this but when we found out about the wedding here, a lot of people spread the news, maybe a disgruntled person is responsible for the attack."

"Well whoever they are would be better off dead because when I get a hold of them, I am going to use every single torture technique on them before I kill him."

"Jack, stop threatening people in front of me," Janet demanded as she shook her head and started to walk away but Jack grabbed her wrist gently to turn her back.

"What am I supposed to do here Janet?" Jack whispered.

"Wait for him to wake up, call for me so we can get him under the X-ray then you have to get him to talk to you, or someone. We need to know what happened to him otherwise we can't help him work it through."

"Stay with him?" Jack asked hopefully.

"You're the only one capable of calming him so I need you to stay with him until he speaks."

Jack nodded, if all he could do was be with Daniel and try to get him to talk it through then Jack would stay with him in this hospital until the end of their stay. He didn't want to leave the kids to their own devices for too long but at the same time, once again he didn't know if he could really be there for the children without Daniel and he was in no hurry to find out the truth.

"Like I said, call me when he wakes up but I think before we do anything else, you need to call your family and let them know that he looked like he's going to be okay."

Jack nodded and walked away to do just that.