"Qetesh," Daniel informs Jack as soon as he opens the door.
"Bless you," says Jack, taking two of the five cases of beer Teal'c is carrying and leading the way into his house.
"Vala was Qetesh," elaborates Daniel, following him.
"Bless you," Jack calls over his shoulder.
"Jack," chides Daniel.
"Save it 'til Carter gets here, Daniel," instructs Jack, cracking open a case. "I really don't wanna hafta hear it twice."
Daniel knows that Jack's perfectly capable of sticking his fingers in his ears and singing if he pushes it, so he drops it. Accepting the beer Jack hands him, he settles on the sofa and starts jotting notes and queries about Qetesh in his current notebook. Teal'c and Jack chat about some kind of sports and leave him to it. Fortunately, Sam soon arrive and Daniel starts speaking before she's even taken a seat.
"Teal'c says that Vala was host to Qetesh, the Egyptian goddess of sex and divine ecstasy, for about fifty years," he informs them.
"Does that mean she was a Goa'uld Queen, like Hathor?" asks Sam.
Daniel looks to Teal'c for the answer, and Jack and Sam follow his gaze.
"Not to my knowledge," Teal'c informs them.
"After we killed Ra on Abydos, there was an uprising and Qetesh was either killed or severely injured," Daniel picks the tale back up. "According to Vala, the Tok'ra saved her and removed Qetesh."
"Why?" asks Jack.
"I don't know," admits Daniel. "We haven't heard anything from the Tok'ra, yet."
"I sent a message to my dad," Sam tells him. "Still waiting to hear back from him."
"So, what, the Tok'ra just swoop in and resurrect a dying or already dead Goa'uld, and then remove the symbiote out of the goodness of their hearts?" Jack asks doubtfully. "I'm not buying it. Too un-Tok'ra. What's their endgame?"
"It might not have happened like that at all," says Daniel. "Vala's not exactly a reliable witness. Practically every word out of her mouth is a lie. It's entirely possible she lied about the Tok'ra. I'm not even sure Vala's her real name."
Not everything she said was a lie. Daniel remembers their last conversation aboard the Prometheus. How she'd stood there, proud and defiant, as she refused to apologise for being a thief, and his chest aches at the memory. She'd held herself like a Goddess, even then.
"Welp, we're not gonna know until they deign to tell us," shrugs Jack. "Might as well watch a movie while we wait."
Jack snickers every time a character mentions pirates, which is a lot. Daniel drinks to drown him out. He also drinks whenever he hears the words true love. He doesn't notice that his teammates are quietly replacing his beer whenever he finishes a bottle. He thinks he hates this movie. He definitely hates Jack for picking it.
By the time the four heroes ride off into the sunrise on white horses, Daniel's more than half-drunk. Pizza does little to sober him up, instead making him sleepy. He rests his head on the back of Jack's sofa and let his eyes drift shut as his friends talk about everything and nothing whilst the world spins them round and round and round.
Lost in a boozy haze, he can't stop the question that's haunted him since Vala healed him from bubbling into his head and out of his mouth, "Is that what Sha're would have become?"
His teammates hush, and even though Daniel's eyes are shut, he can feel them staring at them. Sam's the first to speak, her voice soft and sympathetic as she says, "Daniel, you can't think like that. They're two completely different women."
"Yeah," chimes in Jack. "Sha're was, well, Sha're. No way she would have turned into a badass space pirate."
"I know that," Daniel snaps, raising his head to glare at Jack because it almost sounds like he's is disparaging one of the gentlest souls he's ever known. Jack isn't, but Daniel's not willing to admit, even to himself, that he finds Vala utterly fascinating in a way he never felt about Sha're, and Jack's words have hit uncomfortably close to home. "That's not what I meant."
Jack's eyebrows raise and he replies mildly, "Then you should say what you mean."
"It's just – there's so much of Qetesh in Vala, I can't help but wonder if Amaunet's personality would have bled through for Sha're too," Daniel explains.
Everyone stares at him.
It's Jack who breaks the silence, "For cryin' out loud, Daniel! You barely know the woman, let alone Quiches!"
"Qetesh." Daniel corrects him automatically.
"Bless you," replies Jack.
"Jack!" snarls Daniel.
"You never met the damn Goa'uld, Daniel!" exclaims Jack, "How the hell would you know what she was like?"
"Let's see, Vala's ruthless, amoral, pathologically psychotic, willing to use her body as a weapon," lists Daniel. "I mean, the amount of times she offered to have sex with me!"
"Oh, really?" asks Jack, grinning salaciously. "Do tell."
"She didn't mean it," dismisses Daniel. "She was just trying to distract me, keep me off guard."
"Uh-huh," Sam mutters sceptically. Daniel has always been oblivious to the effect he has on women, but this is obtuse, even for him.
"Even after ten years, it's obvious Qetesh is still influencing Vala," Daniel informs them. "I can't help wondering if the same would have been true for Sha're." He sighs, scrubbing his face with his hand. "I don't know. I guess it's just dredged up some old stuff."
"That, I get," Jack says sympathetically, and hands him another beer.
"Sha're would have had the love and support of two worlds to rebuild her life," rumbles Teal'c. "This Vala did not."
Daniel frowns and squints at the alien, "So Vala's what Sha're could have been, not would have been?"
Why does that make him feel worse? What would Vala be like if she'd had the help and support of the SGC? The question intrigues Daniel so much, he rejects it completely, telling himself that there's no way Vala would ever tolerate the rules and regulations of life under the mountain.
"I don't know, Daniel," Sam says thoughtfully, "I don't think that's fair to either woman. I mean, you have no idea what Vala was like before she was taken as a host. For all you know, she was already like that."
"This is true," agrees Jack, saluting Carter with his beer.
"And let's face it," Sam's on a roll now. "The rest of the galaxy isn't exactly progressive. How many worlds have we visited where women are considered second-class citizens, or worse? Even the Jaffa refuse to allow women in their armies. Maybe Vala has to be that way to survive out there and, frankly, you wouldn't be judging her the way you are right now if she was a man."
"Well, that's definitely true," Jack mutters into his beer.
"Being a host is awful," Sam tells Daniel. "And it does change you. But even though you can't control anything that happens, you're still you. All of the host remains."
"Sam," Daniel says apologetically. "I didn't mean…"
"It's okay," Sam smiles reassuringly at him. "I know you didn't. I just think you're doing both Sha're and Vala a disservice. I honestly think you're giving Qetesh more credit than she deserves. And for the record, the General's right; Vala's a badass."
"Oh, God, she is!" groans Daniel, flopping back on the sofa and staring up at Jack's ceiling.
"It's okay, Danny-boy," Jack comforts him with a wicked smirk. "You're never gonna see her again, right?"
"Sir, there's really no such thing as jinxes," Sam informs Jack with a grin.
"Says you," Jack responds, grinning back at her.
"Thanks, Jack," Daniel replies in a monotone. "That makes me feel so much better."
"Always here to help," Jack tells him.
"Yeah," Daniel says sarcastically. "Sure. You betcha."