The day after the satellite launch Jack wakes from a dream, shaking. The covers are tangled around his feet as he tries to unglue himself from the bed. Soft morning light is filtering in through the heavy lace curtains in Daniel's master bedroom. There's no trace left of Daniel; he must have left sometime during the night, failing to wake Jack.

Judging from the way his head is pounding, Jack thinks that maybe Daniel has slipped something into his drink last night. He wouldn't put it past him. He's not at all sure he can still recognize traces of his friend in the man Daniel has become. The Daniel Jackson he knew would never in his right mind have wiped out an entire city of ten million people in cold blood.

He's not at all sure he's made the right decision in choosing to stick around and try to keep an eye on Daniel, but he figures with Teal'c dead and Carter in jail, there's really no one but him left who could try to stop Daniel from taking over the world.

He isn't sure either if that isn't already what's happened and maybe he's just kidding himself. The President sure got the message that there will be no access to the Anti Goa'uld Satellite Defense System without the cooperation of one Doctor Daniel Jackson. So did the Russian and the Chinese governments.

Not that they really have a choice in the matter after yesterday's hastily assembled press conference on the front lawn of Daniel's mansion. Jack had watched, equal amounts fascinated and horrified, as Daniel stepped up to the podium, dressed crisply in an Armani suite, Davis at his side, who had done his best getting the journalists of all the major print media and news channels organized. Davis and Daniel are damn near inseparable these days. Officially, Davis is part of the staff allocated to Daniel from the Pentagon; Jack wonders if maybe Daniel fucks him, too.

"I have an announcement to make to the people of this planet," Daniel had said, eyes shining, once everything was in place and the world was listening. "The people of this planet have been kept in the dark about a danger to their lives far greater than anything they, or their parents, or their grandparents have ever before encountered. Their governments have been deliberately misleading about a threat to their lives on a scale vastly unimaginable. I know this sounds hard to believe if you haven't seen with your own eyes the things I have seen; but there are enemies out there, enemies who hold a grudge against the people of this planet; enemies with weapons technologies vastly superior to our own, who are not afraid to use these technologies to attack Earth from outer space."

Here Daniel had paused, flashing them a quick smile. "But the good news is, as from this moment, Earth is no longer denfenseless against these enemies. You are safe. The satellite program developed by myself with the help of certain strands of the U.S. military will ensure that you, the people of this planet, are safe."

Daniel didn't move from his city apartment to his colonial style mansion right away. For some time in between, he lived in a luxurious bungalow on the edge of the Springs. Its central room had been turned into an impressive library resplendent with Daniel's sizable and ever-growing collection of books, antique folios, his treasure trove of ancient artifacts, and ancient maps that Daniel had his staff acquire from auctions all over the world.

Jack visits him there once, back when Sam and Teal'c still believe Daniel can still be reasoned with. Jack isn't so sure but agrees it's still worth a shot.

At home he dresses carefully in tight black jeans and a green shirt, finishing off the ensemble with a brown leather jacket, one of Daniel's favorites. He puts on a fancy aftershave Carter has given him for Christmas one year that Daniel seems to like. He even goes so far as to go out and buy a single white rose.

He shows up at Daniel's doorstep in the middle of the afternoon seemingly out of the blue, though of course he has had his people check Daniel's schedule for that day, despite the fact that it is getting increasingly difficult to get hold of trustworthy intel on Daniel's movements these days. Daniel doesn't seem in the least bit surprised to see him, and this should tell Jack enough about the kind of man Daniel has become, that quite possibly Daniel is starting to find means to monitor the whereabouts of everyone who has at one point been close to him. But Jack chooses to ignore the signals.

It is Davis who opens Daniel's front door and leads him into the library, where Daniel is standing in front of a heavy oak desk. Jack doesn't quite know what to do with the flower in his hand. He hopes Davis is not going to make too much of it; but Davis is his usual inscrutable, polished self, and Jack has brought the flower for a reason, so he figures the best thing to do for now is to keep holding onto it. Daniel looks up only once Davis clears his throat.

"Colonel O'Neill here to see you," Davis says stiffly. Daniel dismisses him with a wave of his hand.

"Hello, Jack." He crosses the room, stopping only once he reaches Jack's side. "Long time, no see. What brings you here?" His manner is exuberant, his gestures too big for the old Daniel, his pupils slightly dilated. Jack wonders what drugs might have been on the menu for him today.

"I was just in the neighborhood, so I thought I'd drop by, see how the work on the program is coming along, see how you're doing."

"Well, that's nice." There's a slightly awkward pause, then Daniel motions for him to follow him over to his desk, which has stacks of books on one end and is covered in old parchments on the other. Some things never change.

"Since you're already here, there's something I'd like to show you," Daniel says. "I've started a collection of historical maps. Here."

He shows Jack a map of the world which is undoubtedly old for on it, California is depicted as an island just off the shore of the North American mainland, and Australia and Antarctica are connected by a land corridor. All around the edges of the map are drawn little angels with puffed out cheeks, causing winds to blow all across the world, bringing pestilence and storm.

"Nice," Jack says. "Nice touch with the angels." Daniel throws him a look.

Then Daniel leads him over to a giant globe standing in a corner of the library. "Jack, you have got to see this. This globe dates from fifteenth-century Italy. I only got it last week. Isn't it amazing?"

The globe is waist-high and freestanding. The various animals of the zodiac signs have been projected onto the Earth's surface, and there are depictions of people and animals presumed to be living in the various regions of the African and Eurasian continents. The globe doesn't have the Americas on it yet, which for some reason Jack finds deeply disturbing.

"Daniel, what exactly are you doing these days?" Jack asks, unwilling to further indulge what appears to be Daniel's latest obsession.

"Jack," says Daniel. "Don't you see? I'm keeping the world safe for future generations. Once my satellite program is installed, Earth will be safe from the Goa'uld. Not even a mother ship will be able to penetrate the shields. If everything goes according to plan, ten years from now, the Stargate program will have gone public. There won't be any wars on Earth any longer, because what's the point of beating ourselves up if there are much bigger enemies out there? Then we can finally work on getting a grip on more pressing issues like world hunger, climate change. Don't you see? I'm keeping the planet safe. I'm working for what's best for humankind."

His gaze falls to the white flower in Jack's hand. His features soften. "Oh, Jack. That's very sweet. I appreciate the gesture, I really do."

"But?" says Jack, feeling like the world's biggest fool.

"But I have work to do." Daniel smiles lopsidedly. "You know. Planets to safe. Maybe some other time, okay? You should call first and arrange a meeting with my secretary. I'll be all yours next time. I promise."

But there is no next time. Jack just doesn't feel like calling Daniel for the longest time.

He doesn't know about Daniel, but for him, this has started almost exactly two years earlier, when he opens his front door one night to find Daniel standing on his front steps. It's been five days since Nicholas Ballard reappeared in Daniel's life only to leave him again to finish his life's work studying the giant aliens on the planet with the Mayan pyramid, and Jack hasn't heard from Daniel since then.

"Well, this is a surprise," says Jack.

"Yeah." Daniel smiles tightly.

Jack doesn't move an inch. "You could have returned one of my calls. What? Too much trouble to pick up the phone?"

"I know. I had some thinking to do. Can I come in?"

"Sure."

Jack takes a step back, letting Daniel pass, closing the door and following him down the hallway, down the few steps into the living room where Daniel turns around to face him.

Daniel, Jack notices, has dressed too carefully for this to be an ordinary social call. He's wearing a silk blue shirt with the top two buttons undone, white slacks, loafers. In his left hand he's carrying a brown paper bag which he hands to Jack and which, Jack discovers, contains a six-pack of beer. His favorite brand, not Daniel's. In his right hand Daniel is nervously clutching a single white rose. Jack raises an eyebrow.

"I'm not quite sure what you're thinking right now," Daniel starts, "but this is not what it looks like."

"Oh, yeah?" He motions for Daniel to take a seat, offering him one of the beers but Daniel shakes his head. So he opens one just for himself and settles in on the sofa opposite Daniel, and waits.

"I just wish," Daniel says after a while, "I'd had a little more time with him. Why did he have to leave right away? Why couldn't he have stayed earthside for a couple more weeks?"

"Nick?" Jack asks, just to make sure they're both on the same page.

"Yes. I mean. Don't get me wrong. This is the continuation of his life-long studies. This is what he carried out all those digs for, in the seventies, in Belize. It's important to him. I get all that. But why couldn't we have had a little more time to reconnect first?"

"Daniel, he'll be back." This gets him a frown.

"Yeah. You know? About that, I'm not so sure."

"Daniel, some people just don't make very good grandparents. Ever." But Daniel shakes his head.

"Jack. This isn't still about why he didn't take me in when my parents died."

"Yes, it is."

"I was eight years old at the time. That would have been shortly after he first encountered Quetzalcoatl. What use would he have had of an eight-year-old tagging along on his trips to Belize?"

"Well, judging from what I know about the eight-year-old, he would have just loved that kind of thing." That gets him a quick smile.

"Yeah, he would. Wouldn't he?"

"Daniel," Jack says after a slight pause, looking at the flower Daniel is still holding onto. "Why are you really here?"

Very slowly, Daniel puts the flower down on the coffee table between them. Then he looks up so he is facing Jack, his expression carefully guarded. "I want you to hear me out, Jack. You may not particularly like what I have to say, and I know I'm taking a fairly big gamble here. All I'm asking is that you stay here and listen until I've said what I've come to say."

"Fair enough," Jack says. "Go ahead. Do your thing. Talk."

"It may not have escaped you that I seem to keep losing the people I care about; my parents, Sha're. Now Nick. Some days I think it's a curse. Some days I think it's just an inevitable part of life, a lesson from whatever divine entity is out there. If there is anyone out there. Well, I can tell you one thing. I'm sick and tired of constantly being at the mercy of fate. So this one time, I'm going to try being the one pulling the strings. As someone who has access to my personal files, I assume you're aware of my sexual history to date. So you know that my previous sexual interest has not centered exclusively around women. You're asking why I'm really here, Jack? Well, I'd like to think I have something to offer, an arrangement, shall we say, that might be beneficial to both of us. The fact is, we're working in a high risk environment. We're on the front lines every day of our lives. I have a feeling I'm not the only one here. You must be getting lonely too, Jack."

The last words are said imploringly, with Daniel leaning forward, elbows resting on his knees. Jack's careful to keep his face blank, giving nothing away of what he might be thinking. "Daniel, are you trying to make a pass at me? Is this why you brought the flower?"

"I think so. The question is, is it working?"

Jack doesn't say anything for a long time, deliberating from which angle he's going to start untangling this. "When did you last have a boyfriend, Daniel?"

"That would be Steven, when I was at the Oriental Institute, during my post-grad days. Doesn't mean I haven't had sex with men since then."

"What happened?"

"With Steven? I don't know. A couple of things. We had a few professional disagreements. We were drifting apart anyway. He was very focussed on his career. I met someone else, a woman."

Jack nods. Fair enough. "Why me?"

"Because my wife is dead. Because I trust you. Because I'm tired of being alone all the time." What he doesn't say, because I'm afraid of losing you, too. But Jack can read Daniel like a book by now. He also knows Daniel knows he's playing a dangerous game.

"What makes you think I'd be interested in what you're offering?"

"I don't know. Just a feeling. Don't tell me I'm really way off the mark here."

"Depends."

"On what? Look, Jack. I'm not looking for a bona fide relationship, if that's what you're asking. So no need to bring in the fraternization angle. I'm just looking for something a little more than what we already have, something that extends the boundaries of our current relationship somewhat. I'm not talking about a whole other country."

But Jack is only half listening to what Daniel is saying. Jack isn't stupid. There are certain choices you have to make when you join the United States Air Force. If flying is what you want to do more than anything else in the world, then giving up part of yourself to accomplish that goal seems to be a fairly decent trade-off when you're young and stupid and fresh out of high school. You realize that there are certain things you just won't get to do any more. So you make up your own rules. Admiring how a guy looks is okay. Making a pass at him is not. An ill-advised move can cost you your career. Mostly, Jack has stuck by those guidelines. On a few occasions, he has not. Daniel still hasn't stopped talking.

"Okay," he says, interrupting Daniel's flow of words.

"What?"

"I said, okay," Jack says, taking a leisurely pull on his beer. His eyes never leave Daniel's, and so it doesn't escape him that he's become the sole focus of Daniel's attention.

"Oh," Daniel says. And then, after a little while, "good," followed by a faint smile.

Later, in Jack's bedroom, in the semi-darkness produced by the soft light slanting in through the drawn blinds, creating all sorts of neat patterns on Daniel's skin, Jack gets to look all he wants. Contrary to what he might have expected, Daniel isn't at all shy about displaying his body. Daniel is breathtaking; all those workouts Jack is making him do as a member of an off-world team are obviously paying off. He's starting to acquire his own collection of scars, though, on his chest, along his upper limbs, his thighs.

One thing he could have bet money on: Daniel wants to touch, so Jack lies back on the sheets and lets him. Along his shoulders, down one arm, following the outline of biceps, stroking across the soft skin on the inside of his elbow, along the relaxed muscles on his forearm, the open palm of his hand, his fingers. Up the other arm, where Jack does flex his muscles, not really showing off, more to get a rise out of Daniel, making him smile, until he reaches the collar bone. Then Daniel's fingers trail down his chest, over his pecs, counting the ribs underneath the skin, combing through his chest hair. Daniel lays a kiss above the place where Jack's heart is. The open palm of his hand glides across his solar plexus, abs, stomach, following the trail of hair down to his leaking cock.

Three strokes is all it takes, and he's coming all over Daniel's hand.

"Sorry," he chokes out, mortified.

"'S okay," says Daniel. "Been awhile?"

If his eyelids weren't so heavy, he'd check if that's amusement coloring Daniel's voice. "You have no idea."

He must have drifted off then, because the next thing he knows, the room has darkened and Daniel is lying stretched out at his side, watching him. Daniel has turned on the lamp on Jack's nightstand but his face is partly obscured by the lamp's shade, so Jack has a hard time deciphering the expression on Daniel's face. Whatever emotion is flickering across Daniel's features vanishes when he realizes Jack is awake.

"Hi," Jack croaks.

"Hi yourself."

"You didn't come," Jack remembers.

"Well, I took matters into my own hand, so to speak." Daniel ducks his head, embarrassed.

"Damn. I wanted to see that," Jack murmurs, smiling lazily.

"I'll let you watch next time; if you're prepared to return the favor."

"That can be arranged."

"So," Daniel says, wriggling around on the bed until he's found a more comfortable position, lying with his head propped up on Jack's shoulder. "What's for dinner? I don't know about you, but I'm starting to get hungry."

"You."

Daniel rolls his eyes. "Apart from the obvious."

"You know where the take-out menus are, Daniel. Get whatever you want. I'm easy."

"Apparently."

"Smartass."

"I happen to know you like that about me."

"Yeah, Daniel. Actually, I do."

In the master bedroom of Daniel's mansion, wrapped in Daniel's extravagant 550 thread count sateen Egyptian cotton sheets, Jack is lying on his side, head propped up on his right hand. His left hand is reaching out towards an object standing on top of Daniel's nightstand: a seventeenth-century Chinese vase containing a single white rose. Now he pushes the top sheet off his body, leaning towards the flower, running his fingers along the slender stem. The thorns have been clipped off at the bottom but are still thrusting out on all sides on the upper half of the flower.

He remembers Daniel the night before, leading him along a maze of corridors towards this room, throwing open the swing doors, waiting for him to step through. He remembers standing stock still when his eyes fell on the flower on top of the nightstand. He's not sure if this is a coincidence or if Daniel has placed it there deliberately. But this is not a time for questions, and Daniel steps around him. Then Daniel's arms fold around his body, his hands stroking Jack's back, one hand gliding lower until it curves over his butt. Daniel pushes him backwards against the wall, rubbing himself against Jack, mouth closing on Jack's for an intense kiss. Jack's not sure this is such a good idea, but Daniel has always been good at this, bringing both of Jack's arms up over his head and pinning him there, tongue delving into Jack's mouth like a snake. Jack is half aroused, half revolted, tensing up, preparing to push him off, but then Daniel growls, and Jack suddenly lets go, lets Daniel do whatever he wants.

They used to do this sort of thing a lot, during those first few months. Not so much with him standing, propped up against a wall, Daniel leaning into him, eating him alive; but in Jack's bedroom, Jack lying on his back, hands raised up over his head, like now, only tied to the headboard with black silk rope. With Jack unable to move his hands, and movement in the upper half of his body severely restricted; with him blindfolded, a sliver of light coming in under the silk tie Daniel has fastened around his head, Daniel would make his move, starting off with an unexpected stroke of soft feather along his arm, across his shoulders, down his breastbone, around his nipples, then lower over his body, causing Jack to swiftly tuck in his stomach, and down towards his crotch. Up and down over and over, until there were goose bumps all over his skin, and his nipples were hard and aching for touch.

If he was lucky, Daniel would swirl his tongue around them, sucking them into his mouth, first one, then the other, biting down gently while he was cradling Jack's balls with one hand. It used to make him so hard. Then Daniel would prop up one of Jack's knees and reach further below, massaging his opening with lubed fingers. He used to keep this up for quite a while until Jack would start to beg Daniel to fuck him already.

Daniel had been the first lover he'd let himself go with like that. "Tell me what it is you want," Daniel said the first time they did this, rubbing Jack's left nipple between his thumb and forefinger. "Come on, Jack. Tell me. I want you to tell me exactly what you want to have done to your body. Do you want me to lift up your legs? Oh, yeah. That's it. Just like that. God, look at you. You're so hot, Jack, so incredibly hot." Daniel prepped himself and Jack quickly and thoroughly. Then he pushed Jack's knees further up towards his chest and nudged the tip of his cock inside Jack's ass.

"Daniel," Jack said, broken. He was lying spreadeagled, tied to the bed, arms restricted, unmoving.

"That's it, Jack," Daniel said, sensing him tensing up. "Don't worry, you're doing fine. I know you can take it. Just trust me. I won't hurt you if you just trust me."

And then he had to lie there and just take it, because there was nothing else he could do except use the safeword, and he didn't have to use his safeword with Daniel any of those first times, ever, because deep down he really loved it, loved his control being taken away like that. He was there of his own free will, and they both knew it, and that made all the difference.

And the SGC and the Air Force could go to hell for all he cared, and for the first time in his life he felt free, and in the intense moments of pleasure just before he came he gripped the ropes securing his wrists tight and let the moans escape from his body. And he'd come and he'd come and it would be so good.

And then all of a sudden he's back in the present and there is an intense pain in his left hand, and when he opens his eyes he can see that in his hand he's clutching the rose, this mock travesty of a symbol of everything they've ever been to each other, crushing the petals with his fingers, and there are thorns digging into the palm of his hand, and when he takes away his fingers he can see that there's blood running down his hand staining the white sheets, and it is then, only then, that he takes the antique vase, hurls it against the wall where it splinters and crashes into a thousand tiny pieces; and then he lays his head on the fists gripping the bed sheets and weeps for the first time for what they have become.

Carter may be the one Daniel threw in jail, but for all he knows, Jack may be de facto Daniel's prisoner now. He's the last one of the original team that Daniel has effectively neutralized.

"Like cutting your enemy's heart out with a scalpel," Daniel Jackson had said before he pushed the button on his 160 billion dollars worth of alien technology that would obliterate Moscow.

Now Jack O'Neill can give a first hand account of what that procedure feels like.

fin

Notes: Written for dustandroses in the J/D ficathon 2006. Dusty's requests were: First Time Fic, Awkward NC17 Sex. Hope it's okay that all of these are happening in a flashback scene. :) Additional requests were, involve some of the other regular or semi-regular characters. I tried, but I'm afraid Major Davis makes only very brief appearances and Nick is really only there off-screen. Hope you still enjoyed. Thanks for the requests. They were fun to work with. Thank you also to murron for the handholding and the cheerleading. :)

Disclaimer: Stargate SG-1 and its characters are the property of Showtime/Viacom, the Sci Fi Channel, MGM/UA, Double Secret Productions, Gekko Productions, and probably a whole bunch of other people. I do not own the characters and indeed am only playing with them for a little while. I am not making any money from this and I'm still paying for everything I own so there's very little point in suing me. No copyright infringement whatsoever is intended. The story is for entertainment purposes only. At least I hope it's entertaining. The original characters, situations and story are mine. Please check with me first if you want to archive or link to this story.

back

email Suzanne