Cleaning Up After The Ancients - Chapter 60

Chapter 60 - Results May Vary

“He seemed nice.” Jack offered to Hank Landry as the stargate shut down. “And didn't scold us once for being young or pressing the wrong buttons.”

They'd even ended up with what would hopefully turn out to be a relatively easy solution to their problem, which just felt odd given the hoops they usually had to jump through in cases like this.

“That happen a lot?” Hank asked, following along as Jack began walking to the infirmary.

“More often than you'd think.” Jack admitted as he pressed the elevator call button. 

The door opened with its customary ding and he stepped in, waiting a moment for Hank to join him before pressing the button that would take them to the 21st floor.

“The Nox and Tok'ra just love that sort of thing.” He continued. “The Asgard used to too, but they mellowed out a lot after we saved their little grey asses from the replicators.”

“And you're really not worried about what Doctor Weir told us?” Hank inquired.

“Little bit.” Jack admitted, the Elf, baby Asgard, and inevitable Ancient visit a pretty impressive kettle of fish even for them. “But I'm holding back on forming an opinion one way or another till I can hit Daniel up about whether it was normal for the Ancients to go around creating life.”

He frowned slightly as the elevator came to a stop and the door opened. “Outside of the normal way of doing it of course.”

“Of course.” Hank agreed with a chuckle.

Thankfully it wasn't a long walk from the elevator to the infirmary, and they arrived to several voices in argument.

“Pinch the crystal housing then press the buttons.” Doctor Lee stated as they walked in, pulling at one of the stones on the device to no effect. “See? Nothing.”

“I believe you were supposed to pinch the crystal housing and push the buttons, Doctor Lee.” Teal'c stated in a somewhat exasperated tone.

Lee shook his head and proceeded to try it that way. “No see, I tried that first and…”

The stone lifted out, leaving Lee to stare at it for a moment before pursing his lips. “Maybe I didn't pinch the crystal housing hard enough.”

“T.” Jack greeted the Jaffa with a nod. “How's it going?”

“Trying.” Teal'c returned with a nod.

“Jackson's still out cold.” Colonel Mitchell announced. “Pull the other one before we have a repeat of earlier.”

“A repeat of earlier?” Jack asked, not liking the sound of that.

“Vala Mal Doran briefly passed away.” Teal'c said as Doctor Lee repeated the process, the large glowing crystal on top of the device going dark the moment the last stone was removed.

“That did something.” Doctor Lam confirmed. “Their EKG readings are–”

The siren announcing an incoming wormholes went off, and Jack exchanged a brief glance with Hank before giving the other General a jaunty two fingered wave.

“Unscheduled offworld activation!” Walter's voice announced over the PA system.

“Laugh at up.” Hank offered with a sigh as he headed back to the door. “Knowing your luck this'll be your problem soon enough.”

“But not now.” Jack returned with a grin as he walked over to the hospital bed where Doctor Lam was in the process of checking a groggy looking Daniel’s pupil response. “So how's he doing Doc?”

“Conscious and responsive.” Lam answered as she flicked off her penlight. “Though I'm still getting some odd overlap in their vital signs, though that may just be because of the bracelets.”

“The bracelets?” Jack repeated, the emphasis she had put on the word suggesting she was talking about something a bit more than just jewelry.

“Goa'uld tech.” Mitchell interjected, pointing to the very Goa'uld looking bit of jewelry around Daniel's wrist. “Links two people together so if they get too far apart they die.”

That certainly sounded like a very Goa'uld thing to create, though that wording caused a small worry to form in the pit of his stomach.

“Jaaack.” Vala suddenly asked in an unfortunately familiar tone, and he glanced over just in time to see the dark haired woman pull herself up to stare worriedly at Daniel. “What am I doing over there?”

“Yeeeah.” Daniel draweled, dragging Jack's attention back to the archaeologist who was now propping himself up with an arm. “I was just about to say, not Daniel.”

Not for the first time Jack found himself wondering if all the ancient tomb investigations Daniel had done over his life might have left him with one or more curses. Because extraordinarily unfortunate things really did just seem to keep happening to the man.

“That's certainly unusual.” Lam muttered as she glanced between the pair.

“Indeed.” Teal'c agreed as he raised a single eyebrow in surprise.

“Just to be sure.” Jack began as he pointed a finger at Daniel. “You're Vala?”

“Yup.” He confirmed with a nod.

Letting out a sigh Jack walked over to the bed Vala’ body was laying on. “Daniel, that you in there?”

“Unfortunately.” She muttered, and a moment passed as Jack stared skeptically at the woman.

She rolled her eyes. “My wife was Sha'uri, I've died seven times, I played rock paper scissors with you while you were captured by Ba'al, I know how in a bunch of alternate universes you were married to–”

“Okay.” Jack cut him off, very much not needing a further reminder of the last. “You've convinced me.”

“Well.” He continued, knowing Daniel would probably appreciate the distraction of a bad joke right now. “At least this time you're not dying of old age.”

“I just turned thirty!” Vala offered in an unhelpfully chipper tone.

“I'm sure you did.” Mitchell muttered.

“Yes, well, I'm not sure it's much better.” Daniel groused, ignoring the byplay to glance over at the inactive Ancient device. “How did you disconnect us anyways?”

“Doctor Weir called in ahead of schedule.” Jack admitted, not seeing any reason to hold that back. “There was a whole thing with Evan, that Elf, Asgard babies, and a bunch of stuff the Ancients might have left scattered around the solar system. So she called him up and he walked us through the emergency override.”

“Huh.” Daniel murmured as she scrunched her brow in thought. “That seems oddly easy for us.”

“I know right?” Jack agreed, not particularly sure he liked the feeling.

“Speaking of Ancients though.” He continued, glancing between the two as that reminded him of the whole reasoning behind this in the first place. “Did you find any on the other end of that marital aid?”

Daniel's face lit up. “Well, I can't say for sure, but we encountered a group who called themselves the…” She stopped dead, scrunching up her face in a very Daniel motion. “Marital aid?”

“Yeah.” Jack confirmed with a grin. “According to Evan it was what the Ancients mostly used those things for.”

“Oooh, kinky!” Vala exclaimed, sounding more than a little happy at the thought.

Moving to cross her arms, Daniel flinched half way through as they came in contact with Vala’s chest before settling on clasping her hands together in her lap.

“I suppose that might lend an interesting perspective to the conflicting stories about Merlin and Nimue’s relationship. And explain why both were thought to possess shapeshifting abilities even though that’s not really a capability Ancients were known to possess.”

“That’s great and all.” Vala cut in, motioning down Daniel’s body with an arm. “But do any of you stories explain how to reverse this?”

“Well no.” Daniel admitted with a grimace. “I’d guess this wasn’t– Hey! Hands above the belt!”

Vala dragged her hand out from under the sheet with a look of forced innocence on her face. “Just checking everything was intact.”

“I am very intact thank you very much.” Daniel shot back, and Jack once more had to hold back his urge to laugh since it was so rare to see the Archeologist so thrown off his game.

“As I was saying.” He continued, this time seemingly making sure to keep a firm eye on his former body. “I’d guess this wasn’t an intentional effect. Did Eventus say anything about potential side effects, Jack?”

“He did.” Jack confirmed with a nod as he glanced down to the bracelet with a slightly guilty look on his face. “But he also said they should only occur if you were already under the effects of something similar.”

He would have suggested holding back if he had known about the jewelry, but that report was probably still making its way through the system to his new desk.

“So it’s her fault.” Mitchell muttered as he glared over at Vala’s body only to quickly corred

“Hey!” Vala objected, crossing her arms with a pout. “How was I to know the two would interact badly.”

“I don’t know.” Daniel carefully enunciated as he glared over at his body. “Maybe by waiting the seven hours it would take for the Ancient who could have warned us to phone in?”

“You said it would be weeks before you might be able to confirm things with him.” Vala shot back. “And while you might be fine sitting here staring at musty books for days on end I have a life to live.”

“I said it might be weeks!” Daniel angrily insisted. “Might be! Now unless Lee and the others can figure something out we are going to be stuck this way till the next scheduled dial in.”

“She’s going to dial us back tomorrow to get the IOA’s answer on Evan coming to visit.” Jack offered, figuring he could at least take that uncertainty off the table.

“See.” Vala said, wagging Daniel’s finger at her own body. “I’m sure your Ancient will just be able to stroll in and fix us right up, then we’ll have a big laugh about this entire thing and you can get back to your books.”

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Author’s Notes: When you think about it, Daniel Jackson is kind of the Miles of O’Brien of Stargate in how much shit ends up happening to him. But that's not really a bad thing from a writing perspective.