Beloved, a Stargate SG-1 story by Glacis. Rated NC17 for explicit sexuality and language.
No copyright infringement intended.
P4J305 looked like any other day at work. The MALP was happy, the air
was breathable, the DHD was intact. No obvious
hostiles.
So much for happy MALPs.
The strike force must have been hiding behind the Gate, pretty unusual
strategy, given past experience. Usually hostiles, Goa'uld,
Teal'c saw them first,
and felt more than heard Colonel O'Neill's cry of warning behind him. His
weapon was already raised, leveled and charging up. But the attackers were too
fast, too well trained. Knew precisely what they wanted. Energy flowed from the
hand weapons O'Neill had nicknamed 'Zat' guns, and
the powerful current pummeling his system set his muscles twitching, rendering
him helpless.
All he could do was lie there, teeth gritting, eyes fogging, as three
men,
The leader, as the one who kicked them appeared to be, spoke softly to the two carriers, too softly for Teal'c to hear. Then he dialed the device, but Teal'c was unable to see what address was used from his
position in the dirt, too caught up in the lingering effects of the energy stun
to move. The Stargate came to life, and Teal'c
wondered for a moment why they had taken the time to remove the SG-1 team
members from harm, then the three attackers and their human cargo disappeared
into the watery portal of the Stargate.
By the time they had recovered sufficiently to move, it was too late.
Daniel Jackson was gone, and they had no idea who had taken him. Or why.
Or where.
Daniel was in hell. That could be the only logical explanation for the
fact that his muscles were screaming at him, his head was imploding, all he
could hear was white noise and all he could see was darkness. Dimly he was
aware of being lifted, dumped into some sort of canister that appeared, oddly
enough, to be lined with heavily padded silk cushions, and then the faint tinge
of motion sickness convinced him that he was being carried someplace. The
by-now-normal disassociation of external stimuli that was Gate travel washed
over him, causing the symptoms that had begun to dissipate to wash over him
again.
He tried very hard not to vomit.
His head was just starting to settle back on his shoulders when the
canister was lowered with a thump to what sounded like a stone floor. An
echoing voice, backed by the power of a Goa'uld,
barked something at the servants who'd carried him. Something about gently, and
protection or protected, and heads. Or perhaps hands. It was hard to tell
through the ringing in his ears.
Two sets of hands, moving very carefully, cradled his back and legs,
lifting him from the canister and standing him in a basically upright position.
It helped his head.
Didn't do much for his situation.
He was in a Goa'uld stronghold -- that much
was clear from the glyphs engraved in the ostentatious gold-covered walls and
the vaguely pyramid-shaped throne room. He automatically counted the
Tuning back into the situation at hand, trying very hard not to wonder
at the absence of his teammates and hoping against hope that wherever they
were, they were alive, he stared at the Goa'uld. Who was staring right back at him. Smiling.
Normally, that would have been reassuring. Except, of course, that there
was nothing reassuring about a Goa'uld, unless it was
Tok'Ra, and even then Daniel had his doubts. This man
was tall, at least four inches taller than his own six one, and broad with it,
all muscle, not an ounce of fat that Daniel could see. His head was undoubtedly
shaved bald under the Egyptian headdress he wore, gold and turquoise and
copper. His face was serene, strong nose, full lips, wide eyes with long
lashes, but those eyes glittered, a deep brown that seemed to glow, and not
just from the presence of the Goa'uld. His arms and
chest glistened with a light sheen of oil, setting the armbands and worked
leather off nicely, and clean folds of pure white linen edged in gold fell to
his knees, met at the top of his calves by gold ties from the sandals on his
feet. He looked like a God come to life.
Whoever the Goa'uld was, he'd been doing it a
long time, and he had the pose down pat.
He started down the steps from the throne, and Daniel noticed with
peripheral vision that the
Stopping directly in front of Daniel, the Goa'uld
ignored the
As if reading his mind, the Goa'uld's
smile widened and the hand continued, trailing along the side of his jaw down
his throat, lingering over his Adam's apple, then tracing down to the hollow of
his collarbone, just beneath the collar of his undershirt. The Goa'uld leaned closer, eyes glowing with
eerie white light, smile widening further into something feral and predatory. A
word was whispered to him, and he was distracted by it, distracted enough that
he didn't see the
"Beloved."
What?
Whose?
Jack O'Neill was not having a good day. His skin hurt (along with
every major muscle group and not a few minor ones) from that fucking zat blast. He was still spitting dirt out of his molars
from being kicked over the side of the stairs like last week's trash bag. And
he really, really hated it when bastards took him by surprise and made off with
members of his team.
"Anything further to add, Colonel?"
Sam looked white and pinch-faced, and more than a little pissed. She was
pretty protective of Daniel. Teal'c looked impassive,
as usual, but there was a gleam in his eye that said, loudly, that he wanted to
dismember something. Preferably several somethings,
preferably slowly, and preferably the somethings
who'd taken their resident civilian.
He could relate. "No, sir," he finally answered. "We
went, we got zatted, Danny got snatched, we crawled home with our tails between our legs. I think
that about covers it." Frustration and anger leant a
harshness out of proportion to the cynicism of the words.
"Major, do we have any way of tracking the kidnappers?" Back to business. Even if it was useless.
Gotta love a leader who doesn't give up.
"Not directly, no, sir. We have been working on a system for tracking residual energy
signatures of wormholes after they've been destabilized, and we were able to
get back quickly enough to send a probe back to P4J305 that may give us a
starting point-"
Sam continued to babble techno, leaving every guy at the table in her
dust, but they all nodded encouragingly. Except Teal'c,
who didn't move, but sat there waiting for somebody to unleash him and aim him
at the enemy. Jack watched Sam's hands move as she went into a realm of
theoretical physics that few could understand, knowing that she was their best
chance to get Daniel back.
It galled the hell out of him to not be able to do anything. He fingered
his own collar, pulling it away from his neck. Him and Teal'c, two Rottweilers, and Sam,
their own personal targeting system.
He just hoped it worked. Soon. This whole
situation made him itchy.
"Why Daniel?" he finally blurted out, then looked an apology
at Sam for interrupting her. She smiled back at him, a little smile with more
than a bit of resignation in it. She was used to people tuning her out when she
lost them. Which was often.
"Tactical information is a no-go," he continued, into the
small silence that had fallen at his exclamation. "If
they'd wanted that they'd've grabbed me, or Sam,
since we're the military in the bunch. Or Teal'c,
but he'd've been tougher to crack." Dark eyes
questioned him, and he elaborated a bit. "You know their methods. They
were
Silence all around. Then a babble of suggestions. "Maybe it
has something to do with
Sam looked around the table and shrugged. "Maybe they just liked
the way he looked?"
Jack grimaced. It was as good an explanation as any.
The world was fuzzy, but at least it had colors again, and shapes, and
sounds, and sensations.
Weird sensations.
Daniel shifted, and realized several things simultaneously.
He was naked.
Lying on what felt like very fine linen sheets on a huge bed.
Things were fuzzy because somebody'd taken his
glasses away.
His hands were chained to the headboard.
He pulled his right hand toward his chest, and when his fingertips got
about level with his nipple the chain on his left wrist began to pull it in the
opposite direction. He repeated the experiment with his left hand, and as it
got parallel with his left nipple, his right hand was pulled back.
So, he could move his arms enough to keep them from falling asleep, but
not enough to actually fiddle with the cuffs. Not that he'd have much luck with
these cuffs if he could fiddle with them. The cuffs were finely wrought, thick
and solid, with a tiny keyhole, and padded along the inside with what felt like
velvet, folded over many times. His skin wasn't in any danger of being cut, but
he also wasn't in any danger of getting the damned things open without the key.
The chain itself, running from one cuff to the other through a channel in the
wood of the headboard that showed no signs of weakness, was solid steel,
lightweight but impossible to break.
Putting aside the disturbing questions raised by his nudity, the bed,
and the chains on his wrists, he stared around the room. Under other
circumstances, it might be considered welcoming, even homey, if one was an
Eastern potentate from before the turn of the century. Fine silk draperies hung
from the ceilings; the bed, a backless couch, and a couple tables were highly
polished, heavy dark wood; the walls were covered in delicately painted tile
mosaics. He couldn't make out the subjects of the paintings without his
glasses, but the overall impression was calming, rich and luxurious. On a table
beside the bed sat a gold tray inlaid with copper. The edging was encrusted
with semiprecious gems. It held half a dozen varieties of soft cheese, grapes,
strawberries, and a flagon of something that smelled like red wine.
Didn't quite fit with the image he had of the leader of this pack.
"Beloved."
If he hadn't been chained to the bed, they'd've
had to scrape him off the ceiling. The big guy from earlier had snuck in while
he was trying to figure out if the cheese was brie or
Daniel wasn't afraid to admit when he was intimidated, at least to
himself. He wouldn't give the Goa'uld the pleasure.
"Who are you? Why am I here? What do you want?" It came out
sounding more like one long word than a series of demanding questions, but at
least his voice hadn't cracked. That had to count for something.
"You never once betrayed me," the deep voice continued. Daniel
looked searchingly at him.
Nope. Didn't know this one from Adam.
Obviously, the man had mistaken him for someone else. He opened his mouth to
say so when the big man moved.
Onto the bed.
Onto him.
Opening his mouth was a bad idea, because it gave the guy room to stick
his tongue halfway down Daniel's throat. If he could have gagged without
choking to death, he would have. Then the oddest thing happened.
His skin started to tingle. Everywhere the other man's skin was touching
his. Everywhere the oil on that skin rubbed off onto his own.
It was oddly warm, soon becoming almost uncomfortably warm. Eventually the man
stopped trying to excavate Daniel's tonsils with his tongue, and Daniel was
able to move his jaw far enough to ask a question.
"Hunh?" Okay, it could have been more direct. But the oil was getting everywhere.
And ... it was starting to itch under the tingle.
"The others are strong warriors, yes, but they would have killed Me, and tried many times to do so." The words were
muffled against his neck as the man started nibbling from his earlobe to the
end of his collarbone, but Daniel could still make them out. Not that they made
any sense. "I heard you cry out for Me when you
thought I was dead. You, only you, Beloved, never turned away from Me."
The mouth, busy nibbling teeth and all, was hovering over his right
nipple now. When it wasn't talking, the equally busy tongue was circling over
his skin, rubbing the oil into him. His skin was twitching under the
combination of itching, burning oil and talented tongue.
Well. What a day for new life experiences.
Daniel still didn't know who the hell the guy was, but truth be told,
his body wasn't caring much at the moment. He hadn't been touched like this in
a very long time, if ever, and his mind was being thoroughly ignored by his
nerve endings.
"You could not forget. Even when you tried."
The mouth stopped roving over his chest and the head rose, intense dark eyes
staring down at him. A huge paw caught his chin, and held his head immobile. "As I could not forget you." A quick, hard kiss
that gentled into a long, thorough exploration, and the oil on the other man's
mouth was transferred to his own lips. They immediately began to tingle. The
man's head rose again, and he licked his lips. "Beloved," he said again,
a name, a benediction, a blessing.
Daniel was completely confused, and more turned on than he could
remember. Well, there were one or two really intense sexual experiences in the
last few years, but he'd been drugged for most of them. And like he'd told Hathor, he really tried not to remember
...
His brain went blank as that mouth closed over an erection he didn't
realize he had. Then squeezing fingers, questing tongue and suction stronger
than anything he'd ever felt threatened to suck his spine right out through the
end of his penis. Daniel thought he screamed, but he couldn't be sure. Couldn't
be sure of anything, but the fact that he came so hard the world went away. Again.
Sam stared at the computer models for the eleven hundredth time and
resisted the urge to scream, curse, weep, or drop kick the damned thing into
another dimension. It wasn't working.
Once more, she was expected to pull a technological rabbit from the
computer hat, and she wanted to, desperately. Daniel was special, as important
as any member of her team, but more vulnerable than any of the others, and she
felt the same responsibility toward him that the Colonel and Teal'c did. Maybe more so, in her own
way. She was a scientist too, she knew what motivated him in a way the
men never could. She wanted him back home, where he belonged.
The computer wasn't helping.
Her methodology wasn't just theoretical, it was practically wishful
thinking. But it might work, if she could just figure out a way to wrench the
mathematical models tracing the course of the wormholes' traces into a logical
pattern. It was a little like following ant tracks in a sand dune in the middle
of a wind storm. Nearly impossible ... but not quite.
She rubbed her eyes, swigged the last gulp of coffee long since gone
cold, and rested her chin on the palm of her hand. Staring at the screen, she
visualized the process one more time. It had to work.
It just had to.
Daniel didn't have any idea how long he'd been there, but it couldn't
have been as long as it felt like. Something must have been in that oil other
than whatever made it hot and itchy, because he was so horny he felt like he was
going to spontaneously combust. The Goa'uld had
sucked him off five times already, each time making him come so hard he'd
either grayed out or completely lost consciousness. He'd come around the first
time to see the man lying next to him, propped on one arm, staring down at him.
Hungrily.
There was a trace of white dried beside the man's mouth. Daniel stared
at it, fascinated, then opened his mouth to ask, once
more, who the hell the guy was.
A cup was held to his lips before he could form the words, and he
swallowed to keep from choking as warmed wine flowed over his tongue. Once he
tasted it, he realized he was incredibly thirsty, and he swallowed the rest
quickly. It made his head swim.
Might not have been the best idea he'd had in awhile. Taking a deep
breath, he tried again. This time when he opened his mouth, a grape was popped
past his teeth. He had the choice of chewing and swallowing or choking, again.
The whole tray of finger foods and every last drop of the wine went the
same way.
The man fed him with one hand and kept up a continual caressing motion
all along his body with the other. Along the side of his
neck, down across his chest, playing with a nipple along the way. Down
over his ribs, firm enough not to tickle, then along his hip, curving under to
play along his buttock, then back to the top of his thigh. Over
to his knee, then along the inside of his thigh, until he got to Daniel's
testicles.
That's when it became a real task not to inhale something solid and
choke to death.
He was mid-strawberry when that hand wove behind his balls and starting
playing his perineum like a baby grand. He never knew he had so many erogenous
zones in an area he normally only touched to clean himself.
Down to his anus, round and round, up to his ball sac, over and under, back
down again.
Daniel heard whimpering, and it took him a few minutes to realize it was
coming from him.
The oil, combined with the movement of that hand on his body, was making
him insane. He writhed on the linen sheets, not sure if he was trying to get
away or get closer, only knowing he needed relief. Needed the
torment to stop. Or never wanted it to stop. He
didn't know which, and didn't know why.
Swallowing down the last of the berry, he tried, one more time, to ask
his question. If he could just remember what it was he needed to ask. He knew
it was important.
That head bobbed down and that mouth inhaled him again, and the only
thing that came out of his mouth was a scream.
The next three times he woke up, it was deja
vu all over again. He didn't know whether he was going to expire from
exhaustion or just pass out and never wake up again. The Goa'uld
had stopped saying anything, partly because his mouth was usually full, and
partly because Daniel couldn't have understood him even if he had talked. One
word, though, came through clearly, and worried at what was left of Daniel's
mind. It was important, if he could just stop feeling and be able to think
long enough to figure out why.
"Beloved."
Jack believed, deep inside in the place where things were taken on
faith, that Samantha Carter was a miracle worker. If anybody could figure out a
way to find Daniel, Sam would be the one. But Jack was also a military man from
way back.
He had a Plan B to fall back on.
Like most Plan Bs, it wasn't as good as Plan A. There was a reason why
it was a B instead of an A. But if it wasn't quite good enough to figure out where
Daniel had been taken it was at least good enough to find out by whom.
He stared at the small scrap of writing SG-5 had brought back from their
most recent mission. Jack had sent out a coded request for help, to be
answered, if it was answered, by an information drop on P9D722. Where SG-5 had gone that morning. Returned
this afternoon. With what little information the Tok'Ra
had been able to give on the mysterious disappearance of one Doctor Jackson.
Jack stared at the name inscribed on the paper,
and actually heard the enamel on his teeth crackle as he ground them together.
He'd killed her. He knew he'd killed the bitch. He knew it.
Marching briskly to the General's office, he rapped once and walked in.
"Hathor has him, sir."
"I thought Hathor was dead!" The
general actually dropped his pen. Jack could really relate.
"Not nearly dead enough." Not yet, at least. When he caught up with the bitch, this time he'd
make sure.
As soon as he got Daniel back.
Daniel was nearly insensate from sensory overload, and his penis felt
like it was going to explode if anyone touched it again. He'd shifted over onto
his right side sometime during his sleep, or coma, or whatever one would call
the periods of unconsciousness between the bouts of incredible head. His hands
were curled into fists, the right one up by his ear, the left against his
chest. His right leg was straight, balancing his body, and his left was bent at
the knee, curved up in an attempt to keep his painfully sore genitals away from
prying hands. Or mouths.
By the time he realized this left his ass completely unprotected, it was
much too late.
He felt the bed dip behind him, and a warm wall with at least ten hands
swarming over him lay down behind him. Close enough to sear him with its body
heat. The hands resolved themselves into two when they finally stopped roaming,
and settled on his buttocks. More of that damnedable
oil was slicked down over him, and he felt the flesh being parted, probed, stretched.
Too tired to protest, or move for that matter, Daniel buried his face
against his right shoulder and waited for it to be over. He was utterly
drained, and that relaxation actually helped as he was breached for the very
first time. Fullness, heat, strength, the impression
of bulk that seemed to go so far into him he could feel it at the back of his
throat. Motion, sparks of arousal he'd've thought
impossible but felt nonetheless, as that bulk moved over something deep inside
him. He moaned.
Couldn't stop moaning.
There wasn't enough fluid left in his body to allow him to come,
although the semi-rigidity his abused penis managed did hurt, brushing against
the linen. It felt like sandpaper, his skin was so sensitized. It was almost
enough to take his mind off what was happening behind him. Almost.
Except that he was liking it. A lot. A fact which paralyzed the few
neurons that had managed to survive being fried by the marathon sessions of
oral sex earlier.
His hips were moving of their own accord, in part to avoid the now
painful scraping of his pitiful excuse for an erection against the sheets, but
mainly so he could feel that incredible sensation in his ass. It wasn't just
the oil. It was the fact of being fucked. Who'd've
guessed.
He never would have.
It felt so good. Vaguely he was aware that the moaning was louder now,
that words were mixed up in it. Words like yes, and harder, and god,
and deeper, and more. Fuck me was pretty distinct,
and please came up more than once. By the time the man burrowing into
his body slammed against him one, two, a third final time and he felt the hot
gush of fluid deep within him, Daniel was converted.
It was simply incredibly good.
Words were flowing past his own ear, and he
gathered all the strength he had left to concentrate on their content. They
were marginally more coherent than his own cries,
although there was a definite breathlessness that bespoke satiation from both
ends of the connection. Then the sense of the words exploded in his brain like
a landmine, and all the hazy contentment vanished along with the last ounce of
arousal in his system.
"I shall rule the universe, with you by my side, Beloved. With your
seed, more children shall come, and My glory shall
shine forth again. As it should be, my Beloved."
He knew those words. But it wasn't possible. Forcing the word past a
throat gone tight and dry, he whispered, "Hathor?"
The man behind him nuzzled his neck, and Daniel shivered.
"Yes, Beloved."
"How?" Daniel managed to croak out. "You're ... you're ... a man."
A warm chuckle ghosted over his nape, and Daniel stilled completely.
"Did you honestly think the gender of the host determined the
Queen?" Daniel had a quick, utterly inappropriate flash to the road scene
from Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, before the strong grip around his waist
brought him back to the nightmare that was his current reality. "Goa'uld do not require clumsy
methods of procreation such as wombs and vaginas. Merely the
seed of the host." A long lick from that talented tongue between
his shoulder blades, and Daniel closed his eyes.
Oh, yeah, Hathor had gotten her ... his ... its
seed. As much as Daniel had had to give.
"Why'd you fuck me?" he asked. It hadn't been necessary. Hathor had gotten what she'd ... he'd ... why the hell
couldn't English have a gender-neutral personal pronoun, anyway? His mind shied
away from the fact that he'd once more been raped for his DNA by concentrating
on inanities of language.
"Pleasure, my Beloved. Purely for pleasure."
As the Goa'uld gently disentangled his limbs
from Daniel's and climbed off the bed, a tear squeezed from Daniel's
tightly-shut eyes. Damn Hathor to hell anyway. Because it had been a pleasure. An
incredible pleasure.
For both of them.
She didn't quite cry '
Sam would have kissed her, but she was too busy typing. It worked. She
checked the numbers one last time, ran the fourth statistical probability
count, and headed for the general's office. She didn't even think that he might
not be there, since it was the middle of the night. Of course, he was there.
She barged in after a cursory knock and waved the print-out in his direction.
"Sir! I've got
it! I know where they took him. Whoever they were--"
"Hathor," came
Jack's voice from the corner of the office. Sam swung around to face him.
"But ... but ... I thought you killed her?"
"Not dead enough, apparently. But if you can find her, Major, I can damned
well do it again." More thoroughly this time, his expression said. He
didn't have to say it out loud. She nodded agreement.
"It's a Gate we haven't explored before, one of the oldest on the
map, near the edges of the Gate's range. Pretty sparse out
there. I think she's hiding."
"Not a surprise, given she was poaching on other Goa'uld's
outposts the last time we ran across her. She probably has half the system
lords trying to find her, make her pay for stealing their
"Like she stole our Daniel."
The three looked at each other for the space of a heartbeat. O'Neill
said it best. "Sweet."
"Find him,"
Before there's a whole galaxy of little Goa'uld
out there with Daniel's eyes, Sam thought, but also left unsaid.
Hathor settled gently
into the giant birthing tub. The fluid bubbled around her, steam rising, the
smell redolent with the nutrients the young would need to survive until they
were placed in hosts. Reaching below the surface of the water, shifting the
bulk of male human genitalia out of the way of the birthing opening in the
belly of the host, Hathor sighed.
Mating with the Beloved had been as satisfying as the first time, if a
trifle unusual. Hathor preferred female hosts,
enjoying the lush sensitivity of breast and vagina, but either gender would
serve. And the male body had the advantage of defensive strength, as well as
being an excellent hiding place. This body was much more difficult to overpower
than a female host, and the System Lords would not immediately think to search
for Hathor in a male body. It was not the usual
choice.
Not to mention the unusual enjoyment of a penis. Hathor
stroked the length of flesh, flaccid now under the warm water, and smiled.
Daniel had enjoyed it, as well. He had been a virgin, to the second act of
love. It had been ... stimulating to partake of that virginity. He had reacted
well, strongly, with the innate sensuality that had drawn Hathor
to him from the beginning.
A tremor passed along the muscles of the opening in the host's abdomen,
and Hathor smiled, eyes closing, head going back. Soon. Soon there would be an army of
With no mercy, for any but the Beloved.
The attack went with perfect precision and in near-total silence. SG-1,
SG-3 and SG-6 rolled through the Gate, SG-1 at point, and took the minimally
guarded palace with no casualties. Among the friendlies, anyway.
"Eight
"Hathor is vastly undermanned," Teal'c responded in a whisper. "Her armies are reduced
to the few she can steal from others."
"Others like us," Sam gritted out, then Jack gestured toward
the throne room and the second phase of the attack was on.
The group split at the throne room, O'Neill leading SG-1 further into
the darkened passageways of the palace while SG-6 took the anterooms to the
throne room, and SG-3 guarded the flank and the Gate. Behind them, Jack, Sam
and Teal'c heard volleys of automatic weapon fire and
the whoosh of flame throwers. Sounds of attack were followed by an unearthly
scream, and the unmistakable odor of burning Goa'uld.
"Smells familiar," Jack quipped absently. Neither of his team
responded.
Nobody said much of anything.
They'd found the bedroom.
"Oh, Danny-boy," Jack breathed, then
moved forward. Daniel was curled up on a bed the size of the Titanic, and both
bed and man looked pretty well wrecked. He was naked, covered in bite- and
finger-sized bruises, dried sweat and what looked a hell of a lot like semen.
Jack put a knee up on the bed, peering down at what he could see of Daniel's
face. There were tear tracks along the pale cheeks, and long eyelashes were
stuck together in salty clumps.
"That bitch!" Jack hissed. Daniel responded, waking up
suddenly and trying to either scramble off the bed or curl into a ball. That's
when they saw the chains.
Sam didn't say a word, just ran to the opposite side of the bed and
pulled at the chain, trying to figure out how to get Daniel loose. Jack put a
hand on the quivering shoulder hunched into the pillows.
"Hang on, Daniel, we'll get you out of this," he said as reassuringly
as he could. How, he didn't know, but they would. The shivering eased a
fraction.
"Jack?" Tear-clogged, rusty, sounded like
he'd blown his voice out. Probably screaming.
Jack closed his eyes, gritted his teeth, and patted Daniel's shoulder gently.
"Yeah, buddy. Hang on."
Sam looked up at Jack with frustration on her face. "It's pretty
solid, sir," she growled, pulling at the chain. Daniel's left hand was
yanked up by the pressure, and Sam let go of the chain quickly. "Sorry
about that, Daniel."
"This will assist you in your effort," Teal'c
put in suddenly, taking up a small object from the table by the door and
striding over to the bed. He held out what looked like a stubby hatpin to Sam,
whose face lit up.
"Excellent!" She took it from him and started rooting around
in the tiny hole on the left cuff. Daniel stared dully off into the distance.
Jack watched a slow blush rise along the side of Daniel's neck, and reached out
to pull up the cover, belatedly realizing the man might like a little privacy. His
hand collided with Teal'c's.
Looking up quickly, he noted an unusual look on Teal'c's
face. The dark eyes were wide, fixed on Daniel's body, and they looked slightly
glazed. Jack tore his eyes away from Teal'c and
determinedly pulled the cover up. He wasn't going to go there. He just wasn't.
Although he had to admit, pissed as he was at Hathor,
Jack had to admire her taste.
The cuff gave with a slight squeal, covered by Sam's hissed, "Yessss!" Daniel didn't say anything, just offered his
right hand for the same treatment.
From the doorway, Jack heard running footsteps. He looked up at Teal'c, who by this time seemed able to look away from
Daniel. Jack jerked his head toward the door. He didn't have to say a word. Teal'c took off toward the door at a controlled run, and
blocked any view from the hall. There was a muffled report, and Teal'c's clear, "Yes, we have Daniel Jackson. Is Hathor neutralized?"
"He's deader than a doornail, up in flames," Hodges, commander
of SG-6, reported. Jack snorted, mentally. Yeah, he'd thought the same thing. A couple of times. First fire, then ice, now fire again.
Then he thought back over Hodges' words.
He?
HE?
Jack looked back at Daniel.
Oh, fuck.
Then Sam cracked the second cuff, Teal'c came
back to report that SG-6 was joining SG-3 at the Gate and waiting for them,
there were clothes to round up, Daniel to support, and a final run for the
Gate.
Jack very carefully didn't think at all, all the way home.
He especially didn't think about how good Daniel felt, tight up against
his side, arm around his waist, head against his shoulder. He wasn't going to
go there, goddamnit.
Not now. Maybe not ever.
Not if he could help it.
The briefing was long and unpleasant, but not as long and unpleasant as
the physical exam. Doctor Fraiser was nothing if not
thorough. Thankfully, she was also gentle, understanding, and extremely
discreet.
Daniel sat in the control room, empty now, since it was the middle of
the night. He stared at the Stargate.
So many things had happened to him since this had all begun. He'd learned so much, about other cultures, other peoples, other
worlds. There had been a lot of horrible along with the wonderful, but he'd
learned to separate the bad from the good, learned to accept knowledge
regardless of the cost and keep the wonder of that knowledge separate from the
pain of its gaining.
Even when that knowledge was about himself. Perhaps, especially when that knowledge was about
himself.
He shifted on the hard seat, cautious in his movements. It would take a
few days for his body to recover. Much longer for his
emotions to recover.
He wasn't sure if his mind would ever fully recover. He wasn't sure if
this particular knowledge was worth the pain it had cost. Was even less sure if
it was worth the pleasure it had cost.
The sound of a throat clearing behind him interrupted his increasingly
confused thoughts. "You okay, Daniel?"
Jack. One of the few constants in his life.
"I don't know," he answered honestly.
"Wanna talk about it?" Hesitant, but sincere.
"Not now. Maybe later."
Maybe never.
Maybe in a few days. When his body had recovered. Or a few months,
when he was more emotionally stable. Stray thoughts whispered at him, memories
played, nerve endings prickled. Bulk was replaced with more compact muscle,
hatred with friendship, rape with respect.
Okay, maybe sooner rather than later.
Daniel smiled at the Stargate. Jack came further into the room and
stopped at his shoulder. They stayed there for a very long time. "Whatcha looking at?" he asked finally.
"Myself," Daniel said, very softly.
Jack's hand came up and rested, lightly, on his shoulder.
Daniel let it rest.
Light green eyes stared at the ruins of her plans one final time.
Stepping over the charred body of her previous host, the slim young woman
stepped from the shadows of the gutted palace and walked, alone, toward the
Stargate. In her wake trailed the few household servants still remaining, and
two lone
It would take time. Cunning. Resolve.
Eventually, she would find her way back from hiding to a position of strength.
Then she would have her revenge on those who would thwart her and, once again,
take her Beloved.
FIN