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PART SEVEN
They wouldn’t let him see him at first. Apparently Janet still had herself and Daniel sealed up in the cargo bay as she finished performing her miracle with the meager supplies she had brought.
Though Sam had reassured Jack that the surgery had went well, he saw the shadows in her eyes.
“I had to assist,” she supplied softly, answering his silent observation unnecessarily, because Jack already knew where the shadows had come from. He recognized them well and looked out through his own. They were the memory of watching someone you love hurt.
Jack had wanted to tell her. He wanted to tell Sam, Janet…someone what he had almost done. How desperate he had nearly become. It was on his lips. ‘I nearly cut Daniel open, in, believe it or not, an attempt to save him.’ But his confession could wait. Seeing Daniel alive and breathing couldn’t.
But it wasn’t until after Janet came out a few moments later, removed the I.V. he didn’t even realize he had in and did some annoying vital checks, did she finally call Teal’c off.
If it weren’t for the fact that Jack actually needed assistance just sitting up, so stiff from holding the same position for days, he would have been up and pounding on the cargo bay door the second he had learned Daniel was in there…alive.
But now though…now as he finally sat beside his friend, breathing in the sight of him, relishing in the fact that pain did not crease his brow, that tremors did not wrack his body, Jack found himself afraid to touch him. Afraid to break the illusion. Afraid he’d wake up in that cave, arms full…but utterly alone…
Sam sat down heavily into the ‘co pilot’s’ seat of the Tel’tac. “He’s calmed down now that he’s with Daniel.” She answered sadly, glancing behind her at the object of their conversation.
“Good,” Jacob acknowledged softly, turning away from the controls and following his daughter’s gaze. When he looked back at her, his eyes softened at her dejected posture. “You couldn’t have known, Sammy.”
Carter deflated. “We brought Janet and half the infirmary, didn’t we?” she retorted testily. Daniel had already been in need of medical attention when they last saw them and she didn’t want to risk adding more days to the wait if he still needed it. Janet, of course, was all for it…but never did Sam think to…
Jacob frowned. “The healing device isn’t something to take advantage of, you know that, Sam. What are you going to do, start taking it on every mission?” Although, with SG-1’s track record, the Tok’ra mused, maybe it wasn’t such a bad idea after all.
But Sam wasn’t hearing him, lost in thought, she worried her bottom lip. “Maybe if we hadn’t waited so long to contact you, Daniel wouldn’t have been so close to…”
The older man sighed sadly. It never got easier watching your children beat themselves up. No matter how old they got. “Yeah, and maybe if I weren’t so far away to begin with. And maybe if we hadn’t burned out the hyper-drive trying to get here…” Jacob leaned forward and gently tilted his daughter’s chin up until she was looking him in the eyes. “You’re not a ‘what if’ girl, Sammy. You know the facts.”
Carter closed her eyes with a resignated sigh and then turned to the blue hues of the hyper-speed window, hoping it would offer her an excuse to feel as inadequate as she did, but it didn’t and she conceded woefully. “We did everything we could.” And it was barely enough.
For hours after they had stumbled backwards on the ramp-images of the enemy charging their friends imprinted into their minds and hearts, the Stargate wouldn’t even lock. And then they discovered that it had been buried. But unlike the situation on Edora…it wasn’t even safe for Teal’c to gate in and dig his way out. The ground was too unstable and there was fear of aftershocks which greatened his risks of being buried alive.
Teal’c didn’t care.
Hammond did.
When they finally made it to the planet they had unwillingly left their friends on, all hope was momentarily lost. The destruction… they couldn’t even tell where the Stargate used to be- where Jack and Daniel were last standing. It was as if the entire mountain had come down…and their friends were nowhere in sight.
Never would Teal’c forget the way Janet had to cover her mouth to hold back her shock and grief. Never would Teal’c forget the way Carter’s legs shakingly lowered her into her seat, or the grim expression set on Jacob’s face.
Never would he forget the tidal wave of relief that had washed over them all when two images suddenly popped onto their screens. For they knew who it was. They knew who it had to be.
Now, if she could just pry one ripe, graying colonel away from him so he could get his own much needed rest.
Janet watched mesmerized as Jack’s eyes never once wavered from Daniel. The man was beside himself, fighting his own exhaustion …but it was that which lingered in his mind, Janet suspected, that kept him at his friend’s side. She didn’t know what exactly had happened while they were trapped in that cave, but she could tell by the older man’s body language alone that it was something neither would soon forget. And for whatever reason, it was those same memories that had him repeatedly reaching out to Daniel, only to instead shakingly lower his hand back to the cot with fear in his eyes.
Janet looked on sadly, knowing that she carried no medicine that could help the colonel vanquish the demons their latest battle had left within.
At that, she decided to give him just a few more minutes before ordering him to lie down. Maybe the unexpected light that had wiggled his way into the colonel’s heart was all Jack needed to mend. That and time.
Walking up to Teal’c, who had been hovering over the two men practically since they had found them, Janet placed a comforting hand on his arm. “They’re both going to be just fine, Teal’c.”
The Jaffa bowed his head slightly in both acknowledgement and appreciation. For awhile there he hadn’t been so sure. When they had locked onto their heat signatures and ringed up his friends, who happened to be sitting within the transporter rings, as if waiting…
Teal’c had never seen his warrior brother so…stricken. Nor his heart brother so… lifeless. And as a stunned pause settled over them all at the scene, no one even noticed the few inches of water pooling at their feet.
After seeing them, Jack had immediately curled into himself and a limp Daniel, rocking. “You’re too late,” he had cried, refusing to let go so they could help, insisting that he was already gone, to just let them be; despite the fact that Daniel still breathed…though barely.
Knowing time was rapidly working against them, Frasier was forced to sedate their unusually emotional C.O. to get him to surrender his hold on Daniel. …and even then, they had to pry Jack’s fingers off of him.
Later when Jack had finally awoken, it was with their archaeologist’s broken name on his lips. The last he had remembered was holding Daniel in his arms…dead.
“We’re lucky those rings actually worked.” Janet mused aloud. “Sam didn’t seem so confident, but I…I just don’t know what we would have done if…” She shook her head, her eyes flooding from the scenario her mind conjured up.
They would have come so far…just to watch the blips on the monitor slowly fade away.
“They are fortunate” Teal’c rumbled softly from beside her.
Following the Jaffa’s gaze, she solemnly whispered back. “We all are”
Reaching out, Jack’s hand once again stopped just short of Daniel’s and grimacing, he cursed his cowardness and looked away. Rationally, he knew this, now, was real. His mind knew it. His senses couldn’t deny it. They heard truth with every ‘beep’ from the portable heart monitor. They saw truth with every rise and fall of Daniel’s chest.
But for the clichéd, hard ass military man he was supposed to be…it was his heart that had trouble catching up--that had trouble believing. Because it was his heart that had clung tighter to hope, to Daniel, with every beat for so long. And it was his heart that had broken in half, fighting every beat when he thought his best friend had finally succumbed to the poisoning in his body.
So raw, everything that lay before it still wasn’t enough. It needed to know…to hear the only two words that could ease its pain; two words that would let Jack know that it was alright…that it was real, that they were still holding on.
“Hey…”
Jack jerked his hand back, startled by the raspy voice and looked up into a pair of glazed blue eyes.
“Daniel,” he breathed leaning forward. “Hey,” he finally managed to greet past the lump in his throat. “How you feeling?”
Another weak smile was all he was rewarded with before Daniel’s eyes began to droop. Jack panicked and reached for the younger man’s hand, finally taking the now much cooler fingers in his own. He needed to know. “Daniel?” he pleaded.
Eyes fluttering open briefly, with a small grin, Daniel reassured him with two thickly spoken words before he was pulled back into a healing slumber. “I’m here.”
And for the first time since the world had brought them to their knees, it truly stilled. And Jack smiled. It was a tearful dopey smile, he hoped no one else had witnessed, but a smile nonetheless.
And he nodded to himself.
They were still holding on, still fighting. And Daniel would push on, just like always.
Leaning back against the wall, Jack let out a long held breath- comforted in the knowledge that death would be held at bay, kept within the borders of silence by the sound of his best friend’s heartbeat.
There would be no ‘goodbyes’ today.
Jack closed his eyes.
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A/N: So, there you go. MY version of Daniel's appendix bursting. lol Some of you might still have some questions left...((enter evil laugh here)) Well, this story is actually A LOT longer. I already have a scene written out for when Jack visits Daniel in the infirmary in 'Nemesis', but I felt this was a good ending and the story could stand alone. There will be a few more fics spanning over another ep or two that will kind of be a continuation of this one, but they will be slow to come. Sorry, but I must get back to 'The Awakening'. Thanks for reading!
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