Children of Circumstance

"Colonel O’Neill?"

The Jaffa’s voice sounded oddly questioning, which was the first thing that gave Jack O’Neill an inkling that something was wrong. The second thing was the headache that, while not quite bad enough to be described as pounding, he suspected would become so as soon as he either moved or opened his eyes.

"O’Neill." Teal’c’s voice was becoming more insistent, and at last Jack responded, putting his hands to his face and rubbing his eyes vigorously in a futile attempt to quell the headache, before he finally opened his eyes.

"Teal’c. ‘M ok," he mumbled. Teal’c was kneeling over him, his eyebrows arched high. To those unused to the Jaffa, that could have meant anything, since eyebrow movement generally seemed to be his sole way of expressing any of a whole range of thoughts or emotions. To Jack, however, that particular eyebrow look meant that Teal’c was concerned, and somewhat confused.

"Are you alright O’Neill?" Teal’c questioned further, almost imperceptively relieved that Jack had finally rejoined the land of the conscious.

"Yeah I…." Jack stopped. Something wasn’t right. His voice wasn’t right. He looked down at himself and it occurred to him that somehow his fatigues, shirt and jacket had become too large, and were hanging baggily off his body.

Movement off to his right caught his eye, and he turned to see a blond young teenaged girl helping an even younger, smaller boy to his feet. The boy then promptly fell over his obviously adult sized fatigues.

O’Neill’s inkling that something was wrong suddenly became a certainty, as an all too familiar bad feeling settled in the pit of his stomach.

"What the hell is going on?" he asked, mostly rhetorically. Teal’c decided to offer an answer anyway.

"It would appear, O’Neill, that you, Major Carter and Daniel Jackson have been transformed into children."

"Well, strictly speaking," piped up the obviously not-yet-broken voice of Daniel Jackson, "Our bodies have been transformed into children. My mind is still, well, me." As he was saying this he was methodically tightening his belt and rolling up the legs of his fatigues in a mostly futile attempt to make them fit his now very small and thin frame.

"Same here," said Sam Carter looking slightly more relieved across at Jack as he stood up. "What about you, sir?"

O’Neill hesitated as he looked down at himself. At least he didn’t seem to be quite so dwarfed by his clothes as Daniel was, but it was still more than a little disconcerting. He didn’t remember being this short since high school, and suddenly Teal’c seemed to be looming even more than usual standing next to him. Realising that Sam was still waiting for an answer he nodded, and said "Yeah, its still me in here."

For the first time since waking up he took the opportunity to look around. They were in the middle of a large grassy clearing, forest stretching away to the right, and the familiar metallic grey ring of the stargate in the distance to the left. Behind him was a large domed building, oddly reminiscent of the British Millennium Dome, except that it was a pale metallic grey colour, and did not appear to have any windows, doors, or openings of any kind on its smooth surface.

On seeing the dome Jack’s memories flooded back into place. This was P4X227. They had stepped through the stargate to explore this world five hours ago. The dome being the only obvious sign of civilisation within sight of the gate, they had headed straight for it, but it had taken an entire walk around its circumference to realise that there were no signs of an entrance or opening of any form in the building, if indeed it was a building at all. Jack remembered Daniel and Sam starting what looked like one of their incomprehensible discussions of what it might be, when he had noticed a faint humming sound. Faint, but getting louder. He had been on the point of asking if anyone else heard it when there had been a series of blinding flashes, and the next thing he remembered was Teal’c waking him a few moments ago.

Five hours? Jack’s train of thought pulled to a sharp stop and he double-checked his watch in surprise. By his reckoning that made about four hours unaccounted for after whatever the humming and flashing had been.

"Ok," he said slowly, trying to unobtrusively hitch his fatigues to a less baggy position. "Who wants to bet that whoever, or whatever, did this is inside the dome thing?"

"Seems logical," said Daniel, finally managing to stand up, but still looking supremely comical. "Shame we can’t get in."

Jack felt a sudden rush of frustrated annoyance, and quickly found an alternate target to direct it at than the archaeologist.

"I don’t know about that," he said, swinging his automatic rifle up and emptying half a clip against the side of the dome at short range. As a release of frustration it worked. As a method of gaining entry to the dome it was an abject failure, no perceptible mark having been left on the surface. As he stopped shooting the sound of fire was replaced by the sound of Sam and Daniel yelling in protest at him.

"Jack! What do you think you’re doing?" Daniel demanded as he stumbled across, trying desperately not to fall over again. "They’re really going to want to reverse what they’ve done if we blast our way in like that."

Jack swung round to face the boy next to him and practically yelled in his face "Well I don’t see them coming out here to do that, do you?"

They glared at each other for a long moment, Teal’c and Sam standing back, unsure quite what was happening. Jack couldn’t explain to himself why he was feeling quite so angry at Daniel, so to avoid the confrontation going any further he spun round to face Teal’c.

"Try a staff weapon blast."

Teal’c cocked his head slightly as Daniel blew up at Jack.

"Didn’t you listen to a word I just said?" he demanded. His show of resistance was somewhat let down at that point by his still adult sized glasses sliding off his face and landing at his feet. Jack turned his back on the ‘boy’ and looked expectantly at Teal’c.

"Sir, are you sure?" Sam asked tentatively. "Are you ok?" she added as an afterthought.

"I’ll be fine once we get inside that thing and get our normal bodies back," he snapped, ignoring the spluttering and gesticulating Jackson.

Teal’c stepped forward and levelled his staff weapon at the point O’Neill had fired on previously. The blast had about the same visible effect on the surface of the dome - nothing.

"Well that got us far," Daniel noted, his voice dripping sarcasm. Or rather, that was probably the intention, but with such a childish voice it actually came out sounding more like a petulant whine.

Sensing another flare up Sam stepped in. "Sir, perhaps we should head back to the gate." When Jack’s angry eyes rested on her, she forged ahead, attempting to forestall further argument. "We obviously aren’t going to break in, and considering the way we look, and the way you two are behaving, we need to get checked out by Dr Fraiser. She might be able to figure this out without us needing to make contact with who, or whatever is in the dome."

There was a long silence, in which Jack finally managed to get his temper under control. Why the hell did I lose it quite that badly? He thought to himself worriedly. Perhaps Carter had a point.

"Alright," he decided, taking one more look at the dome. "We go back." As he gathered up his pack he muttered, "Fraiser’s gonna have a fit when she sees this."

The walk back to the gate took rather longer than the walk in the opposite direction had done, mainly due to three quarters of SG1 having somewhat shorter legs this time. Well, actually it was primarily Daniel holding them up. Not content with the struggle not to fall over his clothing, he was also unable to carry his pack, and after seeing him gamely attempt to drag it a couple of metres Teal’c picked it up and carried it for him.

"Daniel, dial us home," Jack ordered when they reached the gate, turning to check Carter was ready with the GDO signal. He was well into a conversation with Carter before he realised it was taking longer than usual for the wormhole to engage. He turned around to see Daniel standing on tiptoe, stretching to reach a symbol on the top of the DHD.

"Teal’c, a little help here?" Daniel finally asked, admitting defeat, and looking somewhat embarrassed at himself. Jack couldn’t help the smirk for a moment, before his protective instincts kicked in, and he put a consolatory hand on Daniel’s shoulder as they walked up to the wormhole that Teal’c had finally established.

"Yeah," he sighed. "Fraiser’s gonna have a fit."

It had taken a whole battery of medical examinations and blood tests, followed by a plethora of questions that only the members of SG1 would know the answers to before General Hammond was entirely convinced that the three children in front of him were the members of his primary team. Now after an impromptu debriefing was over, and someone had finally routed out sets of fatigues and t-shirts that actually fitted (although truth be told Daniel still looked a little dwarfed in his), Hammond was standing in the infirmary looking them over with a more than usually perplexed expression.

"Well Doctor?" he asked turning to Dr Janet Fraiser. "Can you explain what in god’s name has happened here?"

Janet glanced down at her clipboard full of notes one more time before starting. "Well sir, aside from mild headaches medically they appear to be fine. Mentally they are they adults that we know. Physically…. Well… Colonel O’Neill appears to have the body of a mid teenager, approximately fourteen or fifteen years old. Major Carter seems to be around twelve or thirteen, and Dr Jackson I’d guess at around nine or ten, possibly younger although he assures me that until his late teens was small for his age, so I’m willing to go with the upper estimate." She paused for breath, glancing at Daniel, who shrugged and pushed his glasses back onto his face as they threatened to fall off again. Smaller sized replacements for those were proving a little harder to come by.

"I’m guessing that Teal’c wasn’t affected because his symbiot provided some kind of resistance," Dr Fraiser continued. "As to how this was achieved…. I’m afraid I really can’t tell you until we’ve got more test results back. And without knowing how it was done, I’m at a loss to know how to reverse the effects." While saying the last, Dr Fraiser managed to both look entirely military and professional to General Hammond while at the same time throwing Jack, Sam and Daniel an apologetic, yet reassuring look.

General Hammond bit back an impatient sigh. "Alright Doctor. Keep working on it, and I want to know the minute you get some results. In the meantime," he turned to SG1, "None of you, including you Teal’c, are to leave the base until further notice."

"Sir," O’Neill started, his tone of voice suggesting to everyone that Hammond wasn’t going to like what Jack was about to suggest. "What about P4X227? I still think our best shot at finding out what did this is inside that dome."

Hammond nodded, almost imperceptively. "Be that as it may Colonel, it seems from your report that there is no way of accessing the interior, and I’m not willing to let this happen to any more of my men until we understand it better. P4X227 is currently off limits to all SG teams. Besides, the three of you are in no condition to go off world right now." The finality in his voice told Jack not to push this one. Not just yet anyway.

"But we’re still free to work on it from here on base, aren’t we sir?" Carter asked

"I’m pretty much counting on it Major. Just take it easy, ok? You’ve all had something of a shock to the system, no doubt. Don’t overdo it." He looked at them all again rather curiously, before leaving the infirmary.

"Well," Janet said when Hammond had gone, "You’re all free to leave the infirmary, but, and I mean this, if any one of you notices any change in your condition, however slight, I want to know about it right away. Is that clear?" She was giving them her best ‘I’m you’re doctor so you’d better damn well listen to me’ look, and they all knew better than to argue with her.

"So, what now kids?" Jack asked, with what sounded like rather forced chirpiness, after Dr Fraiser had returned to her office leaving SG1 alone.

They all looked at each other silently for a long moment, and Teal’c took the opportunity to properly take in his companions’ new appearances. Jack had become a stocky teenager, his military short grey hair replaced by slightly longer, thicker brown. Despite a certain air of restlessness he was beginning to look a little more comfortable with his situation (or rather, a little less uncomfortable), and the wry look on his face was pure O’Neill. Sam was now a tall, slim, and slightly gangly girl, her blond hair still cropped short in a tomboyish way, and it was possible to see the adult that this child would/had become in her face. Daniel, on the other hand, was changed almost beyond recognition, appearing so much younger. He really was small and thin for his supposed age and the changes of puberty were yet to start moulding the man from the soft childish features. It was only by looking into his blue eyes that Teal’c could convince himself that this really was his friend. It was possibly this reason why Daniel looked so much more lost and uncomfortable with his situation than either Jack or Sam, and his unease was beginning to show itself by his constant fidgeting. Or possibly, Teal’c allowed, that could merely be down to the slightly too large clothes he had been provided with.

When no one answered Jack’s question, Teal’c said, "Major Carter. Did you have anything in mind when you spoke to General Hammond about working on your predicament from here?"

Sam looked sheepish for a moment as all eyes fell on her. "Well, that was just a question to cover our backs later if we did think of something," she admitted. "So, no actual ideas yet I’m afraid. Anyone else?" she added hopefully

There was another silence for a long moment until Daniel jumped down from the bed where he had been perched. "Well, other than the dome there were no signs of writings or civilisation on P4X227, so I don’t see there’s a great deal I can do right now. But, I still have a pile of work to do on the inscriptions SG5 brought back from P3Y486 last week." He waited to see if there were any objections to this. When there weren’t he added, "If anyone does have any ideas, I’ll be in my office."

"I’ll come with you as far as the lab," Sam said, following Daniel out.

Jack waited until they had gone before turning to Teal’c and suggesting "Coffee?"

Several hours later that afternoon there was a knock on Daniel’s door, and Sam walked in. Daniel glanced up and looked surprised to see her.

"Oh, hi," he said. "Sorry, I thought it was Teal’c again. He was in here a while ago looking more than usually pensive."

Sam was about to reply but suddenly had to stop and suppress a laugh when she saw Daniel. Despite her best efforts she couldn’t stop the smile from touching her face. Daniel saw the smile and gave a self-deprecating shrug.

"It seemed like a good idea, ok," he muttered. "Its not my fault I’m so short." Daniel was sitting with three cushions piled on his chair just to allow him to work at the height of the desk.

Sam decided it was probably more tactful not to comment, so instead she asked, "How’s the translating going?" as she sat down across the desk from him.

"Badly," Daniel answered, tossing his pen down in something approaching frustration. "I can’t seem to concentrate on it for any length of time to actually get anything done. And this," he caught his glasses as they slipped off (again) and waved them at Sam, "Is not helping." The glasses followed the pen onto the desk, and Daniel rubbed his eyes before looking back at Sam apologetically.

"Are you ok? You look kinda… tense," she asked becoming concerned.

"No, I’m ok. This is just a bit weird to get used to. But anyway," he straightened up a little. "What can I do for you?"

"Tell you the truth, I’m avoiding O’Neill," Sam said, lowering her voice guiltily.

"Why?" Daniel’s brow furrowed slightly at that.

"I’m not sure," Sam was starting to look supremely nervous. "He’s been hanging around the lab the last few hours giving me weird looks and generally distracting me from work. Not that I was actually making any progress, but it’s starting to make me feel, well, uncomfortable. And that’s what’s weird. I never feel uncomfortable around him. Why now?"

Daniel considered this for a long moment. "Some kind of side effect?" he offered, feeling it was a fairly lame suggestion even as he made it. "Maybe it’s affecting our behaviour somehow. That might explain the fight I nearly had with Jack on P4X227."

Sam stood up and started pacing.

"Yeah, I had been wondering about that. I thought for a moment that Teal’c might have had to hold you off each other. What was that all about?"

"I dunno to be honest," Daniel admitted, jumping down from his chair and standing, looking up at Sam. "I was just pissed at his ‘shoot first, diplomacy later’ attitude." A look of concern suddenly crossed his face. "If this thing is affecting our behaviour maybe we should talk to Janet."

"Not yet. If Hammond gets to hear of it he might take us off duty altogether, and I need to be doing something, not just sitting around waiting for an unnecessary medical ‘all clear’. I think for now we should just keep an eye on each other."

"Ok, " Daniel said slowly. "Do you want me to try talking to Jack?" Sam continued pacing, and Daniel was becoming increasingly worried about her. Sam eventually met his gaze and the hopeful look on her face was all the answer Daniel needed.

"I’ll go find him," he said, retrieving his glasses. "If you need somewhere to hide out feel free to stay here." He turned to go, then decided that more was needed. He looked back at Sam and caught hold of her arm as she paced across his office.

"I’m sure its nothing personal. Jack’s probably just feeling as weird and frustrated as we are, that’s all."

Sam nodded, but the look in her eyes still told Daniel that she wasn’t convinced. He held her arm a moment longer before leaving to find Jack.

Teal’c was worried. He had spent the better part of the afternoon with Colonel O’Neill, at first merely talking and drinking coffee. Then O’Neill had insisted on going to the gym, to work out his bad mood, he had explained. In practice though, the longer the workout went on, and the more strenuous it became, the more angry and aggressive O’Neill appeared to be getting.

Teal’c understood the Colonel’s frustration, but had become concerned when nothing he had said or done seemed to have any effect on the rapidly blackening mood. Especially when O’Neill had started taking his anger out on any SGC staff who threw more than the briefest glance in his direction. Unfortunately, considering his current appearance, all too many people were looking at him.

Teal’c had finally voiced the opinion that something was very wrong, and perhaps they should consult Dr Fraiser, after he witnessed O’Neill come within inches of hitting Sgt. Siler in response to the unfortunate Siler’s query if O’Neill was alright.

O’Neill had not only refused the suggestion of seeing Dr Fraiser, but had then in no uncertain terms told Teal’c to leave him alone. The Jaffa had remained silent as he had watched O’Neill storm off, but his face must have betrayed enough that even Sgt. Siler recognised the worry he was feeling.

After that Teal’c had sought out Major Carter, but a search of the research labs failed to locate her, so he had gone to Daniel Jackson’s office where he had found the archaeologist trying, and it appeared, failing, to work. He stayed for a while, noting that while Daniel Jackson seemed mildly aggravated with both his inability to concentrate, and his greatly changed form, he was not displaying anything like the level of aggression Teal’c had witnessed from O’Neill. Eventually Jackson had also expressed a desire to be left alone, although he had put it in much politer terms, and offered the excuse that he needed to work.

Now, some hours later, Teal’c found himself standing in the control room overlooking the stargate. He wasn’t sure what had brought him here, but standing sentinel to witness SG teams leaving or returning through the gate was somehow reassuring, and offered a welcome distraction from his deep thoughts about his team-mates.

Movement in a corridor off to the side caught his attention and he turned from his vigil to see Dr Fraiser pacing hurriedly past, a look of intense concentration on her face. It occurred to Teal’c that if he could not be of direct assistance to O’Neill, Carter or Jackson, perhaps the doctor would have need of him, if only as a sounding board for theories. Besides, he felt the odd moods of O’Neill and Jackson should be brought to her attention in spite of O’Neill’s assertion to the contrary. He headed after Dr Fraiser to the infirmary, somewhat glad to be finally finding a useful purpose in this very odd (even by SG1 standards) situation.

It was going on 23.00 hrs, and Daniel still hadn’t found Jack. Admittedly, it was a big base, he allowed. And it was taking longer than usual to get around it, and not just because of his shorter legs. After the fifth guard stopped him for a security check he was beginning to get annoyed. Sure, it was a good thing to know that in the event of alien intruders base security were so vigilant. But, on the other hand, he had expected pretty much everyone to know what had happened to him, Sam and Jack, and would therefore recognise them. Apparently the base grapevine must have been having a particularly slow day, especially when it came to the security guards.

Daniel suddenly realised he had stopped in the doorway of the commissary, and his eyes scanned the room for Jack. He spotted his friend sitting alone at a table, his back to the door. As he stood there, Daniel became aware of quite how many people were looking at him. Again. Trying to avoid meeting their stares, he took a deep breath before walking across the room to sit down opposite Jack.

"Hi, Jack," he started, as brightly as he could manage.

Jack waited a long moment before looking up to acknowledge Daniel’s presence. Daniel wasn’t sure he liked the look in O’Neill’s face, especially when he pointedly didn’t answer and went back to staring down at his coffee.

"Jack," he pressed on, trying to sound more confident than he was suddenly feeling. "Are you ok?"

Jack sprawled back in his seat and finally met Daniel’s look properly. "Oh yeah. Peachy." The answer was heavily laced with sarcasm.

"I’ll take that as a no then," Daniel said, finally allowing a resigned look of worry onto his face. This was not going well. He was about to continue when Jack interrupted.

"So, you translated all of SG5’s inscriptions already?" It was posed more as a challenge than a question, and Daniel suddenly realised that he recognised the meaning of the look in Jack’s eyes. He recognised it from the look of every schoolyard bully he had ever run up against. The look was nothing short of predatory.

"Erm…. no." Daniel decided that an honest appeal might still be the best way forward in what was rapidly becoming a conversation he didn’t want to have. "I just needed a break." He hesitated briefly before ploughing ahead. "Jack, Sam and I are worried about you."

That got a reaction. "You’ve seen Sam?" Jack asked quickly.

"Uh, yeah."

"She’s been avoiding me," Jack commented in a not quite offhand way. "I might have known she’d be with you. Guess I’m not good enough company for the brain bunch."

"What?" Daniel spluttered, louder than he had intended. He was simply too shocked to construct a more coherent reply.

"I guess the two of you must have it all worked out by now. Care to share?" That disturbing predatory look was still there, underlying the otherwise reasonable question. Daniel felt an involuntary shiver, but refused to break eye contact. Apart from anything else, that would seem like an admission of weakness.

Weakness? Where the hell had that thought come from? This was Jack - his best friend. Supposedly. He took a deep breath, trying hard not to let it shake, before replying.

"No, we’re just worried about you. I mean, who wouldn’t be? You’ve been weird since the moment you regained consciousness, and you’re acting all aggressive at everyone and…"

"No." Jack cut him off sharply. Letting an utterly humourless smile tug at the edges of his mouth, he slowly leaned forward until his face was inches from Daniel’s. "I’m not being aggressive at everybody Daniel," he paused and the smirk got wider. "Just at you."

As his stomach turned into an ice cold weight, Daniel’s mouth dropped open but he was unable to force any words out of it. Jack took the opportunity to twist the knife further.

"Why don’t you be a good little boy, and leave Sam alone. And while you’re doing that, stay the hell away from me." He slammed his hands on the table between them and Daniel couldn’t prevent himself from flinching away. Jack’s smirk widened on seeing that reaction, and he loomed over the smaller boy for a moment longer before walking away and out of the commissary.

Daniel stared after him, too utterly stunned, and quite frankly scared, by the encounter to do or say anything.

What the hell was going on with Jack? That man he had just had a conversation with was not the Jack O’Neill he knew.

He slowly became aware that a group of techies sitting at a nearby table were looking at him with something approaching concern. Daniel decided he really didn’t need their worrying, or indeed their sympathy right then. What he did need was to find Sam, preferably before Jack did. He quickly slid down off the chair and made his way determinedly out of the commissary as quickly as his short legs would carry him.

Sam Carter’s day was getting progressively worse, and to be honest it hadn’t started particularly well in the first place. The whole ‘having children’s bodies’ thing she could almost deal with. By SG1 standards, stranger things had happened, and at least it didn’t seem to be in any way life threatening.

Yet. Oh God, that’s another item on the list, she thought as she finally stopped pacing the length of Daniel’s office and sat down.

She was primarily concerned about Colonel O’Neill’s behaviour since they had been changed. First the aggressive outbursts, then the practically intimidating lurking over her shoulder as she tried to work.

That was the thing that was scaring her more than anything. Like she had said to Daniel, she never felt uncomfortable with O’Neill. Especially not with O’Neill. In such a close team who regularly faced deadly situations together, trust was everything, and Sam knew she could, and indeed would, trust any of the three men with her life. But now she had found herself unable to even be in the same room as her commanding officer. That was enough of a worry, even without everything else.

Where the hell was Daniel? He’d left to find Jack hours ago, and hadn’t even bothered to check back, just abandoned her in his office. Although, she admitted, Daniel hadn’t exactly been acting normally either. It just wasn’t quite as obvious as it was with Jack. Anything that was capable of distracting Daniel from the challenge of deciphering alien languages had to be serious, and he was obviously fairly seriously rattled by the whole change. Actually thinking about it, Daniel really hadn’t said much to any of them since they had got back to SGC, and hadn’t he been in something of a hurry to get away from them to the relative privacy of his office? What was that about?

He couldn’t?….. No that was too silly. Surely. Was he simply embarrassed by the child’s body that he currently occupied? That might explain the way he’d been acting, Sam allowed. But on the other hand it was a rather un-Daniel-like reaction. Especially considering that he wasn’t the only one in that particular boat. She wasn’t exactly impressed with how awkward and gangly she was feeling. Sam normally enjoyed the knowledge that her body was capable of such strong, fluid movement, and she knew she had excellent reflexes and reactions. Adjusting to this new size and body shape was proving more difficult than she would have expected. The centre of balance was off, co-ordination was a joke, and she was suddenly sure she didn’t want to wait until a potential combat situation to work out whether her firearms skills had been affected - or even if she could still lift and fire some of the bigger guns. Now that was a scary thought.

Sam started pacing again, and had her back to the door when it opened. "Did you find O’Neill?" she asked, assuming it was Daniel, and so was shocked when she heard O’Neill’s voice reply.

"Oh yeah. He found me."

Sam spun around to see O’Neill close the door behind him and lean back against it. He seemed to be trying to look relaxed, but Sam could tell he was anything but. She likewise became tense, and suddenly became uncomfortably aware that he was blocking the only exit.

"Are you feeling ok, sir?" Sam tried, hoping her voice didn’t betray how much he was managing to unnerve her just by being in the same room.

"I really wish everyone would stop asking that," O’Neill said, a flicker of anger crossing his face. "Teal’c, Siler, Daniel, now you as well. It’s getting old."

"We’re just…"

O’Neill cut her off. "Don’t say worried. I’m going to kill the next person who says they’re worried about me."

"Can you blame us? God, sir, look at yourself. What’s happening to you?" Sam realised her response was somewhat sharper than she had intended, but right then it looked like reasoned discussion wasn’t going to get anywhere with O’Neill.

"I’m just tense," he said, unknowingly echoing Daniel’s earlier excuse, "And I was hoping maybe you could help me with that."

"Colonel?" Sam was sure she didn’t like where this was going.

O’Neill pushed away from the door and moved towards her. "Oh come on Carter. We both know how we feel about each other."

"You know we can’t act on that, sir. And especially not now, when we’re like this."

"I didn’t say anything about acting on it," he replied, a sly glint in his eye. He reached for Sam and she stepped backwards into Daniel’s desk. At that moment the door flew open and Daniel barrelled in.

"Sam, I think Jack’s…." he stopped dead when he saw that Jack was already there and the two ‘boys’ stared at each other for a long moment.

Sam wanted to take the opportunity to step away from O’Neill, but was backed against the desk and couldn’t move until O’Neill did. Her intention must have been clear because Daniel finally broke the silence by asking, "You ok Sam?"

Sam nodded tensely as O’Neill finally stepped away. It took her a moment to realise he was advancing on Daniel, glaring at him. The little boy rather gamely remained standing in the doorway and pulled himself up to his full height (which unfortunately was currently a good foot or so shorter than O’Neill).

"I told you to keep away from me." O’Neill’s voice was quiet, threatening.

Daniel moved sideways slightly to clear the doorway. In an equally quiet, determined voice he said, "Then get the hell out of my office."

Tension built for the barest of seconds. Then O’Neill’s fist flashed out of nowhere and Sam saw Daniel thrown clear out of the doorway and across the corridor.

Sam’s yelled "Hey!" was echoed by other voices from down the corridor, and as she ran to the door she saw Sgt. Siler and a couple of the research department techies running to intervene in what was about to be a very one-sided fight. It wasn’t clear if Daniel was trying to kick O’Neill, or simply scramble to his feet, but either way O’Neill managed to land another three punches before Siler and one of the techies grabbed each of his arms and pulled him away. When he continued to struggle against them Siler wrestled him into an arm lock, and for some reason that Sam couldn’t figure, had a look of satisfaction as he did so. The other techie went to help the bleeding Daniel, but he refused the offered hand and pulled himself to his feet, glaring at O’Neill the entire time.

"What’s going on here?" Siler asked, the look of satisfaction being replaced by confusion. "Major?" he prompted when neither Jack or Daniel replied.

"I’m not sure," Sam replied, beginning to breathe easy again as the tension of the moment started to fade. "Sgt., do you guys think you could give us an escort as far as the infirmary? This has gone on long enough."

In the last twenty-four hours Dr Janet Fraiser had learned a number of rather surprising things. Ironically, the most surprising thing was not about any of the three human members of SG1, but instead was about their stoic Jaffa team-mate.

It was a day after they had returned from P4X227, and Janet had expected Teal’c would have been sticking to his team-mates like glue. Instead, he had spent most of the time with her in the infirmary. Earlier the previous evening he had politely knocked on her office door and, after providing an update on the apparently deteriorating moods of Jackson and O’Neill, she had expected he would leave. He didn’t leave, but had asked, "Is there any way in which I can be of assistance to you Dr Fraiser?" Her initial reply was about to be no - she knew that Teal’c was hardly a scientist of any description, and would be unlikely to offer any intellectual aid.

Something stopped her from rejecting him outright, however. Maybe it was simply the fact that she needed someone to talk to and she recognised that he needed to feel he was doing something to help his friends. Either way, Janet had started bouncing ideas off Teal’c as she worked, mostly just thinking aloud, telling him about what little progress she had made so far, and exploring the possibilities of new research paths. Teal’c, for his part, had mostly stayed quiet, occasionally offering encouragement or practical suggestions, but mainly listening.

Then, there had been the point in the night when Sgt. Siler and two technicians had ‘escorted’ Daniel (with a heavily bleeding nose and rapidly bruising eye) and Jack into the infirmary, with Sam storming in behind them. She got the gist of what had happened, although Sgt. Siler was unable to explain how the fight had started, and the three ‘children’ were too busy glaring at each other, with the occasional furious berating from Sam, to actually admit how it had started. Or perhaps they were all just avoiding the question, Janet had wondered.

Adopting doctor mode, she had ordered them all to remain in the infirmary overnight, and decided that a whole new batch of tests were required to see what had changed since they had returned from P4X227. At that point Teal’c had taken over from Sgt. Siler and the technicians, separating Jack and Daniel to opposite ends of the infirmary, and silencing Sam’s protests that she at least was fine. Janet had decided it was probably safer not to ask how Teal’c had managed it, but when she returned for the first set of blood tests the small but definitely angry mob had become a quiet and well behaved, if sulky, group. After that there were no further fights, or disturbances of any kind, for which she was more than grateful.

Over the course of the night Teal’c had remained with her, keeping a careful watch over his team-mates, and making himself generally useful around the lab, even if that was something as simple as passing the relevant equipment when it was needed. He also frequently disappeared and reappeared, unbidden, with coffee and/or food as the night wore on. At some time around 4.00 AM, somewhat to Janet’s surprise, he had taken it upon himself to insist that she get some sleep, going so far as to walk her to the room she kept on base for those all too frequent medical emergencies that kept her from going home at the end of the day.

"I will watch over Colonel O’Neill, Major Carter and Daniel Jackson," he had assured her as she finally agreed to let herself rest. Her expectations were confirmed when, four hours later, after getting the minimum amount of sleep she felt she could get away with and still be able to work properly, she found Teal’c sitting in the infirmary in a position from which he could see all three of his finally sleeping team-mates.

It was over the course of that morning that Janet had made most of the discoveries of the day as she worked her way through SG1’s test results. Her most surprising discovery about Teal’c, however, gradually dawned over the hours. It was, quite simply, that in spite of his renowned reticence and tendency to lurk quietly in the background, on occasion he could be the best and most reliable company you could possibly wish for.

So, when she finally made a breakthrough, it only seemed right that Teal’c should be the first to hear about it, and by late afternoon Janet could almost be described as being in a good mood. A hefty dose of mood stabilising drugs had sorted out Jack and Daniel’s aggression, and she was in a position to present some actual results to General Hammond. The improving sentiment of the day was topped off when she could have sworn that the scene when she passed the infirmary door earlier had looked like Jack and Daniel swapping uncomfortable apologies.

As Janet entered her office to find Teal’c standing with yet another mug of coffee and a reassuringly less worried look on his face, she decided that perhaps today was going to be a decided improvement on the previous day after all.

At 6.00 PM that evening General Hammond walked into the briefing room and surveyed the rather motley collection already gathered there. He had heard about the incident outside Dr Jackson’s office the previous night, and noted with some concern that Jackson and O’Neill were pointedly avoiding making eye contact with each other or with Carter.

"Alright people," Hammond started after they had all sat down. "What has happened here, and how can we reverse it?"

"Well sir," Dr Fraiser replied. "I do know what has happened now at least. It appears that all the cells in Colonel O’Neill, Major Carter and Dr Jackson’s bodies have been entirely rewritten at the basic cellular level to an earlier stage of development. When their bodies believed at the cellular level that they were much younger, they were somehow transformed accordingly. "

"Question," interrupted Daniel as Dr Fraiser paused for breath. "Why weren’t our minds affected if everything was rewritten?"

"I wondered that myself. The best I can offer is that while your brains were physically changed, the chemical and neural activity that work to make you who you are were not affected. However," Dr Fraiser paused again and looked pointedly at Jackson and O’Neill. "It appears that that may not be a permanent state of affairs."

"I take it this is to blame for Colonel O’Neill and Dr Jackson’s altercation last night?" Hammond asked. The two ‘boys’ glanced guiltily at each other as he spoke, and everyone tried to ignore the swollen black eye Daniel was now sporting.

"I’m guessing so. As you know I kept all three of them in the infirmary overnight, and the latest test results show massively fluctuating hormone levels in both Colonel O’Neill and Dr Jackson. Their blood work is all over the place. I believe that their body chemistries have started to alter in accordance with their new physical states, and I’m not certain that eventually their minds won’t be similarly affected."

"So you’re telling me that three of my best people are about to fully become children again?" Hammond obviously wasn’t happy.

"Actually, sir, its just Colonel O’Neill and Daniel at the moment," Sam offered. "I haven’t started showing the same changes they have. So far I seem to be unaffected by this development."

"Any idea why that is? Doctor? Major?"

"Afraid not sir. For all we know it could be as simple as the process working differently on males and females." Dr Fraiser glanced apologetically Jack and Daniel, although none of them could see what she might possibly have to apologise for. "On the good side, I have been able to control their chemical imbalances to some extent, and mood stabilising drugs seem to be stopping the erratic behaviour. For now at least we should have the adult Colonel O’Neill and Dr Jackson, mentally speaking at least. But I don’t know how long I can keep it that way without more and more drugs, or if it will start happening to Major Carter at some later time."

"I’m hoping this is the point where you tell me how we are going to reverse this and get their normal bodies back."

Janet took a deep breath, and glanced at Teal’c before replying. "I’m afraid not, sir. I can tell what the actual physical effects were, but I have no idea what kind of technology, if indeed it was technology, would be capable of doing this, or how to undo it, or even if it’s possible to undo it."

There was an uncomfortable silence for a long moment around the briefing table. Hammond was obviously unimpressed.

"So you’re telling me there’s nothing you can do?"

"There is one thing that Dr Fraiser and I have spoken about at some length, General Hammond." All eyes turned to Teal’c, and so missed the grateful glance that Janet threw in his direction for deflecting the focus from her.

"Go on."

"Dr Fraiser and I believe that the only way may be to follow Colonel O’Neill’s original suggestion of returning to P4X227. We can once again attempt to make peaceful contact with the inhabitants and perhaps they would be willing to aid us. Or, if not, we may still be able to find a way of examining their technology and method of bringing about the transformations."

Hammond’s frown became deeper. "You know I’m not eager to risk any more personnel on P4X227. What makes you believe that you would have any more luck communicating with the inhabitants a second time around?"

"Well, uh, we’ll have a better idea of what to expect this time," offered Daniel.

"Its not like you need to risk anyone else, sir. Quite frankly the damage has already been done for us. We have remarkably little to lose from at least trying," Sam put in.

"Yeah," Daniel was warming to the idea already. "It could all turn out to have been a huge mistake. A misunderstanding."

O’Neill threw Daniel a look as if to say ‘yeah right - a mistake,’ in that annoyingly sarcastic tone of his. What he actually said was, "And if they did use technology to do this, then they are obviously advanced. If we can make peaceful contact with them they could be very useful allies."

There was a silence during which Dr Fraiser and the members of SG1 held a collective breath, watching Hammond’s unreadable face as he considered their proposal.

"I’m still concerned about your safety considering your current conditions," he finally argued.

"There were no signs of life, hostile or otherwise on P4X227 apart from the inhabitants of the dome. I believe I am more than capable of ensuring SG1’s safety," Teal’c said in a remarkably confident voice. "Besides which, Colonel O’Neill and Major Carter are still skilled warriors in spite of their reduced size and strength, and we can all aid in protecting Daniel Jackson."

"Business as usual then," commented O’Neill, although the remark was not meant unkindly, and Daniel even allowed a slight smile at the long running joke of how protective the others could get - and how often he could get himself into trouble.

"What about if you start to have more chemical imbalances, and behaving irrationally again?" Hammond obviously wasn’t done playing devils advocate just yet.

Janet squared her shoulders against the expected reaction as she said, "That’s part of why I have to go with them sir."

Hammond’s explosion of, "You have to do what?" was almost drowned out beneath the protests of SG1. All except Teal’c, that was.

"Sir, with all due respect, I have to go with SG1 on this one. Not just to keep an eye on their condition from a medical point of view. If we do find the technology that did this then I would have serious misgivings about trying to use it to reverse the changes without a doctor on hand to monitor the entire process. And, as a final point sir, speaking as a medical doctor this is fascinating. If Daniel is right and this was all a mistake, if we can communicate with the people responsible, then we could have a lot to learn from them."

Hammond looked like he was winding up for another protest, but Teal’c forestalled him.

"General Hammond. We are aware of your opinion about risking thus far unaffected personnel on P4X227. However, Dr Fraiser and I believe that the risk to her is acceptable when weighed against the likely benefits of Dr Fraiser accompanying us."

Hammond looked from Janet to Teal’c and back again, wondering when those two had become such a savvy double act, before finally allowing a look of resigned acceptance onto his face.

"Very well doctor. How soon can you be ready to go with the relevant medical supplies?"

"Quarter of an hour, sir. Twenty minutes tops." Janet couldn’t prevent a brief smile. She hadn’t expected Hammond to give in quite so quickly.

"SG1, I want you ready to depart in thirty minutes. People, you have a go."

Half an hour later found a rather abnormally under-equipped SG1 stepping onto P4X227. With the exception of Teal’c, who as usual carried his staff weapon, firearms had been limited to pistols, and there had been some heated discussion as to whether Daniel at least should even be provided with that. The needs of self-defence had finally won that argument, however. Simple physical size and strength was now a limiting factor for all three of them in how much they could carry, and Daniel in particular had only the barest minimum for offworld survival in his pack.

Dr Fraiser stumbled slightly as she exited the gate. She had been through the stargate before of course, but wasn’t nearly the seasoned traveller that the members of SG1 were, and she still considered the prospect of gate travel to be somewhat disconcerting, not to mention utterly disorienting. She found a small, steadying hand on her arm, and looked round to see Daniel giving her an encouraging smile, the unspoken question ‘are you ok?’ clear in his eyes. She nodded an ‘ok’ and found herself yet again trying to remind herself that the small boy next to her was actually Daniel. She wondered idly how much longer even her petite form would be able to tower over him and Sam.

The walk to the dome was again uneventful, and as they approached it Sam asked, "So how are we planning to get in?"

Janet looked around at the mostly blank faces, and decided to take the initiative.

"If its not too radical a suggestion, why don’t we knock?" She walked up to the metallic side of the dome and banged on it with her knuckles. The noise echoed from within, confirming at least that it did seem to be hollow. There was no sign of reply, so she banged again, shouting, "Hello? If there’s anybody in there, we come in peace, we’d like to communicate with you."

Standing slightly further back, Jack rolled his eyes. "She’s been taking alien meet-and-greet lessons from Daniel," he muttered.

At that moment they all noticed the humming noise start up again, and all looked around frantically for its possible source.

"Uh-oh. This isn’t good," muttered Daniel, moving closer to Dr Fraiser.

Janet suddenly noticed that she, and rather alarmingly she alone, was being surrounded by white light. With surprisingly fast reflexes Teal’c and Daniel, the two stood closest to her, threw themselves at Janet. A fraction of a second later, in a blinding flash all three of them vanished.

Teal’c was on his feet and scanning their new surroundings for danger before Janet and Daniel had even overcome the intense dizziness. When they finally did, they realised the three of them were now in a square room, the walls the same pale metallic grey as the dome’s exterior surface. White light so brilliant it hurt their eyes at first was filling the room from an unidentified source, but other than themselves the room was entirely empty.

"Everyone ok?" asked Daniel, standing up and looking around.

"I am fine Daniel Jackson."

"Yeah. Was that what happened to you guys before?" Janet was immensely relived to see that so far she was still her same adult self.

Before Teal’c or Daniel had time to answer they heard a hiss, and a door that they hadn’t even been able to distinguish from the wall, slid open. Two figures walked into the room, talking together, and stopped short when they saw the three of them. The aliens appeared to be human males, although they were both very tall and thin, and were wearing silvery grey jumpsuits oddly reminiscent of those the Tollan were wearing when SG1 had first encountered them. One of them looked rather indignantly at Teal’c and Daniel.

"Why are they here?" he asked the other. "They are no longer of interest to us."

The other looked at the Jaffa and the archaeologist with a dismissive glance. "A mistake in transporting. Easily rectified." He pulled a device that looked rather like a tv remote control from his belt and pointed it at Teal’c. Teal’c, in a lightning reaction, aimed his staff weapon at the alien and they stared at each other for a long moment. "Wait," interrupted Daniel stepping forward, automatically putting himself between the aliens and Janet. "We came to talk to you. I’m Daniel." When the aliens didn’t reply, he forged ahead. "I’m assuming we’re inside the dome, right? We don’t want to fight, we’re peaceful explorers."

The alien who wasn’t holding a ‘remote control’ observed Daniel with a look of interest.

"Why would you wish to talk with people you know nothing about? Why do you assume we would want to talk to you?"

"Well, um, that’s the point of exploring. Meeting new people. We’re from far away. If we can get along with each other we might find common ground, or be able to offer each other trade for items or knowledge." He found himself desperately wishing to be back in his adult body. The whole ‘we’re peaceful explorers, lets trade’ diplomacy thing sounded so much more convincing when it wasn’t coming from the voice of a nine year old. He was also uncomfortably aware that Teal’c and the alien were still having a standoff, and he was almost, but not quite, in the line of crossfire.

The first alien, who had so far done most of the talking, seemed to be thinking about this proposal.

"How do we know you are peaceful? You are obviously armed," he indicated Teal’c. "You could be intending to attack us. You already tried to break in once."

Daniel was confused for a moment, before remembering Jack and Teal’c shooting the dome after they had first been changed.

"The weapons are for self defence only. And the trying to break in - well you have to admit that by that point we had been somewhat provoked." Daniel said the last somewhat tentatively, unsure of what reaction he would get.

"What? You mean the physical changes that you received? That was not an attack." The alien looked genuinely surprised and Daniel felt a surge of hope that they might still get out of this one without the need for a fight.

Janet stepped forward to stand beside Daniel. "If it wasn’t intended as an attack then why, and how did the changes happen?" she asked

"Unfortunate side effect." The second alien spoke for only the second time since they had met. He still had a somewhat dismissive tone in his voice. "They could not provide what we were looking for. Therefore they are no longer of interest. You may be." He nodded at Janet, and Daniel, who had been starting to relax, became suddenly tense again.

"What do you mean ‘not what you are looking for’? If you want help with something you’ll find we are more likely to be co-operative if you talk to us instead of whatever it was you did that caused this ‘side effect’."

The first alien closed his eyes and sighed deeply. Eventually he looked back at Daniel and then motioned his companion to lower the ‘remote control’ device. After a moment’s hesitation he did. Daniel caught Teal’c’s eye and the Jaffa slowly lowered his staff weapon, although Daniel could see he was still tensed for reaction the moment he perceived any danger.

Looking back at the first alien he tried to defuse the situation still further. "I’m Daniel Jackson. This is Dr Fraiser, and Teal’c."

"I am Vargo," said the first alien. Then something seemed to register and he stared at Janet, his eyebrows creasing into a thoughtful look. "You are a doctor? A medical doctor?"

"Yes," replied Janet, suddenly wishing that all the attention would stop being on her again.

"Then perhaps you may still be of use." Vargo saw the look on Teal’c, Daniel and Janet’s faces and quickly added, "But in a different way. We will not attempt further experiments if you do not wish. If you will come with us perhaps we can, as you have suggested, talk." He turned and invited them with a gesture to leave the square room through the door he and his colleague had entered through.

"Hang on," said Janet. "What about Colonel O’Neill and Major Carter? Where are they for that matter?"

"The two others you returned with? They are outside. They did not interest us so we did not see a need to bring them in again."

"If we are to talk they should be present," Teal’c said in a voice that did not invite argument.

Vargo looked at Daniel in confusion. "Are you not able to speak for them as you have so far? Will they not abide by their leader’s decision when you tell them?"

Teal’c raised an eyebrow as Daniel laughed and shook his head. "Even if I was leader, which I’m not by the way, this still concerns them because they have been affected by it. Will you let them in please?"

Vargo nodded and turned to his companion. "Bring the others in Lotan. Then I suggest we meet in the briefing room." Daniel noticed Lotan throw a look of extreme anger at Vargo and he hesitated for a moment, before turning swiftly and leaving the room. Vargo appeared either oblivious to the look, or was remarkably good at hiding any reaction to it.

They waited a few minutes in a not quite uncomfortable silence before Sam and Jack suddenly appeared in the room accompanied by yet another blinding flash. Teal’c and Janet went to offer steadying hands as they recovered from the initial disorientation, while Daniel quickly babbled an introduction and brief explanation of the situation before Jack reacted with all guns blazing (yet again).

Vargo led them down a corridor to another room, exactly the same colour and as brightly lit as the first. There was at least furniture in here - a table and three chairs. Vargo obviously realised that there was about to be a seating error and somewhat apologetically offered what few chairs there were to his guests. Janet, Sam and Daniel sat down, and Lotan returned with a third alien, this one apparently female, who Vargo introduced as Arrilla.

"Ok," said O’Neill, standing directly opposite Vargo across the table. "What have you done to us, and how soon can you get us our real bodies back?"

Vargo looked somewhat taken aback. "You are unhappy with the changes we left you with? When we realised that we could not learn what we needed from you we felt that leaving you in those forms would be adequate compensation for our experimentation."

There was an air of collective confusion before O’Neill roared, "You thought WHAT?"

Vargo refused to meet O’Neill’s glare after a moment, instead turning to Daniel. "You all have limited life spans, and each of you appear to be around halfway through those spans, your friend there even more so," he indicated O’Neill. "By leaving you in these younger bodies we have effectively increased your lifespans enormously. You all now have your prime physical potentials to look forward to, for a second time no less, and still retain all the knowledge and experience you had before. Is this not correct? Why is this not of benefit to you?"

Throughout this explanation Vargo’s face held a look of surprise, but Daniel began to wonder just how much of that surprise was genuine. It was always difficult to pick up on meaning from facial expressions with aliens, hell, it had taken nearly five years for any of them to read Teal’c’s face with any degree of accuracy, and they had only just met these people. However, Daniel was almost certain he kept picking up flashes of something which, in a human, he would have interpreted as guilt.

None of them could really think of a reply to Vargo’s question. Technically everything he had said was true. But that still didn’t make it right.

Eventually Janet said, "Some of them are starting to change on a mental level as well as physical. Quite apart from that, they are highly valued individuals among our people, but the changes you made mean they can no longer perform their normal jobs. That’s important to us. If you can reverse these changes I think we’d still like you to, whatever fringe benefits there might be."

The members of SG1 nodded in silent approval of Dr Fraiser’s statement of their case. Vargo looked around meeting each of their eyes for a moment before flicking on to the next. He met Daniel’s gaze for a long time, as if expecting more in the way of explanation, before finally looking down at his hands.

"Alright," he said. "If that is what you wish."

They were all somewhat taken aback. It couldn’t be this easy, could it? Daniel saw the glare that Lotan threw in Vargo’s direction, and wondered what was going on there, but Vargo was speaking again before he had chance to think too deeply about it.

"Daniel, you spoke of trade earlier. We would be very interested in an exchange of knowledge with your people. We are particularly interested in your medical sciences. Would this be possible? After we have restored your original bodies of course."

None of the humans failed to grasp the thinly veiled ‘if we scratch your backs you’d better scratch ours in return’ implication in the statement.

Daniel glanced to Jack and Janet before replying. "Well I don’t think there would be too much of a problem with that in principle. Although you would have to work out the details with one of our science or diplomat teams really. We need to speak to our commanding officer, we couldn’t commit to such a deal right here and now."

A look of anger, and possibly distrust, flickered over Lotan’s face, and Vargo looked worried.

"We will need some time to think, to make the necessary adjustments to reverse the procedure," Vargo said, sounding like he was thinking aloud rather than addressing them directly.

"If you don’t mind I’d like to be involved with that," said Janet firmly. "I want to understand what it is you are going to do, so I can monitor their conditions properly." When she saw Vargo’s dubious look she added, "You never know, I might be able to help."

Vargo nodded his assent and invited Dr Fraiser to follow him and his two companions. SG1 all immediately stood up to follow, still not entirely sure that letting Janet go alone with these people was a good idea.

"The research laboratory is not designed for so many. You cannot all come." It was the first time they had heard Arrilla speak, and she sounded rather exasperated. They all looked to Jack for a moment before Teal’c said, "I will accompany Dr Fraiser to the laboratory. Perhaps you should remain here."

Jack shrugged. "Yeah, fine." Teal’c was probably the safest person for Janet to be with anyway, and while none of them were quite willing to trust the aliens just yet, they were all getting the feeling that Vargo was at least genuine about their error of judgement, and their willingness to rectify it. When the aliens had left with Janet and Teal’c, Jack sat on the table and swung his legs. "We’ll just wait here." He looked bored already (although the alert look never left his eyes for a moment). "Poker anyone?"

Sam eventually found Daniel curled up in the corner of the briefing room, his legs pulled up to his chest and his forehead resting on his knees.

"Daniel?" she asked quietly, unsure if he might be asleep, but at the sound of her voice he looked up with a tired, and rather pensive, expression.

"You ok?" Sam asked, sitting down on the floor next to him.

"Yeah. Just tired. Any news from Janet yet?"

"Last time I saw her she said it wouldn’t be long, and then shooed me out of the way."

"How long have they been at it now?" Daniel answered his own question by glancing down at his watch and his eyebrows raised in surprise. It was now almost 7.00 AM, the morning after they had stepped onto P4X227 for the second time. Janet had been working with Vargo and his colleagues for almost twelve straight hours, and anyone who had seen her recently could tell it was beginning to get to her. Especially considering this was her second night in a row spent working non-stop on how to get their adult bodies back. During that time Teal’c had been an almost constant companion, remaining silently in the background and watching the scientists at work. The few occasions that he left the research lab were only to check on his team-mates, and he reported at one point that tensions with the aliens, particularly Vargo, had eased considerably after Janet had been working with them for a few hours.

Once it had become apparent that the reversal would not be happening immediately, Jack had persuaded Vargo to show him the way out of the dome (this time via a door that they had not been able to detect before it was shown to them) and he went back to the gate to send Hammond an update of the situation.

Since then they had had nothing to do but wait, and wander up and down the same identical looking corridors, mostly unable to even tell where doors to other rooms were, let alone access them.

"Oh by the way, I think we know now what was actually going on with these guys, and why they did this ‘experiment’," Sam said, immediately catching Daniel’s attention. "Teal’c and Janet have been talking to Vargo a lot, obviously, and they think they’ve got about as near to the real story as they’re likely to get from him."

"Go on."

"Well, it seems they are human, and technologically speaking they are probably on a par with the Tollan, possibly a little lower down the scale but they’re still way beyond us. But, a couple of hundred years or so ago some sort of disease started spreading among their race. Even their technological advancement couldn’t help them. They are starting to get desperate now, every generation the population is decreasing in size. Apparently they had buried the stargate on their home planet ages ago, it sounds like they are generally quite insular, and I hesitate to say, xenophobic. But, they eventually realised they weren’t going to find a cure on their own, so they unburied the gate and started sending small groups of scientist out to other worlds to try to find any resources or knowledge they could that might aid them. That’s what this place is; an offworld research post."

"Wow. That explains why they were so interested when I introduced Janet as a doctor."

"Yeah. Well they are generally peaceful, try to avoid interaction with people other than their own as much as possible, and prefer to gain what they need by trade rather than conflict. Well, that’s what Vargo says anyway. But, recently a few among them have started getting more militant, saying if they are going to find a cure they need to take whatever steps are necessary, no matter what the cost to others. It turns out Lotan is a strong believer in the latter philosophy, and this causes some degree of tension with him and Vargo, who’s mainly for the peaceful trade idea. Anyway, to cut a long story short, Lotan managed to persuade Vargo and Arrilla that they should use us to experiment on when we arrived through the gate. He also argued them out of asking our permission first, which Vargo wanted to do, because Lotan pointed out who in their right mind would say yes to such a request?"

"Lotan has a good point."

"Well, Lotan also won out on the issue of erasing our memories of everything that happened inside the dome, allegedly to stop us from coming back and attacking. Vargo claims he suggested they should return us to the state we arrived in before they let us out, but Lotan made a pretty convincing case about preserving their resources and not wasting time on unnecessary work."

"Guess Lotan wasn’t interested the day they did diplomacy 101. It does explain some of the looks he and Vargo were giving each other earlier though." Daniel pondered for a moment. "I assume this side of the story came from Vargo? How sure can we be that he’s not just trying to paint himself as the good guy here?"

"Teal’c says Arrilla kind of confirmed what Vargo was saying, although she never says much herself. Until we know more about them I don’t think we can be really sure, but if it is true it does explain a lot."

They lapsed into silence for a while, each of them busy with their own thoughts. Sam hadn’t seen much of either Jack or Daniel for the last few hours, and was relieved to have found at least one of them. The last time she had seen O’Neill had been shortly after he got back from reporting to Hammond, and it had been a somewhat awkward meeting, as O’Neill had chosen that point while they were alone to apologise for his behaviour the previous day in Daniel’s office. Sam, her mind whirling with a thousand things she wanted to say to him, but knew she couldn’t, had eventually said, "It never happened, sir. As far as I’m concerned, you were under the influence of alien experiments and were not yourself." She had known as she said it that it wasn’t fooling either of them, but it had to be said for the sake of both their careers, as admitting to the truth was out of the question. They had been forced to do that once already, and it was too hard to go there again. Especially right now.

Sam abruptly snapped herself out of her thoughts. She realised with something of a guilty start that Daniel was not looking at all happy, and asked, "So why are you hiding in here?"

Daniel avoided her gaze as he said, "To quote from someone not very far away from here, I’m avoiding Jack."

Sam’s heart sank. It seemed nothing she did at the moment was going to let her stop thinking about O’Neill. "What? I thought you guys had sorted that out."

Daniel squirmed uncomfortably, still refusing to meet her look. "We did. Kind of. But then a few hours ago we noticed we were getting tetchy with each other again. Janet gave us some more mood stabilisers, but we’re staying away from each other as kind of a pre-emptive measure." The swelling had gone down on Daniel’s eye, but there was still an angry black bruise around it, a constant reminder of the earlier altercation.

A somewhat unpleasant idea had occurred to Sam earlier, and she felt she had to ask Daniel about it.

"Daniel, what do you think is the problem between you and the Colonel? I mean, even if it can just be put down to hormonal imbalances, neither of you are reacting so strongly with anyone else. There must still be something that sets you off against each other."

Daniel shrugged. "What, you mean like the fact that we disagree on practically everything, have utterly opposing philosophies on life, and remarkably few common interests?" When Sam looked like she was about to protest Daniel held his hand up to stop her.

"I have been thinking about that actually," he continued. "Want to hear a bizarre theory?"

Sam nodded, intrigued.

"We’re kids now, right? I mean, that’s what our bodies are, that’s what our minds are trying to become. So our way of thinking is becoming more childlike. So what’s one of the basic laws of high school?"

Sam looked confused. "What do you mean?"

"Ok. High school kids are divided into basically three groups. The vast majority are ordinary joes trying to get on with life and being mostly ignored. Then you’ve got the popular ones - for guys that normally means the jocks. The sporty guys that all the girls want to date. Then, at the other end of the spectrum you’ve got the geeks. Membership of this group is normally denoted by being a computer nerd, or being overly academically successful, and is pretty much guaranteed if you belong to an after-school club that has nothing to do with sport."

When he paused for breath he noticed Sam was smiling and nodding, it was a picture of high school she recognised, and for the first time Daniel wondered which group Sam had fallen into when she was younger.

"Anyway, there are more complex sub-divisions in every school, but those are the basic types. It’s generally the case that geeks and jocks don’t get on, they both tend to regard the other group with contempt and avoid each other if possible. I think you can see where this is going can’t you?"

"So you’re saying that you and the Colonel aren’t getting on because of social stereotypes that the two of you may or may not have fallen into when you were at school?" Sam’s voice held a distinct tone of disbelief.

Daniel went back to staring intently at his hands, avoiding Sam’s incredulous look.

"It sounds crazy when you say it like that. What I mean is, Jack and me are just such polar opposites its hard to imagine how we ever got to being friends. I know Jack didn’t like me when we first met. I dunno, I guess I’m just worried that this may have highlighted the possibility that we aren’t really at all. Friends, I mean."

Daniel’s voice cracked slightly on the last statement and Sam’s instinct reaction was to put an arm round him and squeeze his shoulder.

"You know that isn’t true," she insisted.

Daniel took his glasses off and seemed to be concentrating very hard on cleaning them on his t-shirt. Before Sam could think of anything further to say, however, Jack ran into the doorway and looked around breathlessly.

"There you are. Fraiser says they’re ready. Lets go kids."

With that he raced off back down the corridor. Sam and Daniel exchanged surprised glances before hurriedly scrambling to their feet and following in their leader’s wake.

"So what do I do?" Jack was looking dubiously at the whole array of machinery and consoles that were arranged around what could only loosely be termed a bed, since it was more accurately a long narrow table with a padded surface. He noticed with slight concern the restraints at the edges of the table but was prepared to take Dr Fraiser’s word for it if she said it was ok.

Janet looked up from the console that she had been staring intently at and offered Jack an encouraging smile.

"Mostly you get undressed, put this on and lie down over there," she said handing him a white infirmary-issue gown. Jack looked at it for a moment before realising that if this actually worked then the clothes he was currently wearing would be too small by the time they had finished.

"Er, I guess that means we wait outside," Daniel said as Jack began to undress, and he Sam and Teal’c left to stand in the corridor, and Vargo closed the door after them.

Vargo and Janet engaged in a hushed conversation, giving Jack some privacy, and in a few minutes he was wearing the gown and perched on the edge of the bed.

"Right Colonel," said Janet coming over. "I’m going to have to put you under a general anaesthetic so you’ll be out for a couple of hours probably. That’s about how long this is going to take, according to Vargo."

"I don’t get to watch?" Jack joked half-heartedly as he lay back and let Janet give him the injection.

"Afraid not, sir."

"Doctor," Jack felt unconsciousness tugging at his mind already but he still needed to ask. "You’re sure about this, right?"

Janet sighed and looked him in the eye. "It’s alien technology Colonel. I’m as sure as I can be."

It was Jack’s turn to sigh. "Guess that’s why I get paid the big bucks. And why I volunteered to go first."

Janet might have made a reply to this but by the time he had finished speaking the anaesthetic was already doing its work, and Jack slipped into unconsciousness.

"Colonel O’Neill?"

Jack had an eerie feeling of deja vu as he woke. He had a headache, but it took a moment to realise that the voice belonged to Dr Fraiser, not to Teal’c this time.

"Hmmmm," he mumbled, mainly to indicate he was awake only in the technical sense of the word, and not quite up to conversation yet.

"How are you feeling?"

Jack organised his thoughts enough to remember where he was and what ought to have happened. For a moment he didn’t want to look. Then he opened his eyes and met Dr Fraiser’s concerned gaze.

"Did it work?"

Janet’s smile told him everything he needed to know, even if hearing his own voice again hadn’t revealed the answer to his question. Janet handed him a small hand mirror as he sat up rather groggily.

"Colonel O’Neill in the flesh. How do you feel?" she repeated the question with an insistent tone as Jack confirmed for himself that the process had indeed worked.

"Bit of a headache," he said. "But nothing like as bad as the one I had the first time."

He noticed Vargo standing back behind Janet, a look something like relief on his face.

Dr Fraiser bombarded him with further questions as he slowly became fully awake. Then she was testing blood pressure, reflexes, pulse and sundry other medical checks while Jack silently rejoiced that an end was in sight to this highly unusual situation. Finally Dr Fraiser seemed satisfied and pointed him in the direction of a stack of adult sized military issue clothing that someone (probably Janet) had thoughtfully left to the side of the room. Next to it were two more nearly identical stacks of clothes, and as he dressed Jack looked forward to getting his team back in one normal sized piece again.

He stepped out into the corridor with Janet at his heels, and was almost surprised to see his team all waiting practically outside the door. It had been over two hours yet they were all here, and Jack was pretty certain that this was where they had been the entire time, Teal’c standing vigil across from the door, Daniel sitting against the wall, Sam jumping to her feet as they came out.

"Hey kids, I’m back. Admit it, you missed me." He was grinning wryly as he saw the looks of relief wash across their faces.

"It worked completely? No side effects?" inquired Sam, trying to look professional but failing to keep her grin under control.

"As far as I can tell, yes," said Janet. "It will probably take a while for your body chemistry to settle down properly, so there might be a few more mood swings before it’s over, but essentially I think we can call it a complete success. Who’s next?"

Sam looked at Daniel, who had remained sitting on the floor the entire time. Daniel shrugged and said "Ladies first." Sam shot him an inquiring ‘you sure?’ look, and then followed Janet back into the medical lab, leaving the men to lurk in the corridor for another few hours.

As the time passed Jack wondered why they were not talking. He noticed that Teal’c was looking particularly tired, and eventually the Jaffa sat himself down, cross-legged, and seemed to be attempting to achieve kel-no-reem. Jack found himself pacing restlessly trying to avoid stepping on Daniel on one side of the corridor and Teal’c on the other. He had expected Daniel to be full of questions about what it had been like, but instead there was only a long silence and a refusal to meets Jack’s eyes after the initial relief that he was back safe. On a number of occasions Jack opened his mouth to start a conversation with the archaeologist, but each time he hesitated just long enough to talk himself out of it. Apart from anything else, he wasn’t sure he wanted to get into anything even remotely sensitive with Daniel if his hormone levels were still screwed up. They’d probably just end up arguing again, and Jack had no intention of going there a second time. Daniel’s black eye was enough of a painful reminder for both of them, without wanting an action replay.

So, the silence remained a constant, disturbing state of affairs until Sam Carter emerged fully restored to herself some two and a half hours later.

Teal’c stirred long enough from his meditation to comment, "It is good to see you are yourself again, Major Carter."

Jack clapped Daniel’s shoulder as the boy stood up and took a shaking breath. "Your turn, Danny Boy."

Daniel grimaced slightly and hugged his arms around himself, not replying to Jack’s attempt at levity as he walked into the medical lab with Janet.

It was coming up on two hours later when they heard raised voices coming from inside the room. They all looked up at the door, immediately alert. Then a scream cut through the relative quiet that permeated the dome. Each of them were on their feet in seconds, and Jack pounded on the section of wall where he knew the door to be.

"What the hell’s going on in there?" he yelled, unable to open it.

The first scream was followed by another that almost drowned the raised, panicked voices. Jack continued to pound on the door, Sam and Teal’c hovering at his shoulder, all with identical looks of fear in their eyes. Almost unexpectedly the door slid open after a minute but the doorway was immediately blocked by Vargo.

"Please, just wait," he tried to tell them, but Jack was already pushing him aside and striding in. He stopped dead just inside the door.

Daniel, now apparently returned to his normal, adult body, was restrained by straps across his chest and legs, his arms pinned to his sides, but was nevertheless straining against them, his head arched back as he screamed again. Janet was fumbling with a syringe at his side, her attempts to calm him with words having no real effect.

"It hurts," he cried out, finally giving in the fight against the restraints. "God Janet, stop it hurting. Let me out of here."

Jack noticed Vargo was flapping ineffectively at the other members of SG1.

"Please, wait outside. We will deal with this. A mistake, that is all." He sounded worried and Jack’s stomach clenched in fear.

"Doctor. What the hell is going on?" he demanded, ignoring the alien.

Dr Fraiser barely offered him a glance. "I don’t know, sir. Something has gone wrong. He wasn’t supposed to wake yet." Her voice was terse as she continued to fumble with the syringe. Daniel screamed to be let out again. Jack couldn’t bear to hear that terrified plea a third time and he ran to the bedside next to Janet and started undoing the restraints as Sam went to the other side of the bed.

"Sir, are you sure you should do that?" she asked uncertainly.

Jack ignored her. "Its ok Daniel, we’ll let you out," he said loudly to ensure he was heard over the younger man’s cries. In a lower voice he said to Dr Fraiser, "If you’re going to sedate him, do it fast."

She wasn’t fast enough. As Jack loosened the last of the restraints across Daniel’s chest he dived sideways off the bed towards Sam, and then past her, blindly careering into the wall. He bounced back, and then hit the wall again with some force before sliding down it and curling up into a ball, his fists protectively in front of his face. The screaming was replaced by the sound of sobbing and dry retching, and after a moment of horrified hesitation Sam slowly approached him and touched his shoulder.

"Daniel?" she tried. "It’s ok. Calm down. We’re here. Its ok."

When he didn’t respond she tentatively crouched beside him and put an arm around his shoulders. He flinched slightly, but then let her tighten her hold as he continued to shake violently. The fear that Jack was feeling only increased as he was suddenly reminded of a similar scene a couple of years earlier when Daniel had been locked in a mental asylum after being affected by Machello’s Goa’uld fighting devices. It was not a pleasant memory and Jack tried to force it out of his mind as Janet finally approached the huddled pair, the sedative ready in her hand. Sam looked up, silently warning Janet to back off for a little longer while she continued to talk quietly, reassuringly to Daniel.

"Please, you shouldn’t be here," Vargo was trying again, and Jack snapped. He flew across the room, gripped Vargo’s shoulders and rammed him violently back against the edge of the doorway.

"What the hell have you done to him?" Jack yelled, his face bare inches from Vargo’s.

"A…a mistake," Vargo was stuttering in shock, and Jack shoved him roughly back against the wall a second time, his anger venting in an explosive burst of shouting and cursing at the alien, promising hell if anything happened to Daniel. It was finally Sam’s voice that cut through his haze of fury.

"Sir! Stop it."

Jack looked over and met her eyes. She was silently pleading with him even as she continued to hold Daniel gently, but firmly. "Please Colonel. You aren’t helping," she said in a quieter voice.

Jack closed his eyes and forced his anger under control, finally letting go of Vargo and stepping back. Sam broke eye contact with him long enough to let Janet move in closer and Sam steadied Daniel to allow the doctor to get the syringe of sedative into his arm. He cried out once more before slowly collapsing into Sam’s arms. Silence descended on the room at that point, and with it the awful realisation that some thing had gone badly wrong.

It was almost three hours before Dr Fraiser walked into the briefing room. This was where the remaining members of SG1 had been waiting since they had been firmly ushered out of the medical lab and forbidden from lurking in the corridor outside.

At first Janet barely acknowledged any of them, apparently lost in deep thought, and sat down silently when Teal’c stood and offered her his chair. Then Janet slumped, her elbows on the table and her face resting in her hands. Jack, Sam and Teal’c exchanged increasingly concerned looks as they finally all noticed how exhausted Janet was, physically, mentally and probably emotionally as well after the last few days. Jack quietly passed a canteen of water across and placed it on the table in front of her. Janet accepted it gratefully when she finally noticed it was there.

Eventually she recovered her composure enough to sit up and look each of them in the eye.

"I don’t believe that Daniel’s life is in any danger. Technically speaking the process to restore his adult body worked." She was speaking in a deliberately neutral voice, but they all heard the slight shake as she added, "I’m afraid that’s all the good news there is."

"What happened Doctor?" Jack asked quietly.

"Something went wrong in the later stages. We don’t know what yet. His body had been restored to normal by that point, but his chemical and neural systems were still fluctuating. We aborted when we realised something was going wrong because we thought his life might be in danger if we carried on. We thought his systems would come into line with his reversed physical state. They didn’t. I think what they did was snap back to the last recognised cellular age. In English, Colonel, we’ve got his body back, but Daniel currently has the mind of a child."

There was a collective intake of breath and Sam murmured, "Oh god."

Jack had to force himself to sound calm when he asked, "Why was he in so much pain?"

"You all experienced mild headaches after the initial experiment and after the reversal. The system shock associated with what happened caused that mild headache to multiply several fold in Daniel’s case. I’ve given him a strong dose of painkillers and he’s…" she paused, searching for the right word, "Calmer now. "

"Is he awake?"

"Yes. It was only when I spoke to him that I really realised what had happened. He still has all his memory of us, the stargate programme, hell, the whole of his adult life. And he’s still the Daniel Jackson we all know. Only, mentally and emotionally speaking he’s Daniel Jackson as he was when he was round eight or ten years old."

They could tell that it was taking all of Janet’s mental strength to keep her voice neutral as she relayed this information to them. There was, however, no way in which any of them could make it easier for her, and they needed to know the details, however much they didn’t want to know them.

"Does he understand what’s happened?" asked Sam.

"Yes, I think so. I explained it to him as best I could."

"So how is he now?"

"Mostly I’d say scared and confused. But he’s not panicking any more which is good."

Jack didn’t want to ask the next question, but knew he had to. "Can you repair this?" he said in a voice so quiet Janet almost didn’t hear him. She hesitated for a long moment before shaking her head.

"I don’t know Colonel. I really don’t know."

There was another long silence, broken finally by Jack swinging around and punching the wall once, venting his mounting anger, frustration and fear. Both Sam and Janet jumped at the sudden noise and Jack kept his eyes from meeting theirs, not wanting to see the way they were looking at him, not wanting them to see his face.

"That doesn’t mean we’re not going to try, sir," Dr Fraiser added quietly, but firmly. "Vargo thinks it was a malfunction in the technology, but until we know more…. Colonel, you should know you have my word that however long it takes I am not going to give up on this one. If there is a way of getting Daniel back, we are going to find it. If there’s a way."

"Hang on," said Sam looking thoughtful. "Before, when we were children Daniel and the Colonel’s minds were adjusting to come in line with their physical state. Won’t that happen again now?"

"I’m sorry I have to keep saying this, but I don’t know. It’s certainly possible, and I had thought of that myself, but Vargo seems to think it isn’t likely."

"May we speak to Daniel Jackson?" Teal’c asked.

"Yeah," Janet sighed. "I was pretty much hoping you would. He needs to stay calm and I don’t want to keep sedating him. But at the moment I only want one of you in there. At least at first."

Sam and Teal’c both looked to Jack immediately and he said, "Yeah, I’ll go."

"Actually, sir, you won’t," Janet corrected in a steady voice.

They all stared at her and she slowly added, "I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to go in just yet Colonel. When I spoke to Daniel earlier he asked for Sam."

Jack felt every one of those words like a punch in the gut, but hid it well. He turned to Sam. "Well Major, what are you waiting for?"

Sam nodded and got up, letting Janet lead the way, and they all walked down what now seemed like an unnaturally long corridor to a meeting that none of them wanted. Sam had no real idea what to expect when she saw Daniel. The events of the last couple of days had prompted her to wonder what her team-mates had been like when they were younger. This was not the way in which she wanted to find out the answer to that question.

Leaving Jack and Teal’c in the corridor, Sam and Janet re-entered the medical lab. As much of the equipment as possible had been moved away from the bed where Daniel was sitting cross-legged. He was dressed now, and was intently cleaning his glasses again and studiously ignoring Vargo, who was standing by the console and watching the archaeologist carefully. Vargo looked immensely relieved when Janet returned, and even more so when she indicated for him to step out of the room with her, leaving Sam alone with Daniel, but deliberately leaving the door open.

Sam was surprised that Daniel hadn’t at least looked to acknowledge her, and approached him cautiously.

"Daniel?"

"Hi, Sam," he didn’t look up yet and continued polishing the lenses on his shirt.

Sam sat down on the bed next to him and commented, "I think they’re clean now." She put a hand on his to stop him from continuing and he looked up with a start. Sam knew immediately why he had been avoiding her gaze when she saw his eyes glistening a little too much, and the slight redness around the one not already covered by a bruise.

"Oh god, Daniel." She quickly drew him into her arms and hugged him until the tears stopped. Sam wished that the door was closed, and hoped that the others had moved far enough away to give them privacy.

Eventually, in a voice that cracked a little too much, Daniel said, "Hey Sam. On the bright side my glasses fit now." As if to demonstrate he wiped his face against his sleeve and then put them on.

Sam smiled a little. "Always the optimist. That’s what I like about you."

"Janet can’t fix this, can she?"

The question blindsided Sam for a moment.

"She doesn’t know yet. Give her time. It might just take a while." Sam was trying to be careful not to offer promises that it was going to all turn out ok. She didn’t want to betray his trust if it didn’t.

Daniel took a deep, shaking breath, and pulled away from Sam slightly.

"It’s weird. I still remember everything about who I am. Who I was. But its different now, I can’t explain it. When I try to figure it out, I can’t. And I know I ought to be able to."

"Don’t worry about that. It’s going to take the rest of us a while to figure this one out, let alone you."

"Are we gonna go back to Earth now?"

Sam was a little surprised by the question. "No, I don’t think so. Janet needs to work here still."

"But we could go back, couldn’t we?" it was less a question and more a plea.

"I’m not sure that’s a good idea," Sam said carefully. "Janet is going to want to keep an eye on you. On all of us for that matter, until she’s sure there aren’t any residual effects. Why? What’s so important about going back?"

Daniel shrugged. "Nothing really."

"You sound pretty certain about wanting to get home."

"No." Daniel glanced at the open door and then lowered his voice. "I just don’t want to be here."

Sam processed this slowly, beginning to wish that it hadn’t been her that Daniel had asked to see. It occurred to her that normally the problem with Daniel was that he tended to provide an overabundance of information, and getting him to shut up was a challenge all of its own when he got going. Now the reverse was true, and it seemed like drawing blood from a stone to get any useful information at all out of him.

"Why don’t you want to be here?"

Considering what had happened Sam felt this was probably an extraordinarily stupid question, but wasn’t prepared to make any assumptions about what Daniel might or might not be thinking right then.

He glanced at the doorway again. "They don’t like me. Or any of us. Lotan especially."

"What makes you say that? I thought Janet was getting on ok with Vargo at least. I know Lotan is a bit distant, but he’s just busy with his own work. He doesn’t like distractions."

"Lotan was in here before you came back. He told Vargo they shouldn’t waste their time trying to make me better. That they’d lived up to their part of the deal and we should just give them the medical stuff they want and go."

Sam was less surprised at Lotan’s viewpoint than by the fact that they had discussed it openly in front of Daniel. She made a mental note to speak to Janet, and possibly Vargo as well about that.

"Janet says that Vargo has promised to help. Whether Lotan feels that way or not, that isn’t going to happen."

Daniel was quiet, his face thoughtful for a moment. Then he jumped off the bed and turned to face Sam.

"Lets go explore."

"What?" Sam was struggling to follow the sudden changes in direction that Daniel kept throwing into the conversation.

"We came here to explore, right? Well we haven’t. We don’t know anything about this planet except for this dome. We still need to do a report for General Hammond about it, so lets go do that. Now. We don’t have to go far. We never do go far from the gate anyway. Lets go." The words had tumbled out in a rush and now Daniel was practically bouncing with enthusiasm, his earlier mood apparently forgotten.

"I don’t think….." Sam started to stutter, but Daniel grabbed her hand and pulled her to her feet.

"Yeah Sam, Janet isn’t going to want us here anyway. She kept telling us to go away when she was working before. So lets." He hesitated before adding, "Please?"

Sam sighed. "Let me talk to Janet and the Colonel first. Stay here, ok?"

She let go of his hand and left the room, feeling his gaze on her until she had turned into the corridor out of sight. Janet, Vargo, Jack and Teal’c were stood slightly further down the corridor talking in a quiet group. They all looked her way when she approached

"How is he?" Jack asked, trying to sound as neutral as Janet had been earlier.

"I’m not sure to be honest. His mood seems to be swinging all over the place and it changes like that," she snapped her fingers. "Janet, do you have any time estimate on how long it might take to get some answers?"

Janet shook her head. "Could be an hour, could be a week for all we know right now."

"In that case, do you really need us to hang around the dome for a while?"

"Why?" Janet asked, a suspicious edge to her voice.

"Ok, brass tacks. Daniel isn’t happy hanging around the dome. He keeps saying he wants to get out, and now he’s suggested we go and do a little exploring out on the planet." She held her hand up to forestall argument. "I know what you’re going to say, but we can stay around the area of the gate, we don’t need to go far. And quite frankly, unless there is a major pressing medical reason to keep him here, I think its going to do more good for his mental state to get out of here, for a while at least."

Janet looked unconvinced. While she was thinking, Jack asked, "Are you really sure that’s a good idea Carter?"

"Yes sir. Look, I’ve talked to him. He’s scared, and feeling like he’s trapped in this place isn’t helping. Sir, he’s not exactly stable right now, and I think if we force him to stay here he’s going to lose it big time. You said we need to keep him calm, right?" she focused on Janet. "I think this may be the best way."

Janet remained in silent thought for a while before finally saying, "Ok Sam." Sam started to thank her but Dr Fraiser cut her off quickly. "There are conditions. I want it understood that you stay with him at all times. You do not go out of radio contact range, and for preference not more than a half hour or so away from here. If he so much as stubs his toe I want to know about it right away. Is that clear?" The last statement was an order, not a question.

Sam nodded, feeling both relieved and nervous that they’d been given the ok.

"We need an hour or so to set things up before you go anywhere. Colonel O’Neill was about to send a message to General Hammond about the latest developments, and try to get him to send some medical and research backup through the gate. I want a mobile medical lab if I can get it, so I can run tests with technology I understand," she threw a look at Vargo who merely nodded in acquiescence.

"Sure. I’m pretty sure he’ll be ok with that. I can sit with him while you set all that up. Unless you want my help or anything?"

"No, stay with Daniel." Janet grabbed Sam’s arm as she turned to go back. "You should know this is going against every medical protocol in the book. I’m only even considering this because I trust your judgement Sam. Please don’t let me, or Daniel, down."

"We won’t," came both Sam and Jack’s voices.

It was over three hours later that Janet allowed Jack, Sam and Daniel to leave the dome. In that time Jack had returned to the gate to send a radio message to General Hammond for a second time, and after a brief delay the requested supplies came through, although additional medical personnel were denied as long as there might be uncertainties about the trustworthiness of the aliens. Especially considering their interest in medical knowledge. Dr Fraiser quickly set the new equipment up in a spare room and used it to run a whole battery of tests on all three of them, before being satisfied.

They had been readying to go when Teal’c had announced his intention to remain with Dr Fraiser, as a precaution. While suggesting that it might be better for Daniel if they all went as a team, Dr Fraiser was obviously relieved, and somewhat pleased by the suggestion. Since none of them wanted to leave her alone at the dome with the aliens the idea was readily agreed to, and Daniel’s disappointment at Teal’c’s absence was short lived in the excitement of finally getting out.

Daniel’s change in demeanour was obvious from the moment he stepped out of the dome. Before Jack had even been able to survey their surroundings, Daniel had already grabbed Sam’s hand and was pulling her off in a direction he appeared to have picked at random. Jack followed behind, watching carefully.

He was still trying to keep a lid on his anger, and was now certain that it had nothing to do with hormone levels, whatever Doctor Fraiser had said. Accidental malfunction or no, he was furious at the aliens for what had happened to Daniel, as well as still being more than a little angry about the initial ‘experiments’. However hard he was trying, talking to Daniel right now was only making it more difficult to keep it under control. He couldn’t stand seeing his friend like this, but felt utterly helpless to do anything about it. As they walked Jack noted that Daniel was, by turns, either abnormally silent and subdued or enthusiastically chattering to Sam. Always to Sam. It wasn’t that Daniel was ignoring Jack, but Jack noticed that whenever he tried to enter the conversation Daniel would become quiet and only provide the barest minimum of replies. After a while, Jack stopped joining in the conversations.

There were only about three hours of daylight left when they had started out, and Jack ordered a camp to be set well before it got dark. According to their watches it was still relatively early evening, but they had long since learnt to adjust their body clocks according to the day cycle of whatever planet they were visiting rather than work by Earth time. Besides, after the last two relatively sleepless nights they had had, they were all pretty exhausted.

Daniel, surprisingly, seemed more than happy to crawl into his tent as early as possible, and when Sam checked ten minutes later he was already asleep. Jack offered to take first watch, although he didn’t expect them to actually need a watch. They were all more or less convinced that there were no other sentient races on this planet, and animals appeared few and far between. Still, military protocol demanded vigilance, and Jack O’Neill was nothing if not vigilant.

So, he watched, keeping a more than usually close eye on Daniel’s tent, and periodically checking to ensure that he was actually asleep. It was only by constantly concentrating on his team’s physical safety that he could stop himself from worrying too much about what possibilities lay ahead, and whether there was anything he could do that would restore Daniel’s trust in him.

Dr Fraiser looked like she was all set to have another long night of work when Teal’c found her in the mobile medical lab. Vargo had been muttering something about the technical side of repairing the malfunction, and was last seen working in the alien medical lab with Arrilla. Lotan hadn’t been seen for some time, which was a source of some concern for Teal’c.

Now, though, his main concern was Dr Fraiser. He politely stood at a slight distance, waiting for Dr Fraiser to notice him. While people at SGC had grown used to the almost superhuman stamina that he possessed as a result of his Goa’uld larva, he himself was constantly amazed by the reserves of energy that the humans could call on when necessary. While Dr Fraiser very rarely found herself needing to take a particularly direct part in the fight against Earth’s enemies, she still commanded a great deal of respect and there were few people at SGC who doubted her abilities, her strength, and her sheer bloody minded stubbornness when it came to getting a job done.

Teal’c was aware, however, that there had to be limits, even for this determined little woman, and as he watched he realised that perhaps those limits had finally been reached. Exhaustion and frustration were obviously having an increased effect as she kept making notes, then pausing to cross them out and start again, occasionally accompanied by mild cursing as she noticed her mistakes. The normally upright stance seemed to be being maintained by stress tension alone, and whatever adrenaline had been keeping her going previously seemed to have been utterly drained.

"Dammit!" she muttered harshly, scratching out the last paragraph a little more violently than was necessary, and slamming the pen down.

"Dr Fraiser. I believe you should consider resting for a while," Teal’c stated simply. She jumped slightly, having been unaware of his presence.

"I need to get this done," she muttered, staring blankly at the notepad.

"I do not believe you will achieve much of any merit while you are so obviously tired. Please will you agree to sleep, for at least a little while?"

"Teal’c, even if I wanted to I couldn’t sleep right now." Dr Fraiser got up and started pacing.

"Try."

"What if something happens, if they call?" Now she was just trying to find excuses.

"I will remain alert while you rest. I achieved kel-no-reem earlier and will not need further meditation for some time." That was actually a lie, since he was far more tired than he was prepared to admit, but he could keep going for some time yet.

"No, its ok…"

Teal’c cut her off sharply. "It is not ok Dr Fraiser. I have been charged with your protection, and therefore feel I must point out that you are in danger of accidentally harming yourself if you do not rest soon. I will not take no for an answer."

Dr Fraiser stopped pacing and stared at him for a moment, before suddenly putting a hand to her mouth and struggling to retain her composure. She turned away, and Teal’c heard a stifled sob. For a few seconds he deliberated on the best course of action. Then, in contradiction of his normal ideas as to what was a respectful distance, but feeling that it was necessary anyway, he went over to her and tentatively put his arms around her. Dr Fraiser reacted with a start, and Teal’c wondered for a moment if he had made a severe error in judgement. Then Janet turned around and hugged him back, for a while at least allowing herself to relinquish control of the situation and take comfort from this most unlikely of sources.

"Wow, Sam! Take a look at this."

Sam couldn’t help but grin at Daniel’s enthusiasm as he brandished a particularly well-preserved fossil in her direction. It was the following afternoon, and they had found a rock face that was eroding back to reveal huge quantities of fossils of a bewildering array of alien species. Jack had commented to Sam that this place would keep Daniel occupied for most of the day if they let it, and it was so much easier to keep an eye on him if they could keep him in one place, so they stayed.

Sam had actually collected a few good samples for study back at SGC, and had to admit even she was enjoying this little break from the tension. Fossil collecting had been a hobby of hers when she was young, and watching Daniel was currently reminding her of how much fun it had been. If Daniel could normally be described as enthusiastic when he got interested in something, then this was Daniel in enthusiasm overdrive. It had occurred to Sam on more than one occasion that it was a trait which would normally have made him particularly endearing, and more than a little cute, but in the current circumstances was heartbreaking.

"Hey, I need to take a rest," she said to him, adding, "You keep at it for a while if you want." She wandered over to where Jack was sitting at a distance, watching. Sam was less physically tired than she was mentally drained at having to keep constantly dealing with Daniel, since he was still distancing himself from Jack.

"You ok?" Jack asked, handing her a mug of coffee when she sat down.

"Yeah," she sighed. "I just need a break."

"I know what you mean. I’m sorry I can’t take any of the pressure off you. I want to, but…"

"Its ok, sir. I know."

Jack rubbed his face and then shook his head. "Its not ok, Carter. Daniel’s supposed to be one of my best friends and he won’t even talk to me, or let me help."

Sam hesitated before saying, "I think he’s still upset over the fight. He doesn’t normally hold a grudge this long though, not when we know there’s a physiological reason for one or more of us acting abnormally."

Jack didn’t like where this conversation was going, and so changed the subject abruptly. "I’ve been thinking about what we’re going to do if Fraiser can’t get him back. None of the options are good."

"Options?" Sam wondered if O’Neill and Hammond had discussed this when he had reported in the previous day.

"He’s a kid, Major. Granted its Daniel, so he’s an intelligent kid, but still. We can’t let him live on his own, he’s going to need to be looked after by someone. He can’t stay at SGC, but out there in the normal world with all that knowledge he’d be a security risk. If the medical authorities get their hands on him they’ll probably lock him up again. Memories or no, he’s effectively a grown man with a mental age of ten, that translates as mentally handicapped in anyone’s book. I don’t think Daniel could take being treated like that. He’ll lose it totally if we let that happen."

Sam silently agreed. "What are the other options?"

"The best alternative I could come up with was to erase his entire memory. I’m guessing these aliens can do that after they erased our memories of being inside the dome, or else maybe the Tok’Ra can do it. He’ll still be a kid in an adult body, but if he doesn’t have to live with knowing what he could be, what he should be, it might be easier for him." Jack paused a long time before adding, "I don’t think I could deal with that though. It would mean losing him for good."

Sam contemplated this for a while. "There has to be another alternative. Maybe we could…" she faltered as she thought it through properly.

Seeing what she had been about to say, Jack said, "We can’t Carter. He’d need almost constant supervision. Unless you were planning to leave SGC as well there’s no way any of us could look after him."

"Colonel, we can’t just abandon him. Not again." The memory of how readily they had been prepared to leave him in the mental asylum when they had believed he was insane was all too clear in Sam’s mind.

"We may not get much say in that one way or the other if we take him back to Earth like this."

They were both suddenly startled out of their thoughts by a yell.

"Hey, Sam, Jack. You have to see this. It’s great."

It took a moment for Jack to realise that his name had been called as well. Daniel was actually voluntarily asking for him, for the first time in what seemed like a long time, and he followed Sam over, feeling ever so slightly better.

That night Jack took the first watch again. The night sky was particularly clear and he was indulging in a little astronomy when he heard the sound of movement and low murmuring from one of the tents. It was Daniel.

In and of itself, a member of SG1 having disturbed sleep was not an uncommon occurrence, and over time they had come to an unspoken agreement about leaving each other alone unless help was asked for. Nevertheless, under the circumstances Jack was beginning to wonder whether he ought to go and investigate, when Daniel crawled out of his tent and wandered over to the low campfire Jack had been keeping going. It wasn’t overly cold, but it was a little chilly and the fire was keeping the edge off.

Daniel sat down a little way from Jack and stared into the fire. Jack poured a mug of coffee from the thermos and passed it over. Daniel took it with a slight look of surprise, and cupped it in his hands, shivering slightly.

"You ok?" Jack asked after a minute or two of silence.

"Yeah."

"Nightmare?" He was aware he was technically breaking the normal agreement by asking, but these weren’t exactly normal circumstances

"Yeah. Kind of."

"Want to share?"

"No."

"Ok." Jack went back to scanning the night sky, after a brief but thorough scan of the immediate surroundings. He was still technically on watch, even if there was nothing on this world to watch for.

A good five or ten minutes passed in silence before Daniel said, "Jack?"

"Yeah?" Jack glanced back at Daniel and saw he was looking thoughtful, and a little nervous.

"Can I ask you something?"

Jack’s heart sank. This was going to be the question that he had been dreading Daniel asking, and Sam wasn’t even here to provide backup. He was about to ask what was going to happen next if Dr Fraiser couldn’t reverse his condition, and Jack had no idea what the hell he was supposed to tell him. He steeled himself for the worst and replied, "Yeah?"

Jack was so sure he knew what was coming that he was almost totally blindsided when Daniel said, "Why are you mad at me?"

"What?" Jack’s voice was a little louder than he had intended, and Daniel visibly flinched. When Daniel didn’t reply Jack added, "What makes you think I’m mad at you?"

Daniel was staring intently at his coffee, refusing to make eye contact. When he finally spoke his voice was quiet, but remarkably steady. "Well, you’ve been in a bad mood at me since this started. You threatened me. And you hit me. A lot."

"Daniel, you know that was because of the whole chemical imbalance thing. I’m sorry about what I did, but I couldn’t really control it. And I was pissed at everybody, not just you."

"But it was just me. I know you got weird with everyone, but you got worse with me. You said it yourself when we were in the commissary that first night. And now you’re supposed to be ok but you’re still getting angry and you keep losing your temper all the time around me. So I think maybe the chemical thing made it worse, but there has to be something to do with me that sets it off." Daniel’s voice remained steady and surprisingly rational sounding, but he was still refusing to meet Jack’s look.

Jack was about to deny it again, but paused. Daniel was right. Probably for the wrong reasons, but he was right nevertheless. An answer was needed, but Jack wasn’t sure whether he wanted to tell Daniel the truth. No, cancel that, he was damn sure he didn’t want to tell Daniel the truth. But it began to occur to him that if he wanted to regain his friend’s trust, he couldn’t afford not to tell him.

"You’re right," he finally said in a quiet, hollow voice. Daniel looked up in surprise, but this time Jack was the one unable to meet the other’s gaze. "It is you. But it’s not you."

There was a long moment before, "I’m not sure I understand."

"Tell you the truth I’m not sure I do either." Jack took a deep breath before finally making up his mind. "You reminded me of Charlie. The way he used to be when he was little. Nothing specific, just the way kids that age are. Every time I looked at you in that kid’s body I thought of him. And I couldn’t deal with that. I thought if I could stay away from you it wouldn’t be so bad, but then you kept coming to see if I was ok. Hell, you were trying to look out for me and I just flipped, I wanted to get rid of you. You’re right, the hormone, chemical imbalance did make it worse than it should have been, but I shouldn’t have taken that out on you. I’m sorry Daniel."

There, it was said. Jack suddenly realised it hadn’t been as hard as he was expecting, but he caught his voice wavering slightly and hoped Daniel hadn’t noticed.

"Jack, I had no idea." Daniel sounded shocked. "I’m sorry."

"Christ Daniel, it’s not like it’s your fault. Stop apologising." He realised he really wasn’t controlling that waver very well, but this time he could meet Daniel’s eyes, if only to reassure him that he was not to blame. "Right now the only people I’m angry at are those damned aliens that did this to you in the first place."

They both sat in silence for a while, assimilating the fact that for the first time in four days the air of tension between them was lifting. Not yet gone, but lifting. It was a good enough start as far as Jack O’Neill was concerned.

Three days later, Jack found himself sitting around the table in the briefing room with Dr Fraiser, Sam and Vargo. Fraiser had called him the previous evening and asked him to get back to the dome as soon as possible with Sam and Daniel, and they had arrived back late that night. It was now early morning, and at Dr Fraiser’s suggestion they had deliberately let Daniel sleep, leaving Teal’c to keep an eye on him, so that they could hold a meeting in private.

"I take it you have some news for us Doctor?" Jack started the meeting off.

"Yes Colonel. Vargo, with some help from Arrilla, managed to isolate and repair the technical malfunction that caused the accident with Daniel. He is certain that won’t happen again now. I’m no engineer so I don’t understand the details, but essentially there was some kind of overload, possibly as a result of running three operations in quick succession. Either way, Vargo assures me it’s fixed and I’m willing to trust his word on that." She smiled at the tall alien, and he nodded in reply, looking mildly pleased at the compliment.

"So where exactly does that get us?"

"Well sir, as far as I’ve been able to establish, it should be possible to restore Daniel’s neural systems to normal, but it’s going to be complicated. Effectively, we have to alter his physical state at the cellular level again, and then again back to normal. His chemical and neural systems should fall into line with the physical state he’s in at the end of each operation. The only reason it didn’t last time was because we had to abort before it was completed properly."

"So he has to go through all that twice more?" Sam was more than a little concerned, and her look was mirrored by O’Neill.

"That isn’t the worst of it Sam." Janet was doing a far better job of keeping her face and voice neutral this time, having been persuaded and/or forced by Teal’c to get some decent sleep over the last few days. It was more than Jack and Sam had had, since they had spent the last few nights mostly awake talking either to, or about, Daniel.

"I take it there’s bad news, and that’s why Daniel isn’t here for this little chat?" O’Neill wished Janet would just get to the point.

"My research into what actually happens with the cellular alteration has led me to believe that going through the process multiple times may start to cause serious cellular damage. If that damage takes effect in any of the major organs we could be looking at a worst-case scenario. However, the sticking point here is that none of us know exactly how many times ‘too many’ is. To Vargo’s knowledge, you three all currently hold the records for the most alterations at twice each."

"What are the chances it could happen to Daniel?" asked Sam,

"I believe the probability is high," Vargo said. They all turned to him and he hurriedly continued. "When we ran the reversal procedures on each of you it took far longer for your bodies to stabilize than it had in our initial experiment. If that trend continues in each further operation then it will become more and more dangerous very quickly. But of course, this is all in theory."

"Brass tacks, Doctor?" Jack understood the implications fully, but wanted to hear it from Janet.

"If we don’t try this, there is no way of ever getting his mind back. If we do try it, there’s a chance he might die."

None of them spoke for a long time, each lost in thought. Janet finally broke the silence.

"Sir, I asked you and Sam here without Daniel because I wanted your assessment on how best to make the decision on what we do now. I’ve already explained it to Teal’c and he trusts your judgement on it."

"Huh?" Jack wasn’t quite catching onto the point yet.

"Sir, medical law states clearly that next of kin, most usually parents, have the right to make decisions about whether or not to let a child undergo a medical operation, regardless of the child’s opinion. This is not a normal situation, however. Now I can quote medical law precedents about cases involving this question in regard to mentally handicapped adults with a low mental age, but none of that means a damn thing right here and now."

She paused for breath, and when she continued she was looking directly at Jack. "Essentially there are two questions here that we have to address. Firstly, since Daniel isn’t strictly speaking a child, do we believe that he is capable of making his own decision? If he isn’t, in the absence of any next of kin, who does have the authority to decide? I’ve spoken to General Hammond, and he is willing to make a decision if necessary, but I think he would prefer to trust our judgement on this one."

"Whoa, Janet, you can’t seriously be asking the Colonel to call this one," Sam was horrified.

"Sam, you and Colonel O’Neill have spent the last few days with Daniel. I’m asking your honest opinion on whether you think he can realistically make the call himself. Given my medical assessment of him I would say no, but I haven’t been talking to him for the last few days."

Sam and Jack looked at each other across the table. Jack’s expression was unreadable. He was actually remembering the many occasions when it had come down to his decision as commanding officer whether one of his team lived or died, not just as part of SGC but before when he had worked in special ops. It was a bad enough call to make when it was about another soldier, let alone about his friend.

"Carter? Thoughts?" he finally asked.

"I… I’m not sure, sir. I’d like to think he would understand the situation if we explain it to him, but I don’t know for sure."

O’Neill nodded, assimilating this. "You want my honest opinion Doctor? I think he would understand the facts, but I don’t think he would fully appreciate the possible consequences of either option. So, no, I don’t believe we can ask Daniel to make this call himself."

Jack had forced himself to look right at both Sam and Janet as he spoke.

"Alright. In that case we have to address the second question." Janet was still keeping her voice neutral. "You two and Teal’c are the nearest thing to family that he has. And as ranking officer…"

Jack nodded. He got the picture. He leaned back in the chair, wishing he didn’t feel so damn tired. He needed to think straight now more than ever. Eventually he asked, "Doctor, can you and Vargo let us have a little privacy for a while?"

Janet nodded, and they both left.

"Sir…" Sam started, but Jack held his hand up to quiet her.

"Major. Do you remember that conversation we had the day at the fossil rock face?"

Sam nodded silently.

"Then you know why we have to take the chance. I’m pretty sure it’s what he would do."

Sam forced down the urge to cry. Or vomit. Or possibly both. Then she nodded again. "I think you’re right."

"Major," Jack paused to make sure he was fully in control of himself before he continued. "I’m going to tell him that I think we should go ahead. But I’m going to explain all the possibilities to him. We at least owe him that much."

"Do you want me to be there when you see him?"

"Yeah. Teal’c as well." He stood up and tried to force himself to be calm. "Lets get this done."

When Daniel saw the looks on Sam and Jack’s faces he came close to panic.

"There isn’t a way to fix this, is there?" he immediately asked.

"Wrong," was Jack’s reply as he sat down next to Daniel. "Dr Fraiser believes that if they run you through that whole altered physical age thing twice more it will restore everything back to normal - mind, body, the works. But there’s a catch."

Daniel had brightened up at Jack’s first statement, but frowned deeply on hearing the disclaimer. "What catch?"

Jack looked to Sam for support, before explaining.

"Daniel, there is a risk your life might be in danger if they do this procedure many more times on one person. If we go ahead, you could die."

He searched Daniel’s expression for any clue as to what he was thinking about that. The frown only deepened.

"Daniel," Jack continued softly. "We think you should go ahead with this anyway. We think the risk is worth it if it means getting you back to normal. But, and this is a big ‘but’, if you don’t want to, we are not going to make you do this."

Teal’c raised an eyebrow in mild surprise. He had not heard what O’Neill’s decision had been prior to this moment, having been with Daniel the entire time. Sam, for her part, wondered whether the Colonel had changed his mind after all.

There was no reply for a long time, and eventually Jack prodded gently, "Daniel?"

"Yeah. I’m thinking."

They lapsed into quiet once again until Daniel asked, "There’s no other way of me getting any better?"

"No. None."

"And this is going to work?"

Jack hesitated before saying, "Probably."

"But not certainly?" Daniel’s blue eyes searched O’Neil’s face for some sign of hope and reassurance. Jack only wished he could give him that reassurance, but right now what he owed him was the truth.

"No. Not for certain. But there is no other way."

Daniel took a deep, shaking breath. "Lets get on with it then."

It was one of the longest six-hour periods of Jack’s life. Vargo had advised they work slowly to double check everything at every stage to ensure there were no more accidents, and to allow careful monitoring of Daniel’s condition. Jack, Sam and Teal’c were in the corridor again. No force on this, or indeed any, world was going to make them wait any further away, and for preference they would have all liked to be in there with Janet and Vargo.

Janet came out at the halfway point and reported the first operation had gone off alright. Since then there had been nothing.

The silence between them was tense. There was nothing to say, however, and so each of them spent the time lost in their own thoughts. O’Neill only wished there had been more time for he and Daniel to make their peace with each other. Over the last few days things had improved a lot, but until Jack could look into the face of the real Daniel he couldn’t be sure whether they were really ok again, or whether he had been reading only what he wanted into the words and actions of a frightened child.

Finally the door opened and Vargo came out. SG1 were on their feet in an instant.

"Please, you may go in if you wish." Vargo stepped aside, his face betraying nothing.

Jack steeled himself for the worst and walked in.

Daniel lay still on the bed, Janet at his side. She looked up as they came in.

"He’s still out," she said quietly. "I thought you might want to be here when he wakes up."

The significance of "when" rather than "if" he woke up was not lost on any of them, but they remained sombre as they settled down to wait.

It was a long wait, another hour before Sam noticed Daniel starting to regain consciousness. Jack moved in closer and smiled down when Daniel finally opened his eyes.

"Hey. How are you feeling?"

Daniel’s eyes flickered over each of them in turn and then back to Jack. "Not sure," he muttered.

"Take your time," Janet advised gently, throwing Jack an annoyed look.

After a minute or two he had woken enough to mumble, "Bad headache." They all glanced at each other nervously.

Then Daniel added, "Jack?"

"Yeah?"

"Good call."

A week later things around SGC were about as normal as things ever got in the mountain complex. They were currently playing host to Vargo and a delegation of scientists from his homeworld who had arrived a day earlier for negotiations about an exchange of scientific and medical research. Things were looking hopeful that Earth might be gaining access to some of the alien technology, which all concerned agreed was not a bad outcome from a situation that had started with such a bizarre occurrence.

After a few days of observation all three human members of SG1 had been given a medical all clear, and were now supposed to be having some time off. Which, of course, meant that Sam and Daniel had been catching up on all the work they hadn’t been doing for the past week and a half.

It was late Friday evening when Jack wandered into Daniel’s office to find the archaeologist sorting through a huge stack of books and paper that should not have remained standing so tall at quite that angle according to all known laws of physics.

"Busy?" Jack inquired.

"Yes." Daniel was distracted for only a moment, but gravity took that opportunity to reassert itself, and the pile scattered across the floor. Daniel sighed and added, "But nothing I couldn’t be tempted away from right now."

"Can I interest you in pizza and videos, my place?"

"Sure. Sam and Teal’c coming?"

"No. Sam left the base a few hours ago. Something about visiting her brother for the weekend. And Teal’c is having dinner at Doc Fraiser’s." At Daniel’s surprised look Jack elaborated, "I dunno. I think it’s a thank you thing for him watching out for her on P4X227, but I didn’t like to inquire too closely."

Daniel abandoned the papers, and they set off down the corridor to the elevators. Along the way, an idea began to occur to him, and he had to know.

"Jack?"

"Yeah?"

"What were you like when you were a kid? Actually a kid I mean, at school?"

"How do you mean?"

"You know. What were you like? Academic? Sporty? Involved in every club there was? Popular?"

Jack snorted derisively. "Sporty, yeah. Don’t know about the rest." He shrugged and continued, "I was captain of the hockey team, regular on the baseball team. I don’t think I was unpopular. Why?"

Daniel grinned. "No reason. But I think we just disproved a theory of mine."

When Jack looked at him quizzically, Daniel only shook his head, still smiling. "Its really not important. So," he quickly changed the subject, "What about those videos?"

THE END