Daughter
"I sent you offworld three days ago." He held up the appropriate number of fingers. "Three!" She looked between each of them. "Well, you're 17 years too late, Jack." He suddenly felt a dooming sense that he was about to lose her before even having her.
Chapter 1 – Introductions
"Well, isn't this nice," Jack remarked. Hands up in the air, he glanced sideways at Daniel, who was similarly posed.
"Just like old times, right?" his friend quipped.
The people pointing blasters in their direction did not seem so amused. A hand holding one of the weapons gestured for them to back up. Their new captors did not speak. While one remained focused on guarding these two intruders, the others returned to their original task. They were interrupted when Jack and Daniel stumbled upon them.
"So, seen any hockey lately?"
"Not really, Jack. Been a bit busy."
"Oh. Right. Lady friend been keeping you occupied, eh?"
Daniel huffed. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"That was a really tight outfit she had on the other day…"
"Jack," Daniel warned.
But the General had no problem continuing. "When we find her again, I think I'll ask her where she shops."
Daniel smirked. "Why, so you can get a black, low-cut bodice for yourself, too?"
"You two. Shut it," the gruff man holding them at gunpoint ordered.
The men repositioned their hands up, having relaxed them slightly while they bantered.
Behind their unfriendly captor, his two companions continued using a torch and a saw to cut into some sort of machine built into the wall. They seemed very determined to break something out of a compartment. Neither Jack nor Daniel had any real idea what they were after. They were only here because they were lost.
Jack took a decent look around, deciding their surroundings to be some sort of manufacturing facility. He couldn't guess what was made here. Daniel found the markings on the armbands of their captors to be unfamiliar, perhaps signifying some local gang in this region of space. All they had to do was watch for an opportunity to distract these men and make their escape. Then they could try to locate a stargate on some other part of this planet.
The saw sputtered as it broke through whatever metal it had been cutting. The man wielding the torch set it aside and jimmied the newly broken metal out of the way. Another pair of hands reached into the compartment to gingerly pull out some sort of black crystal. It was larger than those two hands combined.
The man turned it over and over, examining it.
"Is that it?" the blaster-pointing fellow asked over his shoulder, not really taking his eyes off Jack and Daniel.
"Yeah," the examining one replied.
A shot rang out. But instead of it coming from the blaster on display, it came from somewhere above and behind the SGC personnel. Their gruff captor fell to the ground, dead. The torch-wielder drew his own weapon, aiming at Jack and Daniel, but soon a figure dropped out of the sky to take him down. Stunned, Jack and Daniel simply watched as a dark whir physically assaulted both surviving men until they were unconscious on the ground.
The lone remaining figure was lithe and cat-like. Their savior immediately scooped up the black crystal that had been dropped during the attack. The item disappeared into a hidden pocket somewhere on the tight-looking bodice of a shapely woman.
Jack elbowed Daniel. He hazarded a cough.
The female turned around to face them. She pulled back a hood to reveal striking golden hair that fell just beyond her shoulders in loose waves.
"Thanks," Jack offered simply. Daniel smiled weakly. The General studied her face carefully and tilted his head. "Do we…" he hesitated, "know you from somewhere?"
She stared back at them quietly with calculating blue eyes. "Unlikely," she replied.
Daniel looked back and forth between his friend and the woman. They seemed to be gazing at each other awkwardly for a bit too long. "Okay, well, we'll just be going. Thanks for the assist." He started physically pushing Jack to move.
Jack planted his feet in place to override him. "And who do we have to thank for this little assist, as my friend calls it?"
The woman continued to eye them both. She didn't bother to answer the question. "You remind me of someone." She gritted her teeth momentarily. "It's a bit freaky."
"Is that why you saved us?" Jack wondered.
"No. But you're welcome. Those brutes would have killed you." She glanced down at the three fellows she had successfully beaten. "After interrogating you painfully, of course."
Daniel's urge to get out of there was now superseded by his innate curiosity. "Who does he remind you of?"
"What?"
"You said he reminds you of someone."
But once again, she refused to answer the question. She regarded Daniel with obvious derision. "I've seen you before."
No one realized that one of the men on the floor had begun to stir behind the woman. Nor that he had reacquired his weapon and was about to raise it to fire.
Another shot exploded.
The woman whipped back around to find him dead in a growing pool of fresh blood.
"How many times have I told you to never turn your back on…" a familiar voice yelled, but then stopped short. Vala Mal Doran stepped forward out of the shadows, weapon drawn. Her expression switched from fury to confusion as she stared at Jack and Daniel. "Where have you been all this time? In a sarcophagus?" She sheathed her blaster. It disappeared underneath a long, black trench coat.
The younger blonde muttered, "A what?"
"Vala!" Daniel exclaimed with surprise.
"What is this, Jack?" Vala demanded.
The blonde woman looked between Vala and Jack with obvious surprise.
Jack gestured around. "I don't know. What is this? Running a side op, are we?" he accused with disapproval.
"Why is it that you don't look a day older than the last time I saw you?"
"Vala," Daniel tried to clarify, "what's going on?"
"Mom," the other woman warned, staring off in the distance beyond them.
Vala glanced quickly and noted shadows moving. "Get the ship off the ground," she ordered hastily. She produced two guns now from beneath her leather coat. Aiming them in the direction of the looming shadows, she added, "Take them with you. I'll cover you."
The blonde didn't hesitate. As she began to rush out, she spun to ensure the others followed her. Vala donned a menacing look as she moved away, causing the men to think they were better off doing as she said. Daniel hazarded a glance back at her, a million questions running through his mind. As he hurriedly followed Jack and the other woman through the bowels of the manufacturing facility, he couldn't help but notice that Vala looked different. She seemed… older.
They made it to a small shuttle parked on a landing pad outside. Jack paused. "This is the getaway car?" It had obvious dents in several places. He could see scorch marks from previous weapons fire. The vessel had surely seen better days.
The hatch opened automatically and the woman rushed in. She turned in the entranceway and looked at them expectantly. "Come on!" she urged. Daniel shoved Jack in. "Strap in!" the blonde commanded, waving an arm toward some seats along the wall. She slapped a button to close the hatch then moved into the forward compartment to the pilot's chair.
They gaped at her. "What about Vala?" Daniel demanded.
"Strap in unless you want to be flattened when we lift off!"
The men shared a look of exasperation and each took a seat across from each other. Daniel sat nearest the closing hatch to his left. Jack sat opposite in the cylindrical shuttle. As soon as they felt the clicks of harnesses, the shuttle abruptly rose off the ground. They felt their stomachs rise up into their throats.
Jack grunted in response to the torque. He could hear the woman speaking crisply into a communicator on her wrist as she hastily sped the shuttle around to the other side of the facility. He watched as she slammed her hand down on a control pad in the center. The hatch began to open again mid-air.
With no warning, the vessel suddenly lost altitude. It stopped mere inches from the ground, with the open hatch pointed toward the facility. In his nauseated state, Jack had a perfectly good view of someone running toward them. The pilot unhooked herself from her seat as the vessel hovered in waiting.
Vala exploded through the opening, weapons firing back at her pursuers. "You shoot, I fly!" she yelled, voice hoarse. She continued firing.
Her protégé immediately got up. In one fluid motion, Vala slipped her two weapons into the other woman's hands and ran toward the pilot's chair. The weapons fire continued as if nothing had changed. Daniel stared wide-eyed at the woman, determinedly shooting at some unseen foes. Was she about to be splattered all over the ceiling if they took off again?
As if to answer, she unconsciously rocked back onto her heels. Her metal-tinged boots glowed as LED lights on her ankles flashed to signal activation. Her feet planted firmly onto the deck with a soft clank stifled by the rapid percussion of blaster fire.
Vala commanded the shuttle to lift off again, but this time it was slightly less abrupt than before. As Jack held his mouth firmly closed to avoid hurling, he watched as the woman near him barely shifted her weight while the vessel took off. She was still firing. And she seemed to be stuck to the deck like a magnet.
The ship banked left suddenly, bringing them sideways and risking a fall straight out of the hatch. The woman stayed securely inside the ship, shots now firing straight down to the ground. Soon the view through the hatch changed as they rose higher into the air and leveled off.
The blonde discontinued shooting. She leaned forward to reach the control pad and close the hatch. She wiped at her sweaty brow with the back of a hand while turning around to place the blasters into a compartment on the wall. "Why didn't you shoot? You were already here!" she complained loudly.
"Breaking atmo in a hurry is my specialty!" Vala bit back. She didn't add more, though Daniel assumed she could have. She was busy maneuvering the ship around obstacles in orbit as they now cleared the planet's atmosphere.
Soon they felt a sense of weightlessness. The blonde woman's hair began to fly around wildly, as did Vala's. She looked toward Jack and Daniel warily. "You don't have any mag-boots," she observed disdainfully. Groaning in annoyance, she moved to a control panel on another section of wall. She interacted with an interface, swiping and pressing. Turning to Vala, she asked, "Gravity?"
"Go ahead," the current pilot replied.
The blonde hit a button, and both men suddenly felt the stomachs that were hitching a ride in their throats drop back down to where they belonged. She smirked at their nausea. She reached down with both hands to tap at her knee-high boots, disengaging their magnetism from the deck plating.
Jack let his head fall back against the headrest of his seat. Daniel looked similarly relieved that the ride was now more stable. They made eye contact with each other, quietly promising never to do that again. Ever.
"You can unbuckle now," the woman offered. "If you can even stand up."
"Thanks," Daniel replied with a strained whisper, as if it would keep him from vomiting. "I'm good here for now."
Jack unbuckled, but was careful as he tried to stand. His feet tested the ground, noting it to be just barely comparable to Earth gravity. He looked up to see the woman staring at him intently. Already sensing he'd get nowhere asking her questions, he instead called out, "Princess?"
The blonde scrunched her face at this address toward Vala.
The other woman didn't answer immediately, still tapping commands into the pilot's console. But when she was done, she unhooked herself and stood up. She ignored Jack for the moment. "Do you have it?" Vala asked her protégé.
The woman reached into her bodice's hidden pocket and pulled out the black crystal.
Vala stepped closer to take it. She examined it carefully. "All that… for this," she muttered.
The other one took it back, regarding the crystal thoughtfully. "We should see what's on it. See what the point of all this was."
"No." Vala reclaimed the crystal. "They'd know if we peeked. Then the deal would be off. Or worse, we'd be dead." She walked a few steps to a raised console in the center of the shuttle. Vala opened up a compartment in the middle and carefully placed the crystal there. "The less we know, the better." The compartment shut closed and receded into the console. "And besides… we have guests."
Vala turned toward the men on board with them. She placed a hand on her hip as she leaned the other hip on the console.
The blonde woman crossed her arms over her chest, suspicion evident in her eyes. "Is that the copy? All grown up?" she quietly asked.
"I don't know," Vala said pensively, staring at Jack. "Are you?"
Jack looked between them, then glanced at Daniel. "Am I what?"
"The Asgard clone of Jack O'Neill?" Vala clarified.
"What!?"
Daniel squinted his eyes. He looked at Vala carefully. Her face was rounder. She had more wrinkles than before. Streaks of gray hair artfully highlighted her familiar black strands. She was still Vala. That was unmistakable. But this seemed to be a version of her he'd never seen before.
He unbuckled himself and carefully stood up. After the initial wave of queasiness passed, he dared to take a few steps closer to the women. They watched him warily.
He held out a hand to the unknown woman. "I'm Daniel Jackson," he said simply.
She looked to Vala for guidance. Her older counterpart nodded affirmatively. She shook his hand, noting a firm and confident grip.
"Gracie."
At this, Jack choked. "What did you say?"
Vala cut in. "You heard her, Jack." She seemed furious with him.
The General stared at the younger woman in disbelief. "How…"
"You know how. Or at least the Jack I knew did. Before he died," Vala responded.
"I am Jack O'Neill."
"Then explain your obvious lack of aging," she challenged.
"I can't. But I'm not a clone. I'm the original."
"So said every Ba'al clone we used to catch."
"Vala," Daniel interrupted. "We are who we say we are. But the weird part is, and don't take this the wrong way here, you're the one who seems a different age."
Her eyes glowed red hot as she glared at him.
He held up two hands to placate her. "Something must have happened." He turned to Jack. "The wormhole was weird. Didn't you notice?"
Eyes still stuck on the golden-haired woman, Jack acknowledged, "Yeah."
As hostile as she felt toward these two men in the moment, Vala knew Daniel wouldn't bring up a wormhole without a good reason. She couldn't help but consider his ideas no matter how irritated she was. He was too intelligent and genuine to ignore. "What are you thinking, then?"
"I only have a hunch. But if I'm right, things are seriously more screwed up than they were ever meant to be." He looked back at Jack to see his eyes still glued on the younger blonde woman. "We went offworld to find you and Gracie. And now here we are."
"It was only supposed to be a couple of days," Jack said weakly, becoming emotional.
Vala turned to Gracie. "Take the pilot's seat and get us to the drop point."
The woman looked at her with uncertainty. "But…"
"You're a capable pilot. Now prove it." There was more meaning to that statement, in Daniel's estimation, but he lacked the context to understand it. Clearly these two had been in each other's company for a very long time.
Vala's expression must have been enough to keep the other woman from arguing. She let out an audible breath and moved to settle into the cockpit. Gracie looked back as Vala ushered the two men toward the rear of the shuttle. Questions swirled in her eyes.
Now as far away as possible, Vala lowered her voice while they huddled in the back. "Now. Tell me exactly. What happened?"
Jack answered, still glancing at Gracie in the forward compartment. "I sent you and Gracie offworld three days ago." He held up the appropriate number of fingers. "Three!"
Daniel added, "We neutralized the threat on Earth. It was a doozy. Jack knew I'm the only one who could find you, so we left together to come bring you home."
"The stargate disappeared the moment we stepped through," Jack noted.
"Just like 1969," Daniel murmured.
"We started wandering around, looking for anything that would help us figure out where we were or how to get back to Earth. Then you two ended up finding us."
Vala considered their words. "You said three days?" They nodded. She looked between each of them. "Well, you're 17 years too late, Jack."
Daniel's mouth dropped open. Jack sucked in a breath.
Daniel realized, "That's why she called you 'Mom'." He glanced toward Gracie in the pilot's seat. "She must be, what, 20-years-old?"
"She is."
Jack grabbed Vala by the shoulders. "Vala," he said emphatically, "I didn't mean for you to take care of my kid for the rest of your life. I'm sorry."
Blinking furiously at him, she pulled back a little to maintain her composure. "I will admit, there was a touch of resentment here and there. But she had no one else. And neither did I, little by little. I ended up needing her just as much as she needed me."
"What do you mean you had no one else?" Daniel questioned.
Vala turned to him. She spoke slowly in an effort to control her emotions. "One by one, we lost you. First Sam. Then Jack. General Landry. Mitchell had no idea how to find me even if he tried. And Teal'c left Earth."
Daniel looked at her with sorrow. "You've been alone?" He contemplated Gracie up front, then returned his gaze to Vala. "This whole time?" She nodded grimly. "What about me?"
Vala sighed. "You're the only connection to Earth that either of us has left." She shoved him lightly. "Not that I get to see you more than a few times a year." Daniel's eyebrows rose in question. "You find me when you can. But for the longest time you have insisted that it's not safe to come home. At some point, Earth stopped being home. There is no longer anything left to go back to."
"Why wouldn't it be safe?" Jack asked. "The people threatening Gracie are dead and gone. What else could there be?"
Vala rolled her eyes. "I kept asking Daniel that for years."
Jack turned an accusatory stare on his friend. Daniel gestured outwardly with both hands. "Not me!"
"Apparently, there was more to it than just the one-time threat. It's some sort of ongoing, long-game outfit that the SGC is struggling to dismantle."
Jack gently placed two hands on her shoulders again. "Give me all the intel. We'll find a way to go back and fix this. Prevent this mess from ever happening."
She locked eyes with him forlornly. "And if you do? What then? What happens to this life we've been living?" She gestured around them.
Jack let go. He shook his head. "I don't really know."
"We've made a lot of memories, her and I. If you go back, if this even is a time travel thing, everything could be erased." She shook her head. "It's like you're asking me to give up my daughter."
He opened his mouth. "That's my daughter!" he said, pointing in the other woman's direction.
"Guys." Daniel pushed them a little further apart. "We don't know anything for sure yet. Let's just…" Daniel paused, sighing. "Let's just get in contact with the SGC. See what they can do or say to get this whole thing sorted out. We could be in another universe instead."
"For cryin' out loud…"
"Jack, I'm serious. We just don't know."
Vala crossed her arms. "Even if we could just call the SGC to safely say hello without revealing our location, which we can't, we need to make the drop first." She turned around to hit buttons on a wall panel. "What's our ETA?"
Gracie's voice responded over the speaker, "Three minutes."
"Drop? What drop? Vala, what kind of operation do you have going on out here?" Jack asked with suspicion.
"A two-woman operation for survival," she spit out menacingly. "We get hired. We acquire items. We deliver. We eat."
Daniel ran a hand through his hair in apprehension. "You had to fall back on your old skillset."
"And roped my daughter in with you?" The critical stare on Jack's face was evident.
"Yes, Jack. I taught her everything I know. I taught her how to take care of herself. Because one day, one of these jobs is going to go sideways. And it will be over for me. She has to know how to survive in this harsh galaxy on her own." She huffed in frustration, looking at them both. "I tried, believe me, to give her a stable home and a decent upbringing. But we kept getting found. We have been hunted for nearly two decades. There were times that we barely escaped."
A single tear ran down her face, representing all the anxiety the years had wrought upon her. Daniel laid a hand on her shoulder as a show of support.
"She asked me to teach her what I knew. At first, I refused because it's not what Sam nor you would have wanted. But I really did need help to keep us both alive."
"I should have gone with you," Daniel declared. "Why didn't I jump in and help?" He asked it more to himself, scenarios swirling in his mind.
"Whatever was happening on Earth kept you grounded there. I can share what little I know, but it isn't much. There were just some things we had to leave unsaid, or risk worse things."
Gracie's voice announced on the speaker, "We have arrived."
Vala turned around to respond into the wall panel. "I'm coming up." She left the two men behind. She moved to the front and leaned down over Gracie in the pilot's chair. They started conversing out of earshot.
Jack's face was a mixture of horror and fury as he watched them. Daniel looked over to him, concerned. He whispered to him, "We have to find me."
"You?"
"The other me. The one that she says is still alive."
"I'll interrogate him myself," Jack responded angrily.
Daniel sighed. He knew this was too overwhelming for Jack to handle, with emotions clouding his judgement. To imagine that another version of Jack and Sam would leave their daughter orphaned was a lot to process. It was hitting pretty close to home for Daniel as well.
Glancing out the viewport near Vala, the shuttle seemed to be approaching a larger ship parked in the shadow of a moon. Its belly opened automatically to swallow their vessel. The view became dark. They felt the ship make contact with solid deck plating with a thud. Around them, the shuttle hissed as it powered down.
Vala began to arm herself with a blaster from the wall storage opposite the hatch. Its indicator glowed green to show it had fully charged. Meanwhile, Gracie retrieved the black crystal from its storage space in the center console. When she went to retrieve another weapon from the wall, Vala laid a hand over hers. "I'll go. You stay with the ship." She swiped the crystal out of the other woman's hand.
Gracie's mouth twitched in frustration. "You're going to leave me with them?" she hissed under her breath.
Vala leaned in. "You have to guard the ship. Same as always. If I'm not back in the usual amount of time, cut and run." She tilted her head in the direction of Jack and Daniel. "Those two are harmless. Ignore them if you want."
She turned to leave, but Gracie caught her sleeve. "Is it him?"
Vala stared at her, but said nothing. She couldn't provide her a solid answer. She left through the hatch, black crystal in her pocket and blaster in her hand.
Gracie watched her for a moment, ensuring Vala wasn't immediately shot to death upon disembarking, then closed the hatch. She hit a button on the wall, initiating a timer that started counting down on the displays around the ship. It was counting down in Goa'uld, Daniel noticed.
Jack approached, hands in pockets. "Gracie…" he started.
She looked back at him uncomfortably. But instead of responding directly to Jack, she addressed Daniel instead. "What is it that my mother owes you?" she said with more bravado than she actually felt.
Daniel blinked. "What makes you ask that?"
"She isn't getting any younger. She needs to retire. But I don't think all her debts are paid. You just might be the last one. So what is it?" she spat out. Daniel opened his mouth and closed it, unsure of how to respond. "Let's settle it," she demanded with a harsh tone.
"Hey, that is no way to talk to your Godfather," Jack reprimanded.
"And who do you think you are?" Gracie returned her attention to Daniel, who she was obviously regarding with distrust. "My mother. What's the debt?"
"There is no debt," Daniel replied calmly. "Clearly, we owe everything to her." He glanced at Jack in confusion.
"Don't play games with me. What is it that you want?"
"Gracie, where are you getting this idea?" Jack asked.
She pointed an accusing finger in Daniel's direction. "Every time he comes around, she runs scared afterward. She never tells me why. She won't let me help."
"Gracie," Daniel held his hands out in a calming motion, "I'm not a threat. Do you not remember me from when you were little?"
"No. What exactly is a Godfather? Is that some sort of host-symbiote thing?"
Daniel let out a breath in exasperation. Of course Vala wouldn't have explained the concept to her because she wasn't from Earth. "Not at all. Your father," Daniel pointed at Jack, "and your mother asked me to be a sort of special uncle to you. Someone to look out for you, especially if they couldn't do it themselves."
She crossed her arms, looking at him dubiously.
"It's true," Jack supplied. "And in a way, it looks like Vala became your Godmother."
"She is my mother."
Jack's face contorted in response. He recognized the gold hair and beauty of Sam, but the fierceness of Vala in her. He sighed. "I see that." He shook his head, eyes shining. "And look at you. Vala's done a Hell of a job."
Daniel pursed his lips, then nodded to agree. "Look, whether we time traveled or jumped realities or something else, the truth is, we care about you. We care what happens to you. There is no debt. We aren't a threat," he reiterated.
She looked between the two of them, unsure of what to make of this turn of events. She had been so sure of who she was before: she was Vala's daughter. But now she felt that certainty melting away. She'd long ago let go of the fantasy of ever meeting her real parents again. At least, she thought she had. "Then why…" Gracie struggled to maintain her calm, but soon tears began to escape. She looked to Jack, hoping against hope that he was real. She thought she'd forgotten his face. It bothered her that she couldn't clearly remember either of her real parents. But after seeing him now, she just knew that this was the face that belonged to her father. "Then why couldn't I ever go be with you?" She wiped at the wetness on her cheek with the back of her sleeve.
Jack's lower lip quivered. He moved quickly to pull her into an embrace he'd been missing for more than three days. Even though this girl was now ten times bigger, his arms naturally wrapped around her as they always had. "I don't know, baby. I don't know."
That sudden action was too much for Gracie. She didn't expect his hug, nor did she realize she wanted it so badly. She wished desperately to pretend that he was real. That her father was here. Eventually her arms also wrapped around him, too, hugging back against all her good sense. They stood for a few minutes as she began to heave, unable to control her emotional response.
Daniel swallowed a lump in his throat.
Gracie chided herself. She had to collect herself, knowing that this upheaval was going to put them in danger. She willed herself to calm the Hell down. Getting carried away now would do none of them any good. Gracie glanced at the timer on the wall as she pulled away.
"So…" She stepped back from Jack, willing her voice to stop shaking as she wiped at her eyes. "You know what happened to my birth mother?"
Jack and Daniel shrugged at each other, then nodded negatively. "Where we're from, your mother is alive. She's just far away," Jack answered.
"I don't know what makes Vala thinks she's gone," Daniel added.
"Well, she's dead."
"I can't believe that yet." Jack repressed a shudder. "Not yet." He continued to study Gracie, overwhelmed by just how much she resembled Sam. It was why he couldn't stop looking at her.
The ship chimed, signaling the timer was reaching its end. Then another sound pushed through from outside the hatch. A knock. Gracie moved to a wall console to check a video feed. It appeared Vala was at the door.
She turned around to retrieve the same weapon Vala stopped her from grabbing earlier. Then she aimed it at the door.
"Hey, what's going on?" Jack asked.
She didn't answer, instead hitting the button to open the hatch. As it did, Vala reappeared, a heavy cloth bag in hand. She was careful to move out of the line of fire and hit the panel again to close the hatch. Gracie's weapon remained raised until the ship finished sealing itself shut. "I was discouraging uninvited guests," she finally answered Jack as she lowered the blaster. Jack and Daniel shared a look of incredulity.
"Check the bag," Vala instructed, placing it on the center console and swiftly moving into the pilot's seat.
Gracie stowed her weapon and dumped the contents of the bag onto the counter. The shuttle began to lift off. Daniel and Jack automatically strapped into their seats, having learned the hard way that taking off with this pair of gals was no joke. Gracie, meanwhile, reactivated her mag-boots. Both women pulled their hair back into neat pony-tails.
She examined their payment, mouth moving wordlessly as she pointed at each bar of an unknown metal. Soon the darkness that previously enveloped the shuttle gave way to stars shining through the viewport. The bars began to float as their vessel exited the larger ship, its gravity losing a hold on anything inside. Gracie's lips finished moving silently as she did the final tally of the numbers.
"All there?" Vala asked from up ahead, well-strapped into the pilot's chair.
"I think so."
"What happens if it's not all there?" Daniel asked from his seat. He found his feet starting to rise aimlessly off the floor.
"Then we fly faster. Because it means we become target practice," the blonde responded matter-of-factly. Her pony-tail was floating behind her in the weightlessness.
Jack shook his head, in awe of the shit show this had all become. They observed through the viewport as swirling blue replaced the field of stars on black. If they hadn't seen it, they would've felt it by the way the vessel lurched as it entered hyperspace.
Vala's adopted daughter carefully arranged the metal bars and allowed the console to seal them into a compartment. She deposited the bag into a trash bin underneath. After glancing at Jack and Daniel briefly, she turned around to peer at the heads-up display on the pilot's console. She squinted at it. "Where are we going now?"
"It's time to see some old friends," Vala replied, never turning away from the console.
The younger woman raised an eyebrow. "What kind of old friends?" she asked.
"The kind that we don't swindle."
"Ahh. The good kind." She visibly relaxed.
"Yes."
Jack and Daniel shared a look of curiosity.
"Daniel," Vala called.
"Yeah?"
"Come sit with me. Gracie, help him."
She complied by walking over to Daniel, magnetized boots thumping on the deck plating as they consistently released and reengaged to allow her to walk. He looked to her with question in his expression. "I'm going to guide you to the that co-pilot seat up there. There's no gravity while we're in hyperspace. Can't afford the power drain." She unhooked his harness and motioned for him to stand. As he did so, she pushed down on his shoulders to keep him from floating his head into the ceiling. With one hand on his arm, she glided him forward in zero gravity to the aforementioned seat next to Vala. She had Daniel assume a sitting posture and carefully guided him into the seat. Then she strapped him in with the harness.
Vala, meanwhile, kept her attention on the pilot's console. "Good. Now make sure young Jack back there is secure."
Gracie's expression told Daniel she didn't appreciate being told what to do, but she didn't register her complaint aloud for Vala to hear. Instead she turned and left, leaving Daniel staring at his mysterious and now older-looking teammate. He surmised that Vala was dismissing Gracie as much as encouraging her to go be with her father.
In the other part of the ship, Gracie quietly checked Jack's harness, tightening it appropriately to keep him from floating about the cabin. He watched her the whole time, comparing her adult self to the little girl he had just seen a few days ago. "You're only three years old."
She raised an eyebrow at him. "I am not three." Glancing at her mother, now deep in conversation with her intimidating male friend, she decided she was uneager to join them. She stepped back to occupy Daniel's old seat. Gracie didn't bother with the straps for herself.
"Are you him?" she asked without hesitation, doubt evident in her tone.
"I'm Jack. I'm your dad."
"Hard to believe it."
"Why?"
"I've never heard much about time travel and that other nonsense. Those are just wild stories to me."
"Doesn't mean they can't be true."
"Prove it."
"Don't know how," he admitted, gesturing apologetically. "That was always your mom's department."
Her eyes sparkled at this, sensing he was referring to her birth mother. "Tell me about her."
Jack smiled gently. "I'll tell you everything you want to know," he promised.
"Vala…" he started.
But she interrupted. "Daniel. Let's get some things straight here. I will ask the questions. You will respond. Got it?" She turned her head fully to him now.
He blinked. "When did you get so bossy?"
"Ack! Me: Questions. You: Answers."
He sighed. "Alright, alright. Ask away."
"What year do you think it is?"
"2012."
"Who is the head of Atlantis?"
"Woolsey," he replied with derision.
Vala nodded. "Where's Sam?"
"On Atlantis."
"Why?"
"They needed her expertise to solve some sort of equation McKay was using to make new drones."
She locked eyes with him now. "Have you spoken to her?"
"Not since… a couple days ago."
"Daniel."
"Yes?"
"The minute you get back to wherever, or whenever, it is you belong, you call her. Okay?"
He scrunched up his face at her. "Because of Gracie?"
She grimaced. "Just call her."
"Okay," he agreed, not completely understanding. He wasn't sure he wanted to find out the reason behind the instruction.
"Now… what have you two idiots been up to for the mere three days you think that have passed since Gracie and I left Earth?"
"Fighting off an incursion at the SGC," he replied indignantly. She tilted her head, urging him to explain further. "The Trust organized a coordinated attack from within and on the outside. We had a Hell of a time rooting out who was compromised while we held key positions within the base. That included the control room, the gate room, one of the armories, and the infirmary." He brought a weightless arm up to rub the back of his neck in frustration. "We lost good people."
"I'm sorry." She glanced at the pilot console. "It sounds like Jack did the right thing sending Gracie away."
"He wouldn't have been able to concentrate knowing she was on base in the midst of all that."
"No, certainly not." She craned her neck to see that Gracie was safe in the central part of the shuttle. "And when it was finally over?"
"We immediately stepped through the gate to start finding you."
She seemed surprised. Her breath shuddered, thoughts of 'what if' swirling through her mind. "In my version of history, I didn't see you again until almost two weeks later."
"What!"
"I thought something bad had happened, Daniel. Jack was adamant that we stay away until someone we trusted came to fetch us."
"So what happened?"
"I don't know, Daniel. Certainly was not privy to those details. By the time you found us in hiding on some planet, you seemed… different."
"Different?"
"Rattled. Less assured. You strongly urged me to keep Gracie safe off Earth. I argued. You yelled. But you couldn't explain why it wasn't safe to come home."
"I don't get that. Why wouldn't I be honest with you?"
"Wish I knew, Daniel. Wish I knew." The console beeped and she temporarily attended to it.
Daniel sat quietly while she piloted the ship. He turned his head as best he could, still strapped into the co-pilot seat, to observe Jack and Gracie conversing calmly. "You said I'd only come to visit a few times a year?"
"That's right."
"What exactly would happen during those visits?"
She looked at him strangely.
"Gracie seems… afraid of me."
"She doesn't know you."
"No, it's more like she has the wrong impression of me." It was bothering Daniel more than he realized until now.
"You would insist that you couldn't tell me what was going on. On Earth. That giving me all the details would somehow put us in danger. And you'd always come when she wouldn't really see you, as if you were avoiding her." The pain in Vala's eyes was evident. "Sometimes I think she'd catch you sneaking away. Eventually, she stopped asking questions."
Daniel adopted a pained expression. "I'm sorry, Vala. I don't know why that would be." He shook his head. "Look, if it comes down to it and I get to do this all over again, I sure as Hell won't leave you alone without any resources or back-up. That's a promise."
She smiled sadly at him. "I'm sure you will," she said with an air of doubt.
"Did the other me… hurt you?"
Vala stared at him a long time. She seemed to be struggling with how to answer. "Not physically, no." She drew in a deeper breath. "But the secrets…" She met his eyes. "I can't stand not having the full picture. I used to get hints. Quick reports that this friend or that friend had died. But never enough indication that you wanted us back."
Something in Daniel's heart broke for her. "Is that why you'd always be upset afterwards?"
"How did you…" She huffed and looked at Gracie while shaking her head. "That mouth of hers…"
"Vala?"
"I'd be upset because you always had bad news, and then you would leave. Over and over. And you wouldn't take us with you." Her words were harsh and full of resentment.
Daniel reached out to clasp her hands. He wanted to kill his other self for doing this to them. Daniel knew better than most what Vala had been through in her past. He was supposed to be her friend, not the one digging a knife deeper into a long-suffering wound. He berated his other self for acting just like her father. "I'm sorry," he whispered.
"You'd always say that, too," she commented ruefully.
A/N: So, I'm back. I haven't churned out a piece that could potentially be long in a while, and honestly at the time of this writing, it's not finished. But I wanted to put it out there already and hopefully motivate myself to keep up with it. I've got about 10 chapters already written! This is an exercise in creativity – something to keep the mind sharp. Hope you can enjoy it with me along the way. Cheers!